There is no doubt about it, estate planning has a lot of moving parts. As you work your way through the many facets of estate planning, be sure to keep reminding yourself who you are doing this for. Yes, estate planning will provide you with many vital protections. It will also provide your loved ones with a range of benefits. Consider the legacy you are building for those you hold dear and the protections you are putting in place to secure that legacy for them. This is not to mention the fact that a comprehensive estate plan can greatly simplify and streamline all that could fall on your loved one’s shoulders after you pass away. After such a loss, they are likely to want to spend as much time as possible reflecting on your memory and supporting each other. To give them more time for the healing process, here are some ways you can organize your estate to relieve the burden that can fall to your loved ones after your passing.
Tips for Organizing Your Estate
Hey, remember that bank account you opened specifically to save for a family vacation? Or, when is the last time you thought about the bank account you left behind after switching your primary account to another bank? Well, the time has come to confront the string of opened, but not closed, bank accounts you have opened over your lifetime. For a variety of reasons, many of us have such outstanding accounts and may even have some nominal amount of funds left in them. After you die, your personal representative will be tasked with locating all of these accounts and obtaining written information about them. Save them a serious headache by going to close past accounts and transferring the outstanding balances to a central bank account. It will be much simpler for you to accomplish this than anyone else further down the road.
There is also no time like the present to check that you have listed a beneficiary on things such as your life insurance policy and retirement accounts and that, if you have beneficiaries listed, they reflect your most current desires as to who should inherit these assets. Without listed beneficiaries, these assets will pass into your probate estate.
Last, but certainly not least, be sure to let your personal representative know where you have assets and how to access these assets. Do you have a safety deposit box? Write down where it is and be sure that the necessary people can access this after you are gone. Do you have a home safe with assets locked away in it? Let your personal representative know about this and the code and anything else they need to know to access the safe and its contents. You should also list any digital assets, holdings, and accounts you have as well as your passwords and other relevant information. Leave all of this information in your estate planning binder. At Monk Law Firm, PLLC, we offer a digital asset protection document that helps clients think through all of these issues.
Estate Planning Attorney
For a strong, comprehensive estate plan you and your loved ones can count on, reach out to the trusted estate planning team at Monk Law. Contact Monk Law today.