When one sibling is wealthier, holidays can feel less merry

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The holidays are a time of rich food and festivities – and don’t forget complicated family dynamics. That goes double when there’s a significant wealth gap between siblings.

Maybe the youngest sister shows up to Christmas dinner driving her new Range Rover, while the oldest unloads modest gifts from her 2008 Kia Rondo. Or brother No. 2, who just sold his tech business, makes a grand gesture and gives the parents a trip to France. Suddenly, everyone else’s carefully chosen presents seem lacking.

As the world’s wealth gap widens, the consequences can be witnessed closer to home among brothers and sisters.

“We see it all the time,” says Tracey McLennan, a family enterprise advisor and senior wealth consultant at Edward Jones in London, Ont., who has worked with everyone from ultra-high-net-worth multigenerational families to lottery winners.

“Wealth can create all sorts of good and bad emotions inside families. But it’s really not the wealth, right? You bring all the stuff from your childhood into adulthood, all those feelings of competition and rivalry – so wealth simply becomes a measurement between siblings.”

Those complex feelings may become extra charged if one sibling’s financial success is viewed as an indictment of the other’s work ethic or life choices. After all, it’s easy enough to look at Bill Gates’s or Fidelity Investments CEO Abigail Johnson’s affluence and chalk it up to good genes, better education or family connections. But when it’s your own sibling? Hard questions arise.

“‘We actually grew up in the same family, so how is it that they’re doing better than I am?’” says McLennan, referring to the most common of the questions.

On the flip side, richer relations can wind up feeling defensive or self-conscious about giving well-meaning but expensive gifts, inviting family to their lakeside cottage for New Year’s Eve or going away for a luxury vacation over the holidays.

This is happening in every single family with two or more children.

Joe Rich, social worker

Yet it’s not only families with wealthy siblings that are affected by these complex emotions. The situation is the rule rather than the exception, says Joe Rich, a social worker in private practice in Toronto.

“The chances that two children – let alone four or five – would grow up and all have the same income and same financial security would be unbelievable. It’s only exaggerated by extreme wealth,” he says. “This is happening in every single family with two or more children.”

So what to do when money is making adult siblings less than merry this December?

Write and wait.

In other words, take time out to write down precisely what’s driving you bonkers about your siblings during the holidays, then tuck the note away until well after the eggnog, latkes or matzos are gone, says Rich.

“Go and enjoy Christmas or whatever you celebrate. If it’s really important, you have 364 days before it’s going to happen again,” he says. He recommends putting off the discussion for a few months, even. “It’s an opportunity to have some insight and some distance. It’s also an opportunity to be an adult and not impulsive. You don’t have to say or do everything just at that moment.”

Marvin Schmidt, founder and principal of the Schmidt Investment Group at CIBC Wood Gundy, a multi-family office in Edmonton, counsels many clients dealing with less wealthy siblings.

The situation pops up at least once or twice a month, he explains, saying he likes to speak with various family members separately before he brings them together. That way he has a better sense of how to facilitate the meeting and who the players are.

If there’s one thing he’s learned from these conversations it’s that money doesn’t fix relationships, especially if they’re already contentious. And while a wealthy person might feel compelled to give a struggling sibling a large monetary gift during the holidays to smooth the waters, the calm rarely lasts.

The same goes for expensive gifts for nieces and nephews.

“Just because you can does not mean you should,” Schmidt says. “That actually hurts and is even more raw because that might not be the values your siblings are raising their kids with, and now they get this thing that’s way more extravagant than they would ever give. They start to question if they’re as good parents.”

Meanwhile, if well-to-do clients are already trapped in a cycle of overgenerous spending during the holidays, it’s important they don’t change the rules without discussing it with siblings first, or resentments can arise. Schmidt points to a good friend who had picked up siblings’ restaurant tabs for 15 years, but then started to feel taken advantage of. No one else even bothered to reach for the bill anymore.

Yet when the friend decided they were done paying without explaining why, the family didn’t take it well.

“They’d only changed the rules in their own head, but no one else knew,” says Schmidt.

Conversation and communication are so important, McLellan says. She has seen some families actually discuss financial matters over the holidays, since they’re all together anyway. Maybe not as the turkey is being carved but later during the visit (and maybe over a snifter of brandy or two).

And as for those contending with brothers or sisters who expect a big payout from the wealthy sibling come holiday season, it’s important to remember it’s not usually about money. Entitlement can be a personality trait, says Rich. Maybe a sister often butts in line because she doesn’t like to wait, or rides in the HOV lane by herself because she’s late. A sense of entitlement doesn’t stop at dollars and cents.

There is a way to stay sane around these siblings: Consider the whole package and accept who they are: entitled, yes. And maybe hilarious, smart as a whip and loads of fun.

“We really look at acceptance. Because God knows we can’t change these people. They are siblings, and if we don’t accept them we might face a loss of the relationship,” Rich says. “It doesn’t mean the way they act is okay, but acceptance is where change in a relationship takes place.”

More from Canadian Family Offices:

• How high-net-worth investors are handling higher interest rates
• Tips for gift giving to valued household helpers this holiday season
• What drives people of faith to give anonymously, or not?

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