Long gone are the days of preparing a will and locking it away in the safe or bottom drawer!
Whether it be at the completion of this years’ tax return, or when you change the batteries in the smoke detector, every year you should dust off your estate plan and update it for the inevitable changes that most likely will be needed.
Today, changes to the Law and increasing litigation mean, we are frequently seeing even well thought out Wills and Estate Plans being successfully challenged. With this in mind, we take this opportunity to raise some trigger questions below for your consideration. Please keep in mind that we are now able to assist you in these matters. In addition to being responsible for the preparation of your income tax return, I personally lead the Estate Planning Team, backed by an experienced mix of estate planning lawyers, providing both practical and relevant solutions.
Consider the following:
- Who are your current beneficiaries?
- How will your estate be shared among these beneficiaries?
- Do you wish to leave part of your estate to a charitable organisation?
- Who will you nominate as residuary beneficiary, if the main beneficiaries die?
- Have you made adequate provision in your will for your dependants?
- Who will you appoint as executor(s) for your will?
- Do you wish to appoint an alternative executor(s) – usually prudent?
- Do you wish to appoint a guardian for children or grandchildren? Who will this be?
- Do you wish to nominate an amount of maintenance for your children or grandchildren?
- Do you have specific funeral requests such as, where you would prefer to be buried…etc?
What now?
We have developed a comprehensive estate planning questionnaire for you to complete and return to enable us to provide a list of estate planning issues for you to consider. If you would like to discuss your estate planning further please contact me for a no obligation initial review.
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