Estate Planning Attorneys prepare a seniors assets to be managed in their retirement years and ultimately, disbursed upon death. They can also be called probate lawyers. Many EPAs are also elder law experts, and can more broadly represent seniors throughout their aging years.

Services

  • Mediate family negotiations on the disbursement of financial assets and property.
  • Serve as executors of estates.
  • Handle disputes between beneficiaries and representatives of the estate.
  • Experts om writing wills and establishing trusts.
  • Administer trusts by being made a trustee.
  • Address issues with IRAs, pensions, the IRS, 401(k)s, or credit accounts.
  • Track the estate’s financial records and accounts.
  • Establish powers of attorney so designated individuals can act on the behalf of the senior, in case he or she becomes incapacitated.

Specialization

If you are the executor of a loved ones’ estate, and you have questions or conflicts with the heirs of the estate, you are best suited to seek out a Probate or Estate Administration Attorney.

Look for a member in good standing of one or both of the Governing Associations:

  • American Association of Estate Planning Attorneys
  • American Academy of Estate Planning Attorneys

Preparation

  • Make sure a Power of Attorney is in place.
  • Record how the financial assets are to be distributed and to whom.
  • A representative or an executor should be chosen.
  • Know exactly what you are looking for the attorney do and/or manage on your behalf.

Evaluation

  • Research the attorney’s experience in the area of concern.
  • How long has the attorney been in practice? How long has he or she done estate planning?
  • What percentage of the attorney’s practice is devoted to estate planning or elder law?
  • How much training has the attorney had, and from what organizations?
  • How large is the firm? How many attorneys will be working on your case?
  • Will a paralegal who is familiar with your case be available when the attorney is busy?
  • How much will the retainer be? What are the rates and fees? Are flexible payment plans available?
  • What is the attorney’s experience regarding the specific matter with which you are concerned?

Estate Planning Law Articles

  • Financial preparedness for your parent’s long term care - Many families today are torn apart and stressed over a multitude of questions when it comes to caring for a senior parent. When care is needed for an elderly or disabled loved one, we are faced with difficult decisions. Should we provide that care ourselves, or do we hire someone… …Read More

Estate Planning Law Radio Show Segments

  • Recipe for Disaster: Downloading Legal Documents

    The value an estate planning attorney brings you, vs. just downloading documents yourself online, is a discussion Andrea Lee frequently addresses. They are who will advocate for you. If you’re a senior, an estate planning attorney or an elder law attorney is worth their weight in gold. Andrea Lee from Legacy Estate Planning joins Suzanne Newman on the Answers for Elders podcast to talk about the benefits of hiring an elder law attorney.

    Andrea says, “Number one, it’s extremely important when you’re preparing estate planning documents to ensure they’re exactly properly done. The laws are constantly changing, and unfortunately, if someone downloads a form and it’s not in tune with the existing laws, it’s not going to achieve their goals… If an individual signs, say, a power of attorney document and then it’s not enforceable or doesn’t give the right powers, it doesn’t give the right date of being effective — if there are problems with it, then the individual who signed that usually has become incapacitated when somebody else is trying to use that document. There’s no cure for that.”

    “Downloading documents and simply filling them out is really a recipe for disaster, because if they are not properly done, if they don’t go right, there isn’t a way to fix it after the fact… I have had clients who I represented years ago, or the children of clients I represented in drafted documents for many years ago and call me up and say, mom and dad moved twice since they met with you and now mom’s in a facility and we can’t find original documents, but we need an original to sell the house. There are laws that state, if I’m the attorney who drafted the document… I can make it happen that a copy is accepted as much as an original. Whereas if you’ve downloaded a form and you’ve signed it yourself, there isn’t any way legally that I know of where we can get copies accepted, if nobody has a copy of that and can’t attest to the fact that this copy is identical to someone’s original document.”

    “I meet with my clients and I always say to them, it’s my job to think of the worst things that can happen and then to mitigate it. What if this happens? You know, what if, unfortunately, your entire family is wiped out in an earthquake, just these crazy things that can happen, and then how can we prepare a plan that would still work? Yeah. What if there was an earthquake and the house came tumbling down — we’ve seen tragedies as recently as the fires in Southern California, where people have lost homes, they’ve lost everything. And those things happen. And that’s actually another compelling reason to retain an attorney to draft documents.”

    “I think it’s everybody’s hope that their agent, who they select and name the documents, advocate properly for the principle. So right when I sign that health care power of attorney, when I sign that power of attorney, that financial power of attorney, whatever documents that I execute, the hope is always at the agent I’ve named properly advocate for me. But the reality is so many agents lack the education, they lack the experience, they lack the knowledge to truly be a fantastic advocate for their loved ones…”

    Learn more:

    Check out our affiliate podcast Alzheimer’s Speaks.

  • Executor and Power of Attorney: Differences

    Elder law attorney Andrea Lee from Legacy Estate Planning joins Suzanne Newman on the Answers for Elders podcast to clarify the steps an executor of the family estate has to take after a senior loved one passes.

