The 10 Most Common Estate Planning Mistakes, Part 4

In the article Top Ten Mistakes Made in Estate Planning, Ronald P. Kendall discusses 10 common mistakes that both individuals and attorneys make when they go through the estate planning process.

In this article, we will discuss the final 2 mistakes of the top ten mistakes made in estate planning.

9.      Failure to Plan for Personal Property

We all have those items that are of emotional, sentimental, or monetary value.  Those personal items we have accumulated over our life time.

Strangely enough, these are the things that family members most often fight over once you’re gone.  This is because people plan for what is to happen to their home, their money, their savings bonds, and their retirement accounts.  It is clear who gets the cash, but what about the painting in the living room, dad’s baseball card collection, mom’s wedding ring, or the rocking chair granddad would rock me to sleep in when I was a child.

Unless you name who gets this stuff, it could quickly lead to fights and possibly your children never talking to one another again.  It is very easy for things to get heated during that grieving period after someone has passed away.  What may have seemed like a simple decision now could end up tearing a family apart then.

All too often I hear people say, we will just let “them” (“their children”) decide what to do with our personal possessions after we are gone.  While your children may be the exception to the rule, and have a perfect rapport with one another, it may not be prudent to leave things to chance.  If you are uncomfortable deciding who gets what yourself, sit down and discuss it with your children.  Find out what they want and then write it down in your estate plan.

10.  Failure to maintain and update your estate plan

You created the perfect estate plan today.  Your estate plan is completely up to date with the law, meets all your goals, and fits you and your family’s current situation.  What makes it perfect one year from now, three years from now, or even 10 years from now?  No one leads a stagnant life.  Your situation changes and your family’s does as well.  People marry, get divorced, have children, become disabled, or pass away.

Even if nothing changed with you or your family over the course of one, three, or 10 years, the laws never stay the same.  Therefore, it is of the utmost importance to keep your estate plan up-to-date with not only the changes in the law, but also the changes in your life.

Stay in contact with your estate planning attorney so that your estate plan can be kept up to date with these changes.  Better yet, find out if your estate planning attorney has a maintenance program that will help keep your estate plan current with the law and your life.

So as you can see there are many common mistakes that are made during the estate planning process.  You are by no means alone if you made one, two, or all 10 of these mistakes.  You should review your estate plan with your attorney or feel free to contact our office if your estate plan does contain one of these common mistakes.  At Solari Law, our estate planning process is designed so as to avoid these common mistakes when we co-create an estate plan that works.

Attend one of our upcoming workshops or call us to make an appointment for additional information on estate planning and what to avoid.

Visit Solari Law's website at solari-law.com

Disclaimer:  The information provided in this article is for informational purposes only and not for the purpose of providing legal advice. You should contact your attorney to obtain advice with respect to any particular issue or problem. Use of and access to this article does not create an attorney-client relationship between Solari Law and the user or browser.