Luckily for you, we have put together a quick-and-easy guide to help you create your own digital estate plan for FREE. With the popularity of Facebook, e-mail, cryptocurrencies, and other websites, you should include digital assets in your estate plan to enable your representatives to access and/or dispose of your online accounts after your death. Suppose, for example, that your car is owned by your family business. If you are not the sole manager and member of that business, you may not be able to dispose of the car through estate planning documents. If your trust is not fully funded, your estate may still have to go through probate.īut be careful and make sure you have authority to transfer the asset in the first place. Re-titling assets into the name of your trust - a process known as "funding" your trust - is what makes a trust effective. So, you need to ask yourself an important question: One of the biggest differences between a Will and a Trust is that assets owned by a trust can avoid probate, saving both time and money. Therefore, it is crucial that you review your beneficiary designations with each institution or policy to ensure that the beneficiaries listed are the people you want to receive those assets. A divorce decree does not always automatically revoke designations where you have named your now-former spouse as beneficiary. Similarly, divorce or separation can impact your estate plan. If your insurance policy still lists David as a beneficiary, he will still receive part of your estate. Suppose your Trust says your son John will receive your entire estate, and you want to disinherit your other son, David. But that is not always the case.īeneficiary designations are a great way to avoid probate, but they can override the provisions of your estate plan. Some people think that when they execute a Will or Trust, that document alone controls where their "stuff" will go. It is also important to make sure assets with beneficiary designations (such as retirement accounts, joint tenancy ownership, insurance policies, etc.) match your estate plan. Are your beneficiary designations up to date? Your estate plan is more than just a means to financially provide for your loved ones you can also use it to encourage them to better themselves. In short, there is a nearly infinite number of options for how you can distribute your estate. You could also require your beneficiaries to submit to drug tests, to be in school, etc. Many clients like to divvy up the inheritance over time, giving beneficiaries a third when they turn 21, another third at 30, and the rest at 35.Īlternatively, you can authorize the trustee to match your beneficiaries’ W2 each year, up to a maximum annual amount (e.g., $25,000). To help preserve your estate (and to teach your children the value of money), you may wish to split up the inheritance into more manageable portions or make it available only for certain life events such as buying a house, buying a car, or going on a honeymoon. Would you want to leave your entire estate to an 18-year-old child? Do they have experience managing $1 million? $100,000? Even $10,000? Do you want to change beneficiaries?ĭoes your Will or Trust accurately reflect who you want to inherit your estate?Įven if your estate plan has the right beneficiaries, remember this: not only can you decide who gets your assets, you can also decide how they get it. If you have multiple children but only one is named as an executor/trustee, you may also want to consider naming your other children as co-executors or co-trustees to avoid disputes over your estate plan. Have any of your representatives encountered financial difficulties, and you are no longer confident in their ability to manage your estate? Last Will and Testament ( What is a Last Will and Testament?)ĭurable Power of Attorney ( What is a Power of Attorney?)Īdvance Directive for Health Care ( What is an Advance Directive?)Īll these documents name representatives (or "fiduciaries") to make decisions for you if you cannot make them yourself.ĭo you still trust these people to serve your best interests? Have your children become adults and, if so, would you like to appoint them as your representatives or alternates? Review your core estate planning documents such as your: If you have not spoken with an estate planning attorney (and a financial adviser, for that matter) since the new tax laws came into effect, we strongly recommend doing so. The IRS recently announced further changes to the estate tax and gift tax exemptions for 2019. Included in that overhaul were major changes to individual income taxes, deductions, business taxes, and estate taxes - all of which can dramatically impact your estate plan. Forbes even called it "the most comprehensive overhaul of the tax law in 31 years." The 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act dramatically affected our tax laws. Does your plan take new tax laws into account?
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