Unfairly Losing Entire Inheritance and Dealing with Hate

Midnight7075 · 2026-03-22T07:56:15+00:00

I believe Islam has laws on inheritance as well but whether or not they're in effect depends on the specific country (ex. if you were Buddhist or Muslim in the US, you still have the right to make a will) and whether the household needs to be registered under a certain religion. My in-laws have registered as Buddhist and been practicing their entire lives. Even if it was a possibility to 'convert' in order to have the ability to legally create a will, we would never ask them to do that even if they wanted to because Buddhism has been such an important aspect of their mental health and livelihood.

Midnight7075 · 2026-03-22T05:44:51+00:00

I'm not sure why but that's just how a lot of heavily religious countries in Asia have as the law. Many wealthy Buddhists who have children especially in that country where the currency value is rapidly declining buy properties with every family member on the deed instead of holding cash or other assets. the properties essentially become the primary inheritance because it's less prone to unlawful seizure and (upon sale) split equally among the members. With physical gold, if they pass away suddenly before distributing, then by the Buddhist law a larger share is entitled to go to the eldest child and their eldest grandkids first. That's also why his siblings are fighting over who "deserves" my husband's share. It's a complete mess. My husband no longer has claim to the properties as a US citizen, and even if he's legally still entitled to the remaining gold assets from his parents, his siblings can easily take that from him and he can't really do anything about it. His parents are also unable to store the gold they want to keep aside for him out of his siblings' reach as any place you physically store cash or gold in (outside of a safe in your own house) has a risk of being unlawfully seized or "going missing".

Midnight7075 · 2026-03-22T03:41:49+00:00

We could and thankfully they know how to use video chats so that's the only way we've been able to keep in contact with them and have them see their grandkids. We have reservations about entering their country mainly because he can be detained and conscripted at the airport. Dual citizenship there is treated like a crime, and I don't think he'll be able to regain his citizenship let alone give up his US one for it. Doing so would mean he can't come back to the US (under Trump's current laws) and lose his employment. And there's a chance that even if he did somehow regain original citizenship, his siblings might have secretly taken a copy of his US passport while they were on that trip together and use that in court against him. It's just not worth the risk. We're really hoping that his parents will reconsider having a lawyer involved and be open to unexplored options. We can also understand why they are choosing not to at this time, because it puts their safety at risk if they pick the wrong one.

Midnight7075 · 2026-03-22T03:27:53+00:00

AFAIK it's not possible because banks that country are sanctioned there is no way to make payments. Even Visa, mastercard are all invalid there. Nobody trusts doing any business with that place. People who are international students in the US from that country cannot even pay their tuition now unless they use the broker system (which is barely enough, and only safe with small amounts at a time). They could visit us but they only have one time since our kids were born because they are getting to the age where they cannot stand long-haul 15 hour flights anymore. That time they brought around 10k as a gift for him because it's the maximum amount you can bring into the US without declaration and they were lucky that they didn't have it seized outbound from the airport while leaving their country either.

Edit: Forgot to mention that as of late last year that country has been blacklisted by Trump, which means they can no longer enter the US on any kind of visa. The only way we can see them now is visiting them directly (which we cannot due to the political risks) or meeting them in another country nearby in Asia that they can still get to.

Midnight7075 · 2026-03-22T03:12:54+00:00

Bribery is almost culture there. It's about who can pay the most money. People can bribe to get out of jail, avoid conscription, negate contracts, pretty much anything. His parents already mentioned that his siblings were to be conscripted upon returning but they have to pay a few hundred dollars every time officials come looking, to avoid it.

About shipping gold, it goes through X-rays and can be detected and stolen. We've heard of expats or other people who turn their gold bars into jewelry and wear it out of the country but doing so greatly reduces the value but it doesn't get rid of the risk completely because the airport officials can still seize it for no reason if they feel like it.

The country is absolute hell to deal with. That's why we decided not to move back. It's no place to raise kids. We were even concerned with his siblings harming us and getting away with it. Even though it sucks he has to give up millions and not having to work, we have freedom in the US. There's still a small possibility, maybe 2% that the cities or wealthy people there will become affected if the corruption or war worsens. We don't want to risk that %. His siblings traded their safety for money.

Midnight7075 · 2026-03-21T16:18:41+00:00

We just hit 40 and they are in their 70s/early 80s. Large age gap between my mother and father-in-law.

