Do It Now: Name a Guardian for Your Minor Children
We know it is difficult, even horrific, to imagine someone else raising your children. However, you must consider who you would choose to fill this important role. Otherwise, a judge—a stranger who does not know you or your wishes, your child, or your relatives and friends—will determine who raises your children if something happens to you. Depending on state law, your children’s guardian could be a relative you do not get along with or, less commonly, a stranger you have never met.
Left Out of Your Parent’s Estate Plan? What You Need to Consider
What if you inheritance isn’t what you expected to receive? What if you learned that you were left out of your parent’s estate plan. Now what?
How Are My Business Documents Relevant to My Estate Plan?
Company rules about transferring business interests are found within documents such as a limited liability company (LLC) operating agreement, a partnership agreement, corporate bylaws, a shareholder agreement, or a buy-sell agreement. To help a client properly plan for the future transfer of ownership of their business, an estate planning attorney must review these documents.
Estate Planning Roll Call: Important Legal Tools You Should Have
When assessing an estate plan, several legal tools, or documents, should be in attendance to accomplish the goal of a complete and comprehensive plan.
Incapacity Planning and Pets
Few US adults have an estate plan. Even fewer have included a pet in their plan. Perhaps you have an estate plan that addresses who will take your pet when you die. But does it address the possibility of your incapacity and the need for a temporary pet caretaker?
Things to Consider When a Parent Is Out of Town
Your estate plan may include powers of attorney that allow a trusted person to act on your behalf and advocate for you with regard to medical and financial matters when you cannot do so yourself. But do you have a similar document in place that gives someone the authority to care for your minor children when you are not able to? What if you are traveling or away on business or vacation?
3 More Famous Pet Trust Cases and the Lessons We Can Learn from Them
3 More Famous Pet Trust Cases and the Lessons We Can Learn from Them. Sometimes, pet owners can get a bit creative when providing for their pets’ future care. The following three famous cases involving pet trusts offer some important lessons.
Can I Leave My Spouse Out of My Estate Plan?
The relationship between spouses is special in all contexts, not the least of which is the estate planning context. In many instances, you can exclude people from your estate plan, including your parents, siblings, and adult children. But there are special protections built into the law that may help protect a spouse from being disinherited.
A Trust for Fluffy or Fido? Why Every Pet Parent Needs to Consider a Pet Trust Today
Estate planning is about protecting what is important to you. Although much of the traditional estate planning conversation focuses on surviving spouses, children, grandchildren, and charities, many pet parents wonder what could happen to their “furry children” after their death.
What Is a General Power of Appointment?
Your family, the economy, the law, and society can change rapidly and unexpectedly, affecting your best-laid estate plans in unpredictable ways. To achieve your estate planning goals, you need a plan that can keep up with the changes. What is a General Power of Appointment, how does it work and reasons to use it.
Don’t Let Your Estate Plan Go Up in Smoke
Fewer people are creating estate plans today than in years past. Every adult—whether they are 19 or 99—should have a will at a minimum. Many people can also benefit from estate planning documents such as trusts, powers of attorney, and advance directives. But even if you have created a comprehensive estate plan, it may no longer align with your objectives if it is not up to date.
Why Snow White’s Father Should Have Had an Estate Plan
Many of us are familiar with the story of Snow White and the seven dwarfs. Central to the story is the relationship between Snow White and her stepmother. While things were peaceful for a while, once the king passed away, the Queen’s true colors came to light. This fairy tale shows the conflict that can exist when the unifying member of the family dies without an estate plan.