FAQ's for Estate Planning


What is an estate plan?

What is the reason for creating an estate plan?

What does estate planning consist of?


What is an estate plan?

Estate planning is creating a plan for managing your assets while you are alive and then distributing them after your death.


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What is the reason for creating an estate plan?

People commonly create an estate plan to specify how their property should be distributed after their passing. Of equal importance is the desire to structure the assets—through the use of appropriate legal instruments and forms of ownership—so as to maximize their value and minimize the amounts of legal fees, costs, and especially federal and state taxes.


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What does estate planning consist of?

Typically, we will review the way assets are titled (i.e., different forms of ownership such as joint ownership, etc.) Then we write a will specifying how the different assets are to be distributed. In many cases, we also create a trust which can reduce the amount of taxes that the estate must pay, as well as advanced directives such as durable powers of attorney and living wills.


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