Setting up Will for Children and Assets

[TG Park]

DW and I were at a family gathering recently and a cousin discovered, to her horror, that we do not have a will/legal arrangements set up to dictate what would happen to our 1 year old son or our assets in the event that we both die or become incapacitated.

We're in our mid/late thirties and healthy so haven't given this a whole lot of thought. I figure this is a good place to ask what you all have done to address this issue? Ideally not something that is comprehensive (ie expensive and involving lots of lawyers, as DW's cousin said hers was), but covers the commonsense bases that need to covered.

What are those bases, how did you cover them, what was the hassle and cost involved?
Thank you!

[LiveLean]

There are some long, helpful threads on this subject on these boards.

[Psychstache]

I would check your employer benefits package. One of our free* benefits we have is legal supports that included estate planning support with qualified legal staff. Our situation is relatively simple so it worked** just fine.

*Obviously not free, but we don't pay anything directly for using the service.

**I mean, I am really just assuming. Obviously DW and I are still here so we don't know if it will work in reality, but everything passes the smell test thus far.

[Retirador]

Hi, definitely important to setup a will to express who will take care of your dependent, POA for healthcare decisions, funeral arrangements and finances and a revocable living trust to shield assets from falling into a long, complicated and expensive government process called probate. I'm married with 2 young adults children and we did not draw a will, POAs and trust until 2 months ago. So we waited 27 years before working on this .

I drafted our own will, POAs and revocable trust using Nolo Trust and Willmaker because our situation is very simple. There are also several online software you could use. And of course, you could always hire a lawyer which is the best way to go.

I have a nephew who is single, no child late 30s. Unfortunately he passed away unexpectedly due to an ailment with no will and trust. Between court and lawyer, his mom and sibling so far has spent $50k, and will still go higher because nephew's estate is more than $166,250, which is the threshold in California for an informal probate.

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[GilesMM]

Hi, definitely important to setup a will to express who will take care of your dependent, POA for healthcare decisions, funeral arrangements and finances and a revocable living trust to shield assets from falling into a long, complicated and expensive government process called probate. I'm married with 2 young adults children and we did not draw a will, POAs and trust until 2 months ago. So we waited 27 years before working on this .

I drafted our own will, POAs and revocable trust using Nolo Trust and Willmaker because our situation is very simple. There are also several online software you could use. And of course, you could always hire a lawyer which is the best way to go.

I have a nephew who is single, no child late 30s. Unfortunately he passed away unexpectedly due to an ailment with no will and trust. Between court and lawyer, his mom and sibling so far has spent $50k, and will still go higher because nephew's estate is more than $166,250, which is the threshold in California for an informal probate.

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I agree with the first part, but I would find the best and most experienced local attorney you can to handle this important matter. A good attorney will have written and tested in real life hundreds of trusts and now has a great set of tools for plugging loopholes. Modern trust documents are highly sophisticated and can be tailored to a wide range of contingencies specific to the risks your estate may face.  It is worth a couple thousand bucks to get this right.

[Retirador]

Hi, definitely important to setup a will to express who will take care of your dependent, POA for healthcare decisions, funeral arrangements and finances and a revocable living trust to shield assets from falling into a long, complicated and expensive government process called probate. I'm married with 2 young adults children and we did not draw a will, POAs and trust until 2 months ago. So we waited 27 years before working on this .

I drafted our own will, POAs and revocable trust using Nolo Trust and Willmaker because our situation is very simple. There are also several online software you could use. And of course, you could always hire a lawyer which is the best way to go.

I have a nephew who is single, no child late 30s. Unfortunately he passed away unexpectedly due to an ailment with no will and trust. Between court and lawyer, his mom and sibling so far has spent $50k, and will still go higher because nephew's estate is more than $166,250, which is the threshold in California for an informal probate.

Sent from my SM-G781U using Tapatalk

I agree with the first part, but I would find the best and most experienced local attorney you can to handle this important matter. A good attorney will have written and tested in real life hundreds of trusts and now has a great set of tools for plugging loopholes. Modern trust documents are highly sophisticated and can be tailored to a wide range of contingencies specific to the risks your estate may face.  It is worth a couple thousand bucks to get this right.

Or if living in a HCOL area, like SF Bay Area between SF County and Santa Clara county, a super simple trust and a 'pour over' will along with several POAs will run you north of 6k. Still better than 50k and counting.

As an added layer of assurance, have the software generated instruments reviewed by a lawyer on an hourly basis before notarizing and funding the trust.

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