    “When someone steps into that role of power of attorney, loving daughter or son or good friend, whomever that is, there are so many different hats that they wear when they act as an advocate for their loved one. Many people misunderstand the steps that have to be taken care of after someone passes away. And there’s there’s a little bit of confusion about, hey, I was a power of attorney, but mom died. What happens now? What are my roles? What do I do? And what are the necessary steps that an agent has to do after the death of a loved one?

    “When someone passes away, one of the first things that you should do, you grieve them. You take a little time to reflect on your relationship with that person and spend some time grieving your loss. And then, the next step really should be sitting down with a competent estate planning and or elder law attorney to answer some questions about the legal steps or legal requirements after someone dies.

    “I recently had a case where an individual was ill for a long time and his mom actually was his power of attorney. She’d acted on his behalf. She obviously loved her son deeply… And after he died, the mom — thinking, hey, I’m this is my son, I’m the power of attorney — actually started giving away his personal property, taking steps to administer his estate. However, his will named a different executor and different beneficiaries who were his minor nieces and nephews. Luckily, it was a good family and we were able to fix everything that had gone wrong. However, her lack of understanding of her role and what happened after her son died could have very, very easily led to her being in trouble for improperly distributing assets.”

    “I met with a client very recently whose father was an estate planning attorney, and she’s aged herself now, she’s in her seventies or eighties. And she said, my father told me he became an estate planning attorney because he liked and loved people… I couldn’t understand that when I was a child, because I thought he just filled out paperwork. But now that I’m realizing the humanity of aging, and the humanity of assisting family members through the death of a loved one, I’ve really come to realize that — especially with estate planning, different from other laws — really is about caring for your clients. It’s really not just checking the boxes of an administration, but being that support system for that individual who has recently lost a loved one.”

    “One of the main reasons you do want to meet with that estate planning attorney after the death of a loved one is there are significant legal obligations that are thrust upon an agent named in a will, and you start acting in that role, then you’re accepting some of those legal responsibilities. And so the role of that attorney is to guide the executor or the trustee through those legal requirements. There are a number of steps that a trustee and/or an executor have to follow. There are both federal and state deadlines that need to be met. There are obligations they have to fulfill, there are notices they have to provide. And most people will act as an executor or a trustee a handful of times in their life. Once, twice, maybe a few more. And they just don’t have the time to actually learn all of their obligations. So a good estate planning attorney should be able to sit down with an executor or a trustee and then hold their hand through an entire administration.”

    Learn more:

    Check out our affiliate podcast Alzheimer’s Speaks.

  • Parents Moving In With You? Things To Think About

    With multi-generational housing on the rise – aging parents moving in with their adult children — this segment looks at the complex issue from the child’s point of view. Elder law attorney Andrea Lee from Legacy Estate Planning joins Suzanne Newman on the Answers for Elders podcast to talk about expectations and approaches.

    Andrea says, “There’s obviously many ways this can be set up… And the big question that we always want to advise is sitting down and formulating a plan of what that would look like, not just structurally, but emotionally. If mom and dad were to live in there, if mom and dad are investing hundreds of thousands of dollars to modify a house or to add an apartment, then the conversation needs to be had. My recommendation is two kitchens, two living areas. That has been a proven need to make long term care housing happy for everyone, is their home separate space, so you’re not constantly in each other’s hairs. But the conversation the child needs to have with their parent is, ‘hey, if you’re investing all this money and you’re living with me, both parties need to be protected.’ So you have to have a plan.

    “What about the time when mom and dad die? What is going to happen with that money they’ve invested? Do they expect to be put on that deed? Do they expect to earn an ownership interest in that property, or are they going to treat it as a gift to the child and say, ‘I’m giving you this $200, $300,000, and my hope is you let me live in this apartment that we’re building. That creates a risk for the parent, because what if the kids change their minds after a few years? They don’t want mom and dad to live there anymore. If it’s a gift, the parents aren’t protected. But if the parents own an ownership interest in that house, then it opens the kids up to the possibility of, if mom or dad die, and that becomes a part of their will, or distributed through their trust, might they be in a position where they have to sell their own house to pay off a sibling? You don’t want them to be in that position either.”

    Andrea adds, “Many questions can arise if your parents are thinking of living with you. it’s absolutely essential that the parent and the child sit down and discuss these possible scenarios. And because most people only do this once in their life, it is best done if that parent and that child sits down with professionals who have experience guiding families through creating multi-generational housing. So you can discuss the pros and the cons and the risks to the parents and to the child.”

    Learn more:

    Check out our affiliate podcast Alzheimer’s Speaks.

  • Moving In With Your Adult Child? Things To Think About

    Since COVID, there has been a 40% increase in multi-generational housing: either senior parent or parents have moved in with their children, or kids who can’t afford to live on their own have moved back home again. For an aging parent, they wonder: should I sell my house? Should I invest money in my son or daughter’s home? Should I move in with them? What does that mean for my overall estate plan, my assets? How does that affect the other heirs if I have other children? Elder law attorney Andrea Lee from Legacy Estate Planning joins Suzanne Newman on the Answers for Elders podcast to talk about this complex issue.

    Andrea says, “I’m a huge proponent of multi-generational housing. If you want your kids to help you, it shouldn’t be a burden to them. My own mom and dad bought a house half a mile from me, and that’s what allowed us to keep my mom home for ten years after her dementia diagnosis, because we were able to support my dad and provide that care. And it’s even easier if you can live within the same house, because that even decreases that burden of having to go somewhere else to help with that day to day care that people frequently need as they age.

