Four years ago when I was pregant with my first daughter, my husband and I decided that we should get a financial planner to prepare for our family’s future. We met with a recommended Planner, and the first thing he said that we needed to do was to get a Will. I was surprised that this was his first recommendation, because my hope was that he was going to instantly start making us money with great investments. His thought was that any focus on our future finances was a waste if we didn’t have the legal documentation to make sure that it was handled properly if one of us were to pass away. By the way, his second recommendation was that we start to track how much money we spent on chinese takeout and put half of that into savings every month.
Our next step was to meet with the lawyer. We chose a family friend. It was a pretty easy process. We just answered all of the lawyer’s questions, until he asked about guardianship for our children. My husband and I are both very close to our sisters, and we could not agree on who should raise our children. So instead of making a decision on the spot, we asked the lawyer to write up the documents and in the meantime we would make a decision.
The papers finally came for our review. We both pleaded our cases for who should be guardian and why. And we did such a good job, no one won. So instead of making a decision, we held off on signing our Will until three office visits and two years later. If you are trying to keep your costs down during this process, our approach should not be followed. Lawyers charge you by the hour, whether they are writing your documents, or trying to council you through the decision process. And our lawyers were extremely gracious with their time and money.
The good news is we now have a signed Will, and we are both happy with the arrangements that we have made for our children’s future. I have recently seen several television commercials for Online Wills, something like www.legalzoom.com. And if you google this subject, many options come up with good refrences from media outlets and the Better Business Bureau. I have been told that in some cases, you can get documents perpared for right around $100 dollars. So there is no excuse to put it off any longer.
Thanks, Jenny. Does anyone have any recommendations for preparing a Will? Please share.
10 comments
I am actually one of those people who have put this off for WAY too long – simply because the thought of what it means scares the heck out of me! My husband and I have been talking about it since our son was born and now he is almost 4!!! I also just don’t know where to start – does anyone have a good recomendation of a laywer specializing in wills?? It’s definitely time for us to take action! Thanks.
We actually used Family Estate Services here in Charlotte and were very pleased. It was very helpful and very comprehensive (living wills, trusts, power of attorneys, etc.)We had many “discussions” about the guardianship of our two children and it helped us when our adviser explained that we could leave one sibling over financial issues and another with the children. In our family that was a huge help.
We just updated our Will and the process was pretty easy. We use Todd Stewart in SouthPark. We’ve used him for other family and business matters and went to him for this as well. We got very thorough and easy to understand advice. He’s just a nice guy. I especially like Todd because he’s a lawyer and a CPA, so you’re covered with him on all fronts. He’s also the father of twins. Todd A. Stewart, Attorney-At-Law andCertified Public AccountantSouthPark Towers6100 Fairview Road, Suite 510Charlotte, NC 28210(704) 552-5160
I think Todd is who was recommended to us as well. We have been back and forth about this for a year. Finally have come to some conclusions and hopefully will get something on paper soon. Did anyone have any issues about assigning and actual person to be in charge of your child’s money instead of an entity..(like the bank). My uncle helps with estate and will planning and he said you should never leave an actual person in charge of the money. Just wondering anyone elses thoughts. Thanks for bringing up such a delicate subject…it is SO important…
I agree this is in fact a very scary subject to talk about. However, we really open our eyes after our recent lost and realized that anything can happen to any of us at any time. I am glad you are bringing this up and help us wanting to start doing the right thing for our families.Really liked this post.Marie Bunich
Our lawyer cautioned us about giving rights over the money to the guardian. He mentioned that using someone else close to the family who could independently make decisions can be a good idea. On the flip side, he also said that if you really trust your guardian, it can be helpful for them to be able to make decisions on money without consulting someone else. I think it really depends on your situation.
As a person who will help administer a trust but not be guardian to the children, I like this approach. I don’t decide how to invest, etc., that is left to the attorney and financial planner with my oversight. I do get to be the go between and I feel like that will lessen the burden on the guardian. I get to represent the children and their interest and at the same time make sure their financial future is protected. It can be some pretty tough stuff but I think well worth the effort to make sure our families are protected. As difficult as it is, you should also write out what your wishes are in terms of funeral arrangments. What would you like and how would you like it handled. This can make things so much easier on our families.
I’m an attorney, but I still put this off way too long. When I finally got around to doing it (after my second child was born), one of my colleagues helped me, and I was very pleased. I would recommend any of the Trusts & Estates attorneys at my firm (Womble Carlyle). Two in particular would be Liz Coss (ecoss@wcsr.com, 704-331-4954) and Edward Griggs (egriggs@wcsr.com, 336-721-3762).
We used George Sperry in the Ballantyne area. He was great and made everything very easy for us. We met once to go over everything and again to sign and that was it. I think this is so important, if not for you, for those who will be handling things should something happen to you.
My husband and I recently did this and we are so pleased. It took time and money but I am so glad we did it. We prepare for so many things in life–from registering our children for preschool and summer camps to packing for family trips. This is a HUGE task to do for your children as important (if not more) than saving for college. Yes it scary to think of myself or my husband (or both) dying and leaving our children while they are young but what’s scarier than that? Not making our wishes for how we would like for them to be raised in our absence known to the rest of our family. Endure a few uncomfortable hours (for those of you scared to face the matter of death & dying) and prepare for them in the event something happens. We also used Todd Stewart here in the SouthPark area and he was a joy to work with. Shane Tenny and John Dameron are great to work with for any financial planning issues. They are with Spaugh, Dameron, Tenny. 704-557-9696