ESTATE PLANNING • ELDER CARE & DISABILITY PLANNING

Estate PlanningOctober 14, 2015

Top Ten Reasons to Get Your Estate Plan in Order

By: Hazen Law Group

If you have not had your estate planning reviewed in the last three years, meeting with your attorney to review or prepare your estate planning should be high on your list of things to do. You need to have current Wills, Powers of Attorney, and Living Wills that address the needs of your family.

Why is it so important? Here’s a list of my top ten reasons not to put your estate planning off any longer:

10. Your children will stop pestering you to get this done and you will have security and satisfaction of knowing your affairs are in order.

9. If you become incapacitated and have not designated someone in a Durable Power of Attorney to handle your financial and healthcare decisions during a period of incapacity, your family may have to go through an expensive and lengthy court proceeding to authorize someone to make decisions on your behalf. This is the case even if you are married. Spouses do not have the authority to deal with each others retirement benefits, sell real estate, or access medical and insurance records for each other. In addition, it takes both parties to transfer or sell real estate or stocks.

8. If you have a loved one with special needs, and you do not plan your estate carefully, your loved one may lose valuable public benefits and assets in your estate may be depleted unnecessarily.

7. If you do not carefully set out in comprehensive documents what your wishes are with regard to your assets during a period of incapacity or after your death, you open the door to family disputes. Even families with no history of disputes have been known to disagree when money is involved.

6. If you are the parent or guardian of minor children, designating an individual or individuals to take your place in the event of your death or incapacity is very important.

5. If you are leaving assets to minor children, you should not leave those assets outright to the minor children. Rather, your Will should include a testamentary trust to hold the assets in trust for their benefit. Planning is important to ensure the assets are held for their benefit and to ensure you are able to choose who will manage the assets. If retirement benefits or life insurance proceeds will be part of your estate, the beneficiary designation forms need to be carefully coordinated with your estate planning documents to protect your children and/or grandchildren and to minimize the tax consequences.

4. If your spouse or parent has dementia or any other disabling condition, which increases the possibility of a future need for nursing home care, early planning is essential.

3. Having your estate planning in place and current is the only way you control who will handle your estate after your death. If you do not carefully plan, you are opening the door to disputes and the possibility of Court intervention.

2. You have worked hard to build your assets; you should decide how they are distributed after your death. If you do not decide, the distribution of your estate will be determined by Pennsylvania Statute. Without a Will, there is the possibility that your spouse will not inherit all of your assets. In addition, when a second marriage is involved, planning is essential to provide for your children.

And the number one reason:

1. Taxes, taxes, taxes! There may be opportunities to reduce the income and death taxes that will be payable after your death.

The bottom line is that when you need your estate planning, often it is too late to plan. Take care of it now while you are still in control and review with your attorney every three years.

There is a path to a secure future for you & your family.