Family Services

Estate planning is organization of your affairs in order to effectively deal with the prospects of lost capacity and death. Estate plans will typically include a few documents. Some of the key documents in most plans:

• • • Health care power of attorney – will provide direction and legal approval for whomever will make decisions for you with doctors or other healthcare providers should you be unable to represent yourself. This is managed through a health care power of attorney.
    • Living Will (or healthcare directive) – provides instructions for medical staff, in the event that you go on life support or require life-saving efforts to stay alive.
    • Revocable living trusts – are drafted in addition to wills for more complicated estate-planning requirements. In these trusts, assets can be protected from taxes and probate. Instead of going through probate court, a trustee is appointed to manage the trust and makes decisions about trust assets. Trusts not only avoid probate but also the expense of requiring a probate attorney, paying court costs and having assets appraised.
    • Financial power of attorney – appoints someone of your choosing to handle your financial affairs.
    • Will – your Last Will and Testament, “will” is a simple but detailed list of instructions as to how and to whom you wish to leave your property after you die.

Understanding your family needs and getting your estate plan “just right” can have profound and positive consequences for those left behind. In addition to basic estate planning tools, family estate plans often require making special provisions for the ongoing management of estate assets for a spouse in long term care, a child with special needs or asset equalization amongst children, some of whom may have inherited a family business and others who did not.

• • • Having a spouse in long term care can be a weighty issue. We can assist in establishing a plan to ensure that even when you are gone, your spouse’s needs will be met.
    • Families sometimes have children with special needs. Making sure that your estate continues to provide for them, even when you can’t, is a great comfort.
    • The creation of distribution options is important if you should have heirs that may not be able to manage the proceeds of your estate. There are good options available for those beneficiaries in need of long-term support and oversight.
    • Finally, the issue of estate asset equalization may be of great importance for your family, especially if there’s a family business involved. Working to establish equalization will support family harmony after you are gone.

Business Planning Group looks forward to working with you, your attorney and tax advisor to establish and meet your estate planning expectations. We work with some of the top local estate attorneys and CPA firms and if needed, we would be happy to connect you with them.

When you think about all the things you have done in your life, the impact you have had on people and organizations, you are thinking about your legacy. How will those you love as well as the organizations you care about remember you for your lifetime of commitment?

If you have reached that place in your life where you are able to understand and appreciate the fragility of the human form, then you may be ready to consider options for creating a lasting significance for your life, one that will create an enduring legacy for you and/or your family.

Legacy planning is different from estate planning, which focuses on financial and tax efficiency. Legacy planning, instead, focuses on how to leave a lasting impression of your values into the future.

Is legacy planning for you?

For some people, working hard and retiring well is simply not enough. If you have lived a life that can be defined by your personal values, then you may want to continue to support those cherished values with actions and financial support after you are no longer here. Legacy planning is not just charitable giving. When a legacy plan is well constructed, you define and control the assets and distribution of the assets after you are gone. Your legacy plan will make your money really matter by creating assets that will continue to support interests values into the future, even in perpetuity.

Business Planning Group looks forward to supporting your legacy planning needs. We’ll work with your tax advisors, attorney and charity(ies) of choice to assure that you have a legacy plan that creates the kind of lasting impression envisioned by you and your family.