Creating an estate plan is an essential step to ensuring someone’s assets will be handled according to their wishes. However, while setting out to create an estate plan is a good start, there are a few common mistakes that can derail anyone’s best-laid plans:
Overlooking family dynamics
Many estate planning and financial professionals agree that family dynamics are often the most significant challenge to an effective estate plan. Be sure to communicate your wishes to interested parties to help manage their expectations. A relationship that is already strained may lead to even more significant problems when under the pressure of losing a loved one. Jennifer Noble has been practicing for nearly 20 years and is familiar with all sorts of family dynamics. She will bring that experience to bear in planning, and ultimately settling, your estate.
Forgetting to update
As we mentioned in a previous post, updating your estate plan is an essential step to ensuring its effectiveness. Major life events such as getting married, having a child, or buying a house are excellent opportunities to review and update your estate plan. Later in life, it may become time for children to take over fiduciary roles in an estate plan. Come and speak with us to see how we can make your plan last into the future.
Leaving out long-term care
All too often, clients focus on making sure they have a Will, a key, but incomplete, part of a total estate plan. If you suffer an injury or illness that takes away your ability to make decisions, your loved ones will need legal authority to make decisions for you. We believe it is critical that you, rather than the courts, make the choices about who will handle your affairs in those circumstances. We will help you establish financial and health care powers of attorney to name the people you trust to handle your affairs.