Creating an estate plan is a wise step to protect yourself and your heirs. However, you’ll need an estate plan to ensure that your life’s work leaves the legacy you want. This is the clear message from an article in The Washington Informer, “Pass It On: A Plan for Transferring Wealth to the Next Generation.”
A team of trusted professionals, including an experienced estate planning attorney, a financial advisor, and an accountant, can help with this process. An estate plan doesn’t have to be complicated, depending on your lifestyle and asset level.
You’ll need a will. Also known as a last will and testament, this document should provide clear directions for how you want your estate—everything you own—to be distributed. Your will does more than distribute assets, however. Your will includes the person you want to be a guardian for any minor children, the person to be your executor and the person who administers your estate.
An estate plan includes a Power of Attorney. This is a way for you to give another person, often but not necessarily a spouse or adult child, the power to manage your legal and financial affairs if you should become incapacitated. We don’t like to think of ourselves as unable to make decisions or manage money. However, unexpected things happen, and it is far better to have this document in place than to have the court appoint someone to manage our lives.
A Health Care Power of Attorney is also important. This allows you to empower another person to make medical decisions and discuss your care with healthcare providers. Without it, treating physicians will make decisions based on your health, policies set by the health care system, and the law. Your family may not agree with these decisions. However, they won’t be able to challenge them without this document.
You’ll also want a Living Will created by an estate planning attorney. Like the documents named above, these are state-specific documents and need to be made according to the laws of your state. The living will expresses your wishes concerning life-sustaining medicine or medical equipment used to keep you alive if you would otherwise die. It doesn’t give anyone else the power to make these decisions but states what you would want if, for instance, you needed to be fed artificially to keep you alive.
Asset management is also part of your estate plan. Transferring assets into a revocable trust means another legal entity owns the assets. With a revocable trust, you continue to own the asset because you are the trustee, which means you can make any changes whenever you wish. Depending upon your situation, you may do better with an irrevocable trust. An experienced estate planning attorney will help you make informed recommendations.
To learn more about estate planning in the East Valley, Gilbert, Mesa and Queen Creek, schedule your free consultation with Attorney Jake Carlson by using one of the links above.
Reference: The Washington Informer (June 12, 2024) “Pass It On: A Plan for Transferring Wealth to the Next Generation”