    “Now in some instances, maybe a multi-generational house itself is not the best option, or it’s not feasible. But at minimum, you need to live within a mile of your kids… I was part of that sandwich generation, where I had young children at home and I had a mom and dad who needed help. And I’m an attorney, and I work full time. And it was overwhelming at times for me to try and balance my kids, their sports, their school, dinner, homework, work, and also care for my parents. And so for any parent who’s out there, moving near your child so that they don’t have to drive 30 minutes — that’s an hour out of your day, that’s valuable time that really causes a lot of stress for your children.

    “One of the challenges I have found as an elder law attorney with multi-generational housing is combining two households. That’s so hard to do, it can actually increase stress a lot. So if you want to live together, the goal is that it is beneficial for everyone, and not just you as a parent. First, take a step back and say, ‘I want to make sure I’m not overly burdening my child,’ and setting up that expectation of what your child is going to do for you, listening to them in their circumstances…

    “Mom and dad are thinking, I’m going to make a very large investment. I’m going to remodel my son or my daughter’s home so that I can have a downstairs living area that is wheelchair accessible, and that I can age in for the rest of my life. Well, then you have to have that conversation, if mom and dad died a few years later, that money has been invested into that child’s house and the other children aren’t going to get the benefit of that. So those parents need to make sure they’ve updated their estate plan. They’ve created a deed that allows that resource to then pass to the child with whom they’re living. Or if that’s not what they want, they have to have that clear conversation and expectation with that child.

    “But also with other members of the family, they don’t want to be in a circumstance where mom and dad die. Something happens. They can no longer remain in that home, and people are fighting over the investment mom and dad made into living there. And what’s going to happen to that? There’s so many ways it can go wrong, that’s extremely important for clients who are considering doing this, sit down with an expert who has a lot of knowledge of multi-generational housing and issues that need to be addressed when making that decision.”

    Learn more:

    Check out our affiliate podcast Alzheimer’s Speaks.

  • Single? How to Preserve Assets For Retirement

    If you’re single, it’s much harder to plan financially in advance for retirement, as there are more options available for married couples. To alleviate worries about finances and aging — or the possibility of an unhealthy retirement where you might face a chronic illness — you may want to research alternative living facilities on your own ahead of time, or prepare irrevocable trusts to preserve assets. Elder law attorney Andrea Lee from Legacy Estate Planning joins Suzanne Newman on the Answers for Elders podcast to talk about various ways single folks can protect their assets for retirement and beyond.

    Andrea says, “I have found that frequently single individuals have a whole other set of challenges that they need to face when doing their estate and long term care planning. If there’s a spouse, there are significant things that we can do to preserve assets. And unfortunately, so many single people just don’t have those same resources. And it’s oftentimes a huge stress and a burden for them as they anticipate aging. Hopefully they’ve met with a financial advisor or someone who’s a little bit knowledgeable and developed a budget and a plan to make their money last.

    “I have found that frequently single individuals have a whole other set of challenges that they need to face when doing their estate and long term care planning. If there’s a spouse, there are significant things that we can do to preserve assets. And unfortunately, so many single people just don’t have those same resources. And it’s oftentimes a huge stress and a burden for them as they anticipate aging. Hopefully they’ve met with a financial advisor or someone who’s a little bit knowledgeable and developed a budget and a plan to make their money last.

    “There’s just so many conflicting priorities. If I had to choose, I would say the most important thing for an individual to do as they age… is always making sure that they have their power of attorney documents in place. I think one of the biggest challenges for single individuals, as well as for many individuals, is choosing your agents. For many married couples, there is an easy default, which is, ‘Hey, I’m incapacitated, it’s my spouse,’ and they feel comfortable they can rely on their spouse. If people have responsible adult children, the logical backup to the spouse are those adult children.

    “But there is a huge segment of the population who are unmarried, and maybe they don’t have adult children, or maybe they have adult children, but they don’t have responsible adult children. They don’t have adult children who they are particularly close to, or who they think could act as a an appropriate agent. And then for those individuals, I have found that to be one of the most daunting decisions that they have to overcome. And it actually frequently creates a barrier to them even creating a plan or starting the process.”

    Andrea adds, “I do recommend people plan to live to 100. Not many of us make it, but some do. So it’s better to plan for it. But for single people, especially if they are concerned about long term care, I do get that phone call frequently where somebody is saying I have adequate resources to pay for healthy retirement, but I am concerned about unhealthy retirement. I’m concerned about the stroke, I’m concerned about dementia, I’m concerned about ALS, or any type of [chronic illness]… For single people, unfortunately, there are not as many good options if you’re facing incapacity and needing long term care. What’s the priority? And it’s definitely putting in place that financial power attorney, putting in place that health care power of attorney.

    “But I would say it’s also being much more conscientious about planning for the future incapacity and ensuring you have adequate resources and adequate plans to pay for that. If people are single, they have adequate resources, we want to look at long term care insurance. Is that a viable option for you? It’s important. It’s essential to have a housing plan in place. It’s essential to sit down and say, you know, if I become incapacitated, what do I want that to look like from a practical standpoint? Because you might not have a spouse to step in and make those decisions for you. And so the question is, ‘hey, can someone take care of me at home? Do I have the resources to hire someone if I don’t have family members who can step in? And if neither of those are true, what are the alternatives that I would feel comfortable with?’

