OLD - Estate Planning Advice

How An Estate Planning Law Firm Can Help You

Edited by Doug Newborn

From proper beneficiary designations to securing the financial future of your family – estate planning is all about protecting your loved ones even after you’ve passed.

How do you find a good estate planning law firm that you’ll feel comfortable working with? Choosing an estate planning attorney to represent you is vital. From proper beneficiary designations to securing the financial future of your family – estate planning is all about protecting your loved ones even after you’ve passed.

For starters, you must know what questions and concerns to have that will lead you to the right estate planning lawyer you can hire. In today’s post, we’ve compiled a list of the importance and benefits of working with an estate planning law firm.

Estate Planning: Not Just for the Rich Anymore

A lot of people seem to think that estate planning is only reserved for the rich. However, that’s not true at all. Even if you don’t have an expensive home or expansive assets, you still must have a plan in place to settle all your affairs – so your loved ones are protected when you’re gone.

Estate planning ensures your loved ones will know what your last wishes are.

Main Benefits of Working with an Estate Planning Law Firm

  • You can choose which of your beneficiaries get what.
  • You can appoint your children’s legal guardian after you’ve passed.
  • You can help reduce taxes on the assets you leave behind.
  • You can minimize any family strives or unpleasant legal battles.
  • Protecting Your Beneficiaries

Estate planning is not for high-net-worth persons anymore. A lot of middle-class families must have an estate plan in place when something unexpected happens to the breadwinner (or breadwinners) of the family.

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It doesn’t matter how much assets you have – whether it’s a second home or a sum in your bank account.

If you don’t correctly stipulate what happens to your assets when you pass away, the chance to take charge of what happens to it is also gone.

That’s because the main benefit of estate planning is proper asset designation to your heirs. Without leaving an estate plan, the court will have to decide who gets what. Typically, it’s not as simple as the surviving spouse or surviving children getting everything. This process can take years and will accompany a lot of hefty legal fees.

Protecting Your Children

If you have small children, it’s now more than ever that you should hire the services of an estate planning law firm. No one wants to think about dying, but preparing for the unthinkable is the best thing you can do to protect the future of your children.

To make sure that your small children will have the care and guidance you wish for them to have even after you’ve passed, naming their guardian in your estate plan is crucial. Without your appointment, the court will have to step in – and you certainly will want to have the final say when it comes to raising your children.

Protection Against Big Tax Cuts

Securing the future of your beneficiaries and children entails protecting them from significant tax cuts. One of the vital components of estate planning is the transfer and designation of assets to your heirs with the least possible tax cut or burden for them.

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Even with a minor or smaller estate plan, you can minimize state inheritance taxes and estate taxes, and those taxes can get costly. Your estate planning lawyer can also guide you on how to reduce the income tax your beneficiaries might have to pay.

However, without an estate plan in place, your beneficiaries may be looking to pay a hefty amount of tax.

It Helps Avoid Family Conflicts

Unfortunately, it’s a common scenario: a person with money or assets passes away, and the family he or she leaves behind fight over who gets what. One son or daughter may think they deserve to get more than the other, or the surviving spouse may believe that they should preside over the finances, even though the other family members know that they can’t do so.

Heirs and beneficiaries may have disagreements regarding estate management.

Such family disputes and disagreements don’t end up nicely – especially if they have to take their battles to court. When you have an estate plan, you can preemptively avoid these family conflicts.

By deciding who gets to manage your finances when you die or become incapacitated will go a long way.

If you want to quell any future friction within your family and ensure that your assets and finances are handled the way you intend them to be, work with an estate planning law firm.

About the author

Doug Newborn

Doug understands how to manage multiple areas of the law while bringing efficiency and a unique personal touch. In other words, you won’t be our only client, but our goal is to make you feel like you’re our only client.

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