Many of us think that estate planning is for very wealthy people only. You hear about the federal estate tax exemption of $3.5 million per person and think I don’t have that kind of money, why should I bother spending the money on estate planning?
No matter how much or how little money you have, you need a durable power of attorney, to have someone manage your bill-paying and banking affairs, and an advanced health care directive, which appoints someone to make medical decisions for you when you cannot make them for yourself. You also need to think about how you will be taken care of when you can’t take care of yourself. Is there a spouse who will have the strength and energy to take care of you when you are both old? Do you have children who can take care of you? Do they live on the other side of the country and have a job to help support their families? Do you have enough money to pay for assisted living or a nursing home? These are all questions that an estate planning lawyer can help you decide and plan for.
No matter how much or how little money you have, you need a will if you have minor-aged children. You need to appoint a guardian for your children and it must be in writing. Otherwise, you can have all of your relatives fighting over your children to be their guardian and a judge deciding which one of them will make the best substitute parent. Or you can have no one fighting over your children, and they have to go to foster care. Isn’t that a nightmare in either case?
If you have a blended family, you need a will to protect your assets from going to your spouse’s family and not to your children. Many couples struggle with the issues raised by having separate families. If you leave things to luck, you are almost guaranteed that chaos will follow after you die. It is smart to work through these issues now and get all your legal affairs in order.
Is one of your children a spendthrift? He spends more than he earns and has enormous credit card debt? Do you worry that any money that he inherits from you will just go to his creditors and he will not be able to keep any of it? An estate planning lawyer will talk to you about different trusts that can be set up so that your child will never lose the money he inherits from you to a spouse who is divorcing him, to a judgment creditor who sued him for an accident that he was in, or to pay his debts (especially when you know in your heart that the minute he clears his current debts with your money, he will just run up new debts again).
Even if you don’t have “wealth”, you could use the advice of an estate planning lawyer. It will be money well spent.
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