    “So the beauty is there are a lot of options available to single people, but don’t wait to plan. Sit down with an estate planning, an elder law attorney. Sit down with your family members, and have that hard conversation about what can people do for you, what are their boundaries.”

    Learn more:

    Check out our affiliate podcast Alzheimer’s Speaks.

  • Unmarried Couples: Protections and Estate Planning

    A lot of people choose not to get married. They co-habitate, they mix assets, they’ll buy a home, and some even have retirement plans. There are many legal protections for married couples, but some of those protections don’t extend to individuals who live together, such as Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid benefits. If an unmarried couple decides to live together, they ought to discuss how to protect each other, and consider how do you protect yourself if you choose to live with a partner. Elder law attorney Andrea Lee from Legacy Estate Planning joins Suzanne to talk about protections and estate planning for unmarried couples.

    Andrea says, “We all like to think that our partners love us, and we’ll do what’s in our best interest, they’ll always put us first. But the reality is, even married couples can each have their own will. They can each retain their own counsel. So if you’re an unmarried couple and you’re residing together, even if you own a home together, there is the possibility that one partner could go retain an attorney, draft a will, create a trust that says, ‘Hey, when I die, my half of the house goes to my kids, or my half of the house goes to the Humane Society.’ And so it can be very tricky for unmarried couples or even married couples to plan.”

    Andrea adds, “You might be an unmarried couple. You could live together for 40 years. And if one of you has a stroke — or is in an accident and ends up in the hospital, if you are not married — your long-term partner might not have any legal ability to visit you in the hospital, to talk to your doctors, to make decisions on your behalf. That might fall to your parents — or your sibling who you haven’t talked to in decades. So really, unmarried couples, it’s even more important for them to sit down and prepare a plan than it is for married couples, because they don’t have any of those protections that the law puts in place.”

    “There are different rules in different states, and how each state interprets those relationships. and what rights are bestowed upon different individuals. There are some benefits where, if a surviving spouse gets remarried, they might lose some benefits. Some … people don’t want to give up money that they’re earning because of a death of their first spouse by getting remarried. I do military pensions. There are a lot of people who would love to get remarried, but they are concerned about potentially the loss of a military pension, or some other benefit that they might have received.”

    Learn more:

    Check out our affiliate podcast Alzheimer’s Speaks

     

  • Special Needs Trusts: Plans and Considerations

    Elder law attorney Andrea Lee from Legacy Estate Planning joins Suzanne to talk more about special needs trusts, comparing first party special needs trusts and third party special needs trusts.

    Andrea provides an example of a third party special needs trust: “Let’s say I am a parent of a disabled child, and my disabled child does not have assets. Maybe they’re on Medicaid, maybe I support them, but they don’t have their own money. I might draft a will, and in my will give my two healthy kids their distribution outright, and then for my disabled child, I in my will might create a special needs trust, using my money for that disabled child because that money never belonged to that disabled child. It was my money and I’m putting it in a trust for that child. That would allow that child to continue accessing Medicaid, continue accessing long term care, continuing accessing Social Security without having to spend that money down.

    “Now, that’s one use of the special needs trusts. But as an elder law attorney, we most frequently use them when we have a married couple, and sometimes we even use them when they’re both healthy, but we almost always use them if we have a married couple, and one spouse is incapacitated.

    “My mom was diagnosed with dementia in 2014. My dad was very healthy. And when my mom was diagnosed, we faced the reality that, as long as my dad was alive, as an elder law attorney, I could use my resources and my knowledge and my skills to help preserve most of my parents money. And I could do that by making sure my parents have a valid estate plan, transferring assets to my dad, moving some things around, maybe just creating a great plan to preserve assets.

    “But even though my mom was the one with dementia, there was the possibility that my dad could die first. I mean, he could have a stroke. He could be in a car accident. So when we have a married couple, what we frequently will do is we will impoverish the incapacitated spouse, enrich the healthy spouse, and then in that healthy spouse’s will, we would create a special needs trust. So in my parents’ situation, if my dad happened to have died first, the house that he lived in would go into that trust. The retired accounts would go into that trust, their families would go into that trust so that my mom could receive long-term-care benefits, and all that money could be preserved and help supplement what Medicaid does not cover. So that’s a type of special needs trust that can be used by married couples to ensure they never have to spend all of their money down in order to qualify or to keep a spouse on Medicaid benefits for, among other Social Security type of benefits.”

    Learn more:

    Check out our affiliate podcast Alzheimer’s Speaks

     

  • Do You Need a Special Needs Trust?

    So many of us have a loved one that may have special needs, a disability. Maybe a spouse has just been diagnosed with dementia and needs care, and they’re afraid of losing their house or their money. If you’re in that situation, or maybe your parents are, or a child that has special needs, this episode will be important. Elder law attorney Andrea Lee from Legacy Estate Planning joins Suzanne to talk about special needs trusts and how people can protect their own resources.

