Do I Get Anything If My Birth Mother Was a Billionaire?

By Patricia Louise Nelson

             “I was given up for adoption as a baby.  I found my birth mother a few years ago. Obviously, she didn’t give me up because she couldn’t afford to keep me – she was a billionaire! She died recently. Does any of her money come to me?”

             Short answer: probably not.  Unless your birth mother left a Will or Trust naming you as a beneficiary, you are not entitled to any of her assets.  Once a person is adopted into a new family, they are legally considered part of that new family, just like a person who is born into that family.  Similarly, once a person is adopted away from a family, that person stops being a member of that old family as though they had never been part of that old family.  So, being adopted by your new parents means you are no longer an heir of your birth parents.