Preparing for Planning Your Estate

Estate Planning is creating a guided plan of your assets and your family's financial future for after you've passed away. It envisions who will inherit your assets and in what amounts, who will disburse your assets, and (to the extent possible) plans how much your estate may owe in federal income taxes and administrative costs.

Here is a lists of tools used to create this plan:

1. Health Care Directive/Medical Power of Attorney – These can be combined in one document or two indicating what treatments you would or would not like to receive in the event of your incapacitation along with appointment of someone to make health care decisions for you if you are incapacitated

2. Power of Attorney – This document will allow a selected person(s) to handle aspects of your estate with selected powers that either are immediate or will go into effect if you are incapacitated.

3. Last Will and Testament

4. Trusts – Trusts can be revocable, irrevocable, provide for special needs, children and pets, and a variety of other planning issues

5. Retirement and Life Insurance Planning Documents – These documents often treat these assets as outside the trust or will both for tax planning and other reasons

6. Charitable Planning Provisions – These allow you to distribute a portion or the residue of your estate to an organization or university of your choice along with your specific gifts.

7. Tax Planning

8. Additional Clauses that allow flexibility – These are used to plan for unknown future events where some planning can ward of unwanted estate plan results

Our firm provides a free consultation to help guide this process. We envision the estate planning process as just that, a process that allows you to gather the facts, refine your intentions and plan for your family or others, as you desire.

You may want to inform your family and discuss your initial ideas with your loved ones so that they are aware of your wishes. Whether you do so, is an individual choice.