    Andrea explains, “A first party special needs trust is a special needs trust that is created using an individual’s own resources. They’re the least popular… An individual might use a special needs trusts under the following circumstances. Let’s say they were perfectly healthy, but they were in a car accident and they suffered a traumatic brain injury and now they need assistance for long term care benefits, like Medicaid or VA, or they’re accessing Social Security. But they can’t access those benefits because they have their own money. Maybe they’ve successfully were employed or maybe they had an inheritance… If it’s an individual’s own money, we then have to create what’s called a first party special needs trust, where we use the assets of that individual to create that special needs trust. They do have a lot of limitations, so we don’t use them as often as the other type of special needs trusts… The applicant has to be under the age of 65… and it must have a Medicaid payback.

    “I practice in the state of Washington, and even though special needs trusts are created based on a federal law and special needs, trusts exist in all 50 states. And the way each state’s interprets and treats those special needs trusts is different. So even though I can talk about special needs trusts in the broadest terms, if somebody is really interested in talking about how special trusts could serve them individually, they really need to meet with an elder law attorney in the state where they reside, because that elder law attorney can formulate a fantastic estate plan that will protect their assets, allow them to not lose their house, that will allow them to preserve some of their assets. And there’s a lot of ways that we can preserve assets for a married couple, and allowing them to not become destitute, just because of a terrible diagnosis.

    “Most of my clients are much better served with what we call a third party special needs trust… The third party special needs trust is a trust that’s created with the assets of a non-applicant… They can choose the trustee. They cannot be their own trustee, but they could choose a trusted child. They could choose a professional organization. That money is protected, and it’s used to provide good quality of life quality for the beneficiary.”

    Learn more:

    Check out our affiliate podcast Alzheimer’s Speaks

  • Maintain Your Car, Maintain Your Estate Plan

    People sometimes put their estate documents in a file and forget about them. Elder law attorney Steve Waltar joins Suzanne to talk how to keep your estate plan documents current.

    Steve explains, “If you buy a car, would it be wise to never, ever maintain it? Of course not. Would it be okay to never fuel it? So that’s my analogy, a good car. You would take a look at it, you’d keep it maintained, you keep it fueled. It’s going to run most efficiently.

    “So as a rule, we say people ought to come in every five years, or if there’s a change, they come to us. But I’ve had enough clients say, Steve, I want to make sure it’s current. And I thought about the idea of life insurance. And I thought, ‘Hey, we insure things to make sure they’re going to work.’ And so we developed something called a VIP plan. And for $600 a year, they get one hour with an attorney, that’s already worth over $600. And they get updates, like if you have changed the name of your agent and your powers of attorney, your health care, your will, you get those all routinely updated… Also for the trust clients, they get to update their assets. It’s a way to like make sure you’re meeting with an attorney routinely. Family get a discount then, because you’re a part of this membership. I’m an estate planner, so my kids, when they turned 18, they got powers of attorney, they got health care, they got HIPPA, all that stuff. But I think a lot of my clients, their kids go off to college, something happens, and the parents can’t even be notified about the medical status of their daughter or their son, because they don’t have a HIPPA authorization. So our VIP means you get free free healthcare powers and HIPPA authorizations and all that for your kids up to age 25. It’s totally a huge benefit.”

    Steve adds, “I had a client. We did a living trust. They had a good size estate, the assets from growing. The wife had cancer, things got bad. We did some reviewing of, you know, what was needed for health care powers and stuff like that, and figured everything was … Anyway, the wife died, and we learned later that the financial advisor moved $3 million out of the trust and made it joint with a survivor, probably thinking they were doing a favor. But what that did is, it gutted the estate tax planning and ultimately it’s costing the family about $240,000 because of the assets that were moved out of the trust.

    “The annual review with the attorney is priceless, really. You catch those sort of things when you look at who is the owner, who are the beneficiaries… It’s good to review that stuff.”

    “We encourage people to bring their kids to the signing of the plan initially, if they’re in-state. But a lot of times part of this VIP thing is — the kids are flying in for Thanksgiving or Christmas, or they’re here — they want to have a family meeting, so that we’re kind of the referee. We can explain the tax plan… I think it’s just great when people are willing to communicate that with the family. The kids find it kind of a little nerve-racking, but it’s helpful to be talking about this stuff.”

    Visit the Legacy Estate Planning website at waltar.com for beneficial articles, resources, and webinars. For more information:

    Check out our affiliate podcast Alzheimer’s Speaks.

  • Wills and Trusts Are Not Tires, You Can’t Shop Prices

    How do you make updates to your estate plan? Elder law attorney Steve Waltar joins Suzanne to talk about dos and don’ts.

    Steve says, “Let me first start by saying what you should not do. You should not take out your original will and start crossing off, oh, this person’s dead now, this is the new name. You start scratching things up — and there’s been cases on this, fights on this, because sometimes you make changes to who gets what, and they will sometimes throw out the will and say, Oh, you obviously intended to throw it out. So, a much better strategy, of course, it’s meet with an attorney. But I would say, review your documents, but make copies of the things you want to change. Then on the copy, you say what happened, or mark this out, something that helps process this with your attorney.

