March Madness is upon us! This is the most exciting season for college basketball fans, and everyone is waiting with bated breath to see how their brackets will turn out (for some of us, our answer came disappointingly early).

March Madness involves picking the right people to carry out a common goal, and, in that sense, planning your estate can be viewed a lot like picking your bracket. You need to have the right people in the right positions to carry out the goal of distributing your assets fairly after you die.

The Different Spots to Fill

There are many different spots to fill when it comes to your estate plan. There are different documents, appointees, and other means by which you can control your asset distribution.

Here are a few of these positions that you need to consider filling.

• Beneficiaries are people you designate to receive your assets. You want your things to go to people you trust. Select beneficiaries who will be able to handle the assets you transfer to them. For example, the cryptocurrency Bitcoin has been making the headlines lately. It is a digital currency that is volatile, tradeable and an asset that only experienced people should handle. If you’re selecting a beneficiary to get your Bitcoin, you want to make sure that they are knowledgeable about the currency and able to handle it. Think this carefully about all your assets.
• If you create a living trust, you will have a trustor (you), trustee, and beneficiary. You, the trustor, transfer property to the trustee, who becomes the nominal owner until they grant the property to the beneficiary. They grant the property to the beneficiary at your instruction, whether it’s when the beneficiary reaches 18 or at some other point. Pick a trustee that you know will follow your instructions down to the letter.
• In an estate plan, you can also include instructions on who will be the guardian of your minor children. We don’t need to tell you how important it is to pick the right person—you already know. This is another reason why estate planning is so important. If you have kids, you need to make sure that you have peace of mind on what will happen to them if you die.
• Power of attorney. Your power of attorney makes financial decisions for you in the event you are too incapacitated to make them yourself. In your estate plan, you can choose who this important person will be. After you pick the person, you can work with them to ensure they know your wishes and how to carry them out if something happens.
• Healthcare directive. This isn’t necessarily a position so much as it is a set of instructions. A healthcare directive details what a hospital should do for your medical care if you’re too sick to voice your own wishes. This way, you get the care you desire when you need it most.

Much like your March Madness bracket, you need to make sure that the people you choose are able to make the cut. Pick individuals who are responsible and able to handle the duties you give them and follow your directions precisely.

You’ve probably, at some point or another, seen those ads that offer DIY-legal services. These ads claim that, by using their site, you’ll be able to create your own will in less time, with far less expense. Or perhaps you’ve decided to buy a book on estate planning and go for it yourself. While it’s true that you’ll create something, and you’ll probably do it cheaply, do-it-yourself estate planning is a move that will cost you more in the long run.

See, while self-produced legal services may seem tempting, they have a lot of negatives. You won’t get lucky and make the perfect estate plan—luck’s got nothing to do with it. You need a qualified estate planning attorney to get the job done right. In this article, we’ll talk about the dangers and downsides of DIY-estate planning.

Mistakes are Easy to Make and Hard to Fix

Lawyers go to law school for years. Estate planners train in the specific field of estate planning law, and even they check their documents over once, twice, three times or more before finalizing them. Typos, confusion with the legal terms, and problems with the signing are all major areas where DIY wills go wrong.

Requirements can seem nitpicky when it comes to estate planning, but these requirements serve an important state interest: preventing fraud. When it comes to witnesses, things get a little tricky. For example, some state laws dictate that a witness to the will cannot be a beneficiary of anything in it, while other laws require witnesses to all sign in one another’s presence. DIY will-making sites, which often service all 50 states with a boilerplate form, are unlikely to tell you that.

The problem isn’t the screw-up, it’s the fact that the error won’t be caught until after you’ve passed on. That’s when your document will have to go through court because it was handled improperly. The court process will be long and difficult, and it’s unlikely that your plan will be carried out the way you wanted it. And, again, this witnessing slipup is just one example of many pitfalls that accompany estate planning.

The “One-Size-Fits-All” Misconception

DIY services are often one-size-fits-all, meaning that they are not specific to your particular estate. Every estate is different, and attempting to standardize it all into a “one hour or less” planning session just isn’t realistic.

For example, you may want to pass on savings bonds to your beneficiaries, or some other similar asset. These assets, however, do not generally pass through a will or living trust. If you try to designate them through those documents, it will become very messy. Coordinating the different assets with the right documents is something an experienced lawyer will be able to do.

Also, DIY estate planners often leave too much up to their family, simply trusting that their family members will “do the right thing” and intuit what the writers mean in their self-made will. However, if family members always cooperated all the time, there would likely be no needed for estate planning altogether. You want to make sure you have, in clear, precise, correct terms what you want done after you die. That will shield against family fights or schisms that could lead to your will be interpreted in a way you did not intend.

Basically, while a DIY service might be cheaper, it actually costs you more in the long run, as slipups and errors, as well as problems coordinating the documents, can lead to major issues with executing your estate plan after you die. The best course of action is to schedule an estate planning consultation.

St. Patrick’s Day is fast approaching, and, as we all know, everyone’s trying to get the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. However, what you may not realize is you’re already sitting on a pot of gold: your estate. And, not only do you have this gold, you also need to protect it. Estate planning is the process by which you decide where your assets will go after you die. But, that’s not all that an estate plan protects. It also helps with medical care and property while you’re still alive.

