DIY not a good option for estate planning
Although there seem to be many online tool that easily prepare a quick estate plan and provide related documents, the question is the validity and appropriateness of these plans and document. The increasing term ‘do it yourself” may not go down too well and should not be considered as a safe option when it comes to estate planning.
Estate planning is not just about the documents, rather, it concerns the validity of the inclusions in the documents, the process of signing and also implementation of such legal document. Taking up the challenge of creating one of the most important documents of your life has its utter disadvantage. You could throw away assets, valuables and lose them to probate, you could also jeopardize the wellbeing of your family and loved ones. Rather than make such a mess of your estate plans, you should contact an estate planning lawyer for necessary guide.
Estate plan documents are legal documents and should be treated with authenticity, legality to avoid simple and yet costly mistakes. Most notably, these mistakes are usually encountered when you prepare estate plan document yourself.
Here’s what could go wrong:
Wrong inclusion in estate document
For the layman, legal jargons can be very confusing. Much more, the ambiguity of certain terms used in estate planning documents and it meaning differs in separate context leading to wrong inclusion in estate document.
Furthermore, you may not be aware of the state laws and its directives on estate plans. State laws depending on where you live usually dictates what document can be included in you estate plans. They also control the formalities, processes of signing and implementation of such document. When wrong details are supplied in estate plans, the document may turn out to be invalid and revoked.
Whatever your personal thoughts are on lawyers, the fact is you need an estate planning attorney to help you through estate planning processes.
Challenges with estate evaluation and taxes
The first of estate planning is usually to make an assessment of your estate, assets and evaluate them after you might have removed all expenses and liabilities. Taxes are placed on estate and other properties. Although with fluctuating economy, taxes placed on estate can be uncertain at different point in time and thus making it difficult for an individual to figure out.
As a result, you need an estate planning attorney to help you navigate through changes on estate and also prevent you from too many taxes.
Lack of third party influence
When you make estate plans yourself, you may be limited to ideas that would help you make better plans. Asides the long and difficult process of planning your estate alone, unknown to you, you may be blinded to making the right decisions, coerced to take wrong decisions. There is always a chance that estate plans made in this situation go into probate with families or beneficiaries of the estate disputing over the details.
However, an estate planning attorney can step in and act as a third party influence, also, the attorney can act as a custodian of the original copy of the estate plan preventing it from being revoked. It is important to note that a do it yourself estate plan has a higher chance of being revoked owning to the reason that no executioner could produce the will in court. An estate attorney would however prevent these ugly situations.
With so many factors going against it, you should not consider doing your estate plan alone. Without the proper knowledge of the procedure, the state laws directives on estate plans, creating an estate plan yourself would only create more of a mess for you and or your loved ones to clear up.
Although, you may consider it as a way of cutting cost and saving money, but is it truly worth it? With the mistakes and problem associated? When you or your loved ones may end up paying more on legal fees and time on probate issues.
An estate planning attorney is pivotal to making well informed decisions that would definitely result into making solid estate plans.
Planning with an estate attorney is the only way to ensure all appropriate formalities are me with proper protocol. With this, you stand at better chances of achieving your goals of estate plans with its adequate execution. On the other hand, doing it yourself option may leave you and your loved ones to chances of revoked, invalid and void estate plan documents.
With the wellbeing of you and your loved ones at risk and safety of your assets in question, is preparing estate plans yourself worth the risk? Contact an estate planning attorney today.