    “But ideally, you will not only send the attorney a copy of that, but you’ll actually meet with an attorney. And what I want to make sure is that I have an update of their assets and people. Because if someone comes in and says, Steve, I want you to change this paragraph, that’s tunnel vision. That’s not that helpful. Of course I can change that paragraph… But the whole point is, people don’t know what they don’t know. So what they should do is make sure, without messing up documents, to write down their worries, their concerns. Do a review questionnaire so that when they come in and meet with an attorney, we see the whole picture. Because I may tell them, Oh, you want to change this, but a will is not the way to do that, or Oh, you had everything on one document, but you need them separate… They don’t know what they don’t know.”

    People can be penny wise and pound foolish. “Even this week, I had a 99-year-old gentleman come in. He served in World War II. He had all these great stories. And I asked a lot of questions about the son… Like I said before, I want to know [about] the beneficiary… And after I did some analysis, I finally said, okay, I think we can just do a simple will and we could do a transfer on death deed. We don’t need a trust. We don’t need to get fancy… But then the the child was shocked that it was going to cost a little north of two grand to do a will and probate avoidance… Many of my clients, there’s a little sticker shock, right? I mean, I did $800 trust plans, you know, 30 years ago. This was a will plan. It avoids court. You could do a will form, but it’s not going to avoid court. I think someone was looking at like a dollar amount and he wasn’t realizing the value. People sometimes get what they pay for.

    “I like Costco, and I like the value I get. But if you buy a Michelin tire with an 80,000 mile guarantee, you could go to a discount store, go to Costco, whatever. That’s the tire, right? That’s a commodity. A power of attorney is not a commodity. They’re all radically different. Is it immediate? Is it springing, is it a hybrid? Is it a health care one? Is it finances? Is it durable? Is it not durable? It’s not like a tire. What about a will? And a will might not be the most important document. You might want it to avoid court with a transfer on death. Let alone a trust. So it’s really hard to shop prices. What you should do is just do your homework when you want to do your plan, get to know some of that, ask good questions, and see if they treat you well, and hire someone you’re comfortable with. Wills and estate planning is not a commodity. Thinking ‘I got the lowest [price],’ that’s not always best. That’s pretty foolish.”

    Visit the Legacy Estate Planning website at waltar.com for beneficial articles, resources, and webinars. For more information:

    Check out our affiliate podcast Alzheimer’s Speaks.

     

  • Your Legal Documents: Are Kids Unequal?

    With a new year arriving, it’s time to consider reviewing and updating legal documents. Elder law attorney Steve Waltar joins Suzanne to talk about when to update estate plans.

    Steve says, “The $64,000 question: Hey, when should I update my estate plan, or how do I know? It always depends, right? That’s what an attorney says, it depends. I think it’s wonderful to to to check in with the attorney annually. As a rule, we tell clients every five years, you should come in to kick the tires. Because by then your goals may have changed. Your assets have certainly changed. It might even be your wishes and goals have changed for your beneficiaries. On an annual basis, laws tend to change.

    “People usually come to us because there’s changes in people, right? … Obviously, divorce is huge, right? Who do you want to get your assets? Who do you want to be in charge? That’s a big deal. But it can be the children as well, right? If the daughter got married and her last name changed, that’s not going to mean we couldn’t find her in the event of a death to be a beneficiary. But if one of the kids went through a divorce, or got married, and you wanted to treat the step-grandchild as if it was a grandchild, that takes planning, it doesn’t happen automatically.”

    Steve adds, “So I tell people, look, we have attorney-client privilege here. I need to ask you about your assets and your family. And I may ask you some nosy questions. I actually say that, just kind of playfully. And when I’m asking about the children, I am trying to draw legal conclusions about whether they be good power of attorney, successor, trustee. Would they be good at that, or not good at money? Or maybe they’re about to go through a divorce, or maybe they’ve been sued before. Maybe we need to do asset protection for the children… So a lot of the planning that I do is to try to figure out a little bit more about the children and grandchildren. I mean, what are they like? Because mom and dad have the ability to give them more protection than they can do themselves.”

    “There’s nothing more unequal than the unequal treatment of unequals. I have two daughters. They’re wonderful, They’re different. My clients have multiple kids. They’re not all the same. They don’t all know they’re not. And so, if you’re able to communicate what’s going on. You maybe have a makeup provision, maybe someone did get kind of an advancement, someone’s living in the house and you want them to be able to get the house. But it probably shouldn’t be in addition to their share. Maybe it should be part of their share. When people are getting health care, do you honor that? Do you not? If you don’t communicate at all, the likelihood for disharmony or family fighting goes up dramatically.”

    Visit the Legacy Estate Planning website at waltar.com for beneficial articles, resources, and webinars. For more information:

    Check out our affiliate podcast Alzheimer’s Speaks.

  • Financial Wellness: Who Do You Trust?

    What are the criteria to use when choosing people to represent you financially? Attorney Steve Waltar from Legacy Estate Planning joins Suzanne to talk about this aspect of financial and legal wellness, one of the eight foundational principles of senior wellness featured this summer in the Vitality Revolution podcast series.

    Steve explains, “I think the easiest one is the healthcare power, because it is not a popularity contest. It does not matter whose feelings you’re hurting. This is your body. Who do you trust to make collective decisions that might lead to your death? Who do you trust? It’s usually a spouse first. Not always, especially as people age. It might be that someone’s not doing mentally well enough.