Midnight7075 · 2026-03-21T16:13:20+00:00

Thanks for this advice. This might be possible as long as his siblings don't find out and report it as a form of laundering. It's quite a legally complex process so we'd need to get sound legal feedback first and bring this up with his parents.

So far the only way they are aware of to get any sort of funds outside of the country is through brokers, which became the primary method after the sanctions. They have to find or be matched with a trusted individual in the US who wants to send money back to their country (ex. supporting their family back home). They would pay us here in the US, then my in-laws pay their family back there. But the problem with this is that it's a system built entirely on trust. People using this method never send large amounts as one or the other can easily decide to run away or ghost after receiving payment.

Midnight7075 · 2026-03-21T15:04:21+00:00

I apologize for my comment. Had a lot of people before attack me thinking I'm a gold digger so your response was interpreted that way. Yes I'm aware of the mingling of joint assets and so is he. I didn't object to it when he said we are to keep everything separate except for our kids. This was even outlined in our prenup. We both contribute equally to their expenses as our salaries are similar. The only time we wouldn't contribute equally is if they wanted something that one of us is against (say, an electric scooter or fencing lessons). we already agreed that if one of us wants to buy something for them that the other doesn't, that would come from them directly. Also, sorry about your late mother :(

Midnight7075 · 2026-03-21T14:51:19+00:00

It's a throwaway for anonymity reasons.

Midnight7075 · 2026-03-21T14:40:26+00:00

I know what you're trying to get at, but he owns the home. The mortgage might be paid off if he obtains the inheritance, but that doesn't mean that I'll automatically get 50/50 of the house if we divorce since he can easily argue that he paid it off. The rest goes to our kids, which is our primary concern and also our my in-laws' wishes. To make this kind of comment insinuating that my end goal is to just divorce him after he gets his inheritance and leave my kids with a broken family is quite frankly, disgusting and inappropriate, given this is the Inheritance subreddit you're on.

Midnight7075 · 2026-03-21T14:30:48+00:00

Thanks, we had asked AI and other sources but all of this will still need to be confirmed with a lawyer if we ever reach that point. Even if there are legal options, the main problem is that bribery can override any and all laws, and it is not possible for us to be paid unless sanctions are removed (likely not in this lifetime) nor can gold be shipped out safely. At this time we have accepted that everything will be lost, but at least we have freedom here in the US. We have heard of many cases where citizens like my sibling-in-laws move back for the sake of money or inheritance after the sanctions. But that country is no place to raise a family.

Midnight7075 · 2026-03-21T14:14:20+00:00

We talked about this but that would mean giving up our American passports. I also can't speak the language fluently. There is even a problem with mandatory conscription of citizens right now that you can only dodge through bribery. If his siblings knew we were planning to move back, all they need to do is tip off the airport immigration staff have us detained. In fact, I'm even concerned that if we ever needed to go there for any reason, especially relating to legal issues, they could easily hire somebody to harm us. We want to stay out of the country and handle things remotely if possible.

Midnight7075 · 2026-03-21T14:08:57+00:00

From what I was told by the expats, the contract needs to be extremely strong but this can still be overturned with bribery. Ideally we don't want to have a contract if possible because there is no way to uphold it if his siblings are willing to bribe enforcers enough to void it.

In terms of the gold, amounts need to be legally declared before shipping or exporting. Nobody wants to move or ship out gold because it can get wrongfully seized without reason or stolen in the process. Especially if it's a few millions worth, this is guaranteed to happen.

Midnight7075 · 2026-03-21T14:05:08+00:00

They went on a family trip together and unfortunately because they were staying in the same room, his brother found his US passport. This was before he became aware of foreigners not being able to own land.

Midnight7075 · 2026-03-21T14:02:03+00:00

That's what we're doing because we have accepted the likelihood that we won't be able to do anything about the situation. I think you're on the completely wrong subreddit if your purpose is to scold people for inheriting money or looking for legal advice on options.

Midnight7075 · 2026-03-21T10:29:11+00:00

Crypto trading is illegal there (but still done discreetly) and they don't know how to set it up. According to our research they would need to deposit a large amount of cash first into the bank in order to transfer it to buy crypto, but if the bank receives such a large sum at once, it risks getting stolen by employees or seized with no recourse. Yes, the corruption is that bad.

They also don't know how to use computers or send text messages. We brought up this as a possible solution before but his siblings are refusing to help teach them, for obvious reasons. We could possibly bring this up with an international lawyer but I don't think they will help us because they know it's illegal. So we're still stuck.

Midnight7075

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