    “But the harder one I think is the financial. You first have to look at your assets and an estate planner, I have to know what they are. When we’re trying to choose someone, we want to figure out: do they have the experience and knowledge to manage your financial affairs properly? Do you have rentals? Do you have stocks and bonds? What kind of assets do you have called upon to make a decision that may affect other family members? Will your trustee, your personal rep, your power of attorney, act in a fair and unbiased manner?

    “Sometimes that shouldn’t be a child. Sometimes it should be someone you work with, or a peer, or uncle, something like that. Do they have an investment experience? Do they have enough time? Sometimes kids are just so busy in their jobs and with young kids, they don’t really have the time to do it. It’s not an easy decision. It’s not that difficult, but you don’t want to just presume it’s the oldest child. Look at the assets, look at how the children get along. Sometimes I have people wanting to list their 18 year old kid. No, they haven’t lived on their own, they haven’t paid a mortgage. They don’t know things. They could be great down the road, but not now.”

  • Financial Wellness: Family Meeting

    Communication is key. Are we communicating our wishes properly to family members when preparing estate documents, to ensure our wishes are carried out in case something happens? Attorney Steve Waltar from Legacy Estate Planning joins Suzanne to talk about this aspect of financial and legal wellness, one of the eight foundational principles of senior wellness featured this summer in the Vitality Revolution podcast series.

    Steve says, “I do think communication is really important. We encourage people when they sign their wills and trusts to bring in the children, or bring in whoever is the successor trustee, kind of the trusted next person in charge, to be at the actual signing. Last week, a client set up a meeting just because his daughter used to be overseas and now she’s in Colorado, and he wanted me to meet her.

    “I think that’s great to actually have a meeting. My dad did that. I remember it’s a little awkward hearing your parents talk about death, and who’s in charge, and what happens. But it’s a really good way to honor your parents. If you’re on the receiving side, you just don’t put it off, don’t make it awkward. They want to share, let them do it. My client had a family meeting every year, and it kind of got long-winded. As attorneys, we’re not going to share documents with the next generation until there’s a death. But we encourage people to talk about this sort of thing.”

  • Financial Wellness: Investing Rules

    Are you preparing for the future financially? Attorney Steve Waltar from Legacy Estate Planning joins Suzanne to share four simple investing rules. Financial wellness is one of the eight foundational principles of senior wellness featured this summer in the Vitality Revolution podcast series.

    Steve cites four simple rules: 1) be invested, in stocks and bonds; 2) be diversified; 3) rebalance at least quarterly – and most people don’t rebalance often enough; and 4) review your fees – not the only thing that matters, but some are paying a lot more than needed.

  • Financial Wellness: Wills and Trusts

    Attorney Steve Waltar from Legacy Estate Planning joins Suzanne to talk about financial and legal wellness, one of the eight foundational principles of senior wellness featured this summer in the Vitality Revolution podcast series. Are you preparing for the future? Topics include investing in long term care as well as critical documents to have in place as you age.

    Steve says, “I’m an estate planning attorney, so I think you need to have your documents in place. It’s very different when you’re young. You may need a will to list guardians and then when you’re older, a need trust to do tax planning and then sometimes you need to start giving things away to plan as an elder. But you need really clear financial powers, health care powers, you have to have that stuff lined up. Because if you fail to plan, then the state will take over and it might not even be your loved one that is making care decisions for you.

    “People don’t plan to fail, they fail to plan. Statistically, it’s somewhere between 70 to 80% of people who die without a will. And a will is kind of a starting point. A will may be really important, but it may not be that important. It may be that powers of attorney are way more important, and management, and incapacity.”

  • Everything You Need to Know About Probate

    Probate is a court process to retitle assets. Probate is designed to create a “final accounting” upon death. It is the legal process of “proving up” a Will, or verifying that a Will is valid, takes place in one of two instances. First, if a person dies leaving behind a Will, or second, if the deceased has died intestate, that is, has not left behind a Will or estate plan of any type or the Will cannot be found. Estate planning attorney Steve Waltar with Legacy Estate Planning joins Suzanne to give us a primer on probate.

    Steve says, “Probate is a Latin term that means ‘to prove,’ and it’s essentially to prove who died and prove what their assets are. So, it’s this court process to retitle things. Probate is not caused because you have a will, and it’s not caused because you don’t have a will. It’s really caused because there are things that need re-titling.”

  • The Trouble With Joint Tenancy: Estate Planning

    Although Joint Tenancy offers some short-term conveniences, in the long run it poses a host of problems that can cost you and your loved ones many times the expense and headaches you thought you were avoiding. Estate planning attorney Steve Waltar with Legacy Estate Planning joins Suzanne to talk about the difficulties of using joint tenancy while trying to plan your estate.

    Steve shares an example. “It’s a stark story. The mom had already been through a probate, because her husband died, and so she wanted to avoid that. She did a will, listed her three children. That’s fine. But the problem was, then she took her $400,000 brokerage account and she thought it would go through probate. ‘I’m gonna add my son to the account. He knows more than I, he studies Morningstar, blah, blah, blah.’ Well, son was a pretty good kid, but one day he was driving to the Seahawks game and he was in a car accident, and it was his fault. The PI attorneys are pretty good. They do asset checks before they sue people, and they saw that he owned this joint account, he was on title with mom. And so when they collected $100,000 judgment, they went after and they took it from that account.

    “So joint tenancy is you adding someone to an account where you each own 100%. It’s not like a house. In Washington, a husband and wife own a house, they each own half. When you own a joint — a liquid account — the default in Washington is 100%. So it could be a $2,000 bank account. Well, that’s not a huge amount. But a brokerage account, why would you add children to that? And then when mom died, the balance of that account didn’t get controlled by the will. It went to the son.

    “It is a probate avoidance tool. It can be appropriate in limited circumstances. But why in the world, once children are out of your house, would you add them to your accounts? It’s much better to make it payable on death to them, and give them a power of attorney to manage.

    “Joint tenancies, it’s done all the time. I have a report called ‘The Trouble With Joint Tenancy,’ it just gives a lot of the details. It’s very easy to create. You just go down to a bank and you have a bunch of people on an account, they all own it. Anyone can withdraw all the money. It’ll only go to the survivors, your will and trust won’t control it.”

  • Your State Does It If You Won’t: Estate Planning

    If you don’t file estate planning documents, your state will do it for you, perhaps not the way you expect. Estate planning attorney Steve Waltar with Legacy Estate Planning joins Suzanne to talk about various options available when planning your estate, what happens when you list beneficiaries, generally how wills work, living wills, living trusts, and Medicaid planning.

    Steve says, “There’s lots of benefits of proper estate planning. Avoid probate, that’s very common. It’s to protect your assets from creditors, or at least from your beneficiaries. Many people want to leave a legacy, they want to pass on their values, they want to lower estate taxes. And sometimes people want to do generational planning for the grandchildren as well. So the list is long. There’s a lot of who gets what, when, and how.

    “70 to 80% of people die without a will. If you die without a will, the state has one for you. And it’s different in every state. If you’re married, certain property goes to your spouse, but if you have separate property, it would only be half, and the other half would go to children. It may choose the wrong people, or it may be ineffective. You certainly can’t do estate tax planning. You certainly can’t do legacy planning. That’s the big one you want to avoid. The other one, it’s not a very good practical one, we can joke about it, is to have the last check to the underwriter bounce. I don’t know people who want to outlast their estate. Spend it all, it’s not a really good plan.”

  • Guarantee Your Wishes Are Honored: Estate Planning

    Estate planning attorney Steve Waltar with Legacy Estate Planning joins Suzanne to talk about having an estate plan. Families run into gotcha moments where they discover a loved one hasn’t files certain documents, or haven’t made plans, and are left to second guess what they want. In this segment, Steve introduces the concept of estate planning and different types. Most people don’t want it to be a curse, but a blessing, and it’s about protecting yourself during your lifetime. Make sure your wishes are honored they way you want to be honored.

    What exactly is estate planning? Steve says, “I like this definition. It’s not perfect, but it’s what I’ve been using for 25 years. It says I want to be in control of my estate as long as I’m able. If I become unable to manage my estate, I want to be the one who designates the person to manage my estate for me, without court intervention, following my death. I want things to be as easy on my loved ones as possible. I want my estate to pass to the people and organizations that I want, when I want, and how I want, a little bit of control. I want a smooth administration of my estate. And finally, I want there to be an absolute minimum of conflict delays, court costs, and taxes. And though I love you, Steve, attorney fees.”

    Steve adds, “You actually can affect people after you’re gone. I think it is really about choice. It’s choosing things, protecting yourself during your lifetime. Last I checked, we all die. Maybe you want to protect the kids from lawsuits and divorces. Good planning means you’re protecting your assets. Proper planning probably means keeping out of court while you’re alive. Traditional planning may cover final expenses and, and trying to lower estate taxes. And there’s modern planning, there’s sophisticated planning, there’s estate tax planning, and then legacy plan that involves your life experience. So really, it’s a blend a lot of things.”

  • Gift Tax Leverage: Building Generational Wealth & Strong Families

    By law every American can gift $18k annually, to anyone they want, completely gift, estate and income tax free. Many are reluctant to use their gifting allowance for several reasons:

    • Because the gift is irrevocable, they incorrectly believe that the asset is unavailable to them during the balance of their life.
    • They erroneously believe that if they give the gift today, they could run out of money.
    • They mistakenly believe that the gift must be given to the beneficiaries in spendable cash now and therefore will lessen their incentive to work.
    • They don’t understand the power of The Gift Tax Leverage Strategy.

    David T. Phillips explains how proper gifting will not only give the giver fulfillment during their life, it can produce generations of powerful, productive people. David will also show you how to leverage your annual gifts to the max.

    Learn more:
    * Wealth Creation Strategy Table
    * Estate Planning Made Easy website

    * shop.empez.com, use discount code:  EPMEZ  to receive a 50% discount
    * The 10 Most Common Estate Planning Mistakes, 4th Edition, by David T. Phillips
    * Generational Wealth Strategies newsletter

    Contact:
    Estate Planning Specialists at 888-892-1102
    The Durfee Law Group at 480 324-8000

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