In this article, we will look at the many ways your estate plan can protect your pot of gold, both before and after you die.

Before You Go

If you were to ask people on the street what they think estate planning entails, you’d probably get a lot of answers about a last will and testament. But after death isn’t the only time your estate plan comes in handy. With it, you can protect, while still living:

• Your medical needs.

If you are in incapacitated or unconscious, that doesn’t mean that you won’t need medical care, and it also doesn’t mean that your medical care has to become depersonalized. Through estate planning, you can have what is known as an advanced healthcare directive, where you dictate details about your medical care that you wish to receive during this period. This is also called a living will. Your medical needs and wishes will be protected through this estate planning document.

• Your financial needs.

Similarly, if you are incapacitated, you will want someone to make your financial decisions for you and keep your finances in good order. Through a power of attorney, you can select someone you trust to make these decisions, providing protection for your finances.

Protecting Your Pot of Gold After You Pass

Estate planning also allows you to make arrangements after you’ve passed on. By having a living trust, you can avoid probate court and have your assets moved to the correct places as quickly as possible. Here are the things that estate planning can protect after you have passed on:

• Assets.

Obviously, estate planning through documents such as a living trust will ensure that your money and property will go where you want them to when you’re not around. A living trust is a three-party fiduciary relationship between a donor (the person giving the asset), trustee (the person the donor gives it to temporarily), and the beneficiary (the asset’s eventual destination. You can ensure your estate is wrapped up as quickly as possible using these types of tools.

• Your beneficiaries

If you plan your estate properly, you won’t have to go through probate court, which is a long, difficult process your family will not want to experience. Estate planning can also shield your estate from certain liabilities and taxes, saving your family money.

Estate planning can help you protect your pot of gold, distributing it where you want it and saving your family a lot of time and hassle in the future.

As the saying goes around this office, “First comes love, then comes marriage, then comes Michael Wild in a baby carriage!”

While estate planning might not seem romantic, and you probably don’t usually finish that rhyme with Michael Wild, there is something to be said for estate planning as a romantic gesture. It certainly indicates a lot of commitment to your spouse, family, and the people who mean the most to you. No Valentine? No problem. Estate planning is still vitally important for you, even if you’re a bachelor or bachelorette.

Estate Planning & Marriage

If you’re getting married or are currently married, you should definitely be creating or updating your estate plan. An estate plan decides where your assets will be transferred when you die. Here are some things to consider when including your spouse in your future.

• Marital property. Marital property is jointly owned between you and your spouse. It is property that you purchased using marital assets. You and your spouse will have to decide where you want it to go in the event of your death. Because it is marital property, it needs to be a decision made that involves the two of you.
• If you die, you will probably want to make your spouse a beneficiary of at least some of your assets. In an estate plan, you can specify your spouse as the beneficiary through a living trust, which sets up a three-party relationship whereby the trustee grants your spouse the assets upon your death. You can also make your spouse the trustee for your children, who you can make beneficiaries.
• Decision-making in emergencies. An advance directive allows you to delineate the healthcare choices you want in case you sink into a coma or are otherwise too incapacitated to make these decisions. You can also name your spouse as a decisionmaker, if you choose. You can name them Power of Attorney, which gives them the authority to make financial decisions on your behalf if you are unable to make them yourself.
• Money is pretty romantic, and the tax cuts that estate planning can get you and your spouse will be pretty significant, particularly since the estate tax will soon be dissipating in a few years’ time.

Don’t Forget the Kids

Your “baby carriage” probably won’t have Michael Wild in it, but he definitely can help you figure out how to best take care of your kids via estate planning. If you have minor children, you definitely need to make sure that you assign guardianship to them in the event of your death. You can also put aside money for your kids’ colleges and name them as beneficiaries or your Power of Attorney. Your children will benefit highly from your estate plan.

No Kids, No Spouse, No Problem

If you’re single and childless, you should still have an estate plan. You likely have assets and property and, if you die, you don’t want to drag your relatives through probate court. Estate planning can divide up your property and transfer it quickly, with as little hassle as possible.

This Valentine’s Day, show your loved ones commitment and care by creating an estate plan or updating a currently existing one. No matter what your status in life, everyone can benefit from estate planning.

Divorce is a bummer (or maybe not, depending on your situation). It impacts almost every area of your life, and your estate plan is no different. While estate planning might not be high on your to-do list during the divorce process, you should still take some time to consider which documents need to be updated.

Divorce laws vary based on your state, but, overall, the legal principle is the same: it is the termination of the marital bond and restructuring or canceling of martial obligations. Both the pre- and post-divorce phases require action on your part when it comes to your estate plan.

Before the Divorce is Final

There are several documents you need to

update before the divorce is final. These include your living trust, living will, Power of Attorney, and will. You cannot assume that the completion of the divorce will immediately terminate your ex-spouse’s involvement in your estate plan. While that may be the case for the will, it’s not always so for the others.

• Living trust. Your trust will be interpreted based on whether it is revocable or not. A trust that is revocable at the time of your death, provisions in the trust regarding your ex-spouse will be invalid. But, if your trust is irrevocable and you die with the trust still naming your ex-spouse as beneficiary, he or she is going to get all your things. The law cannot help you in this situation.

• Living will. Your living will concerns healthcare directives and other related issues. If you fall ill and are incapacitated, who is your agent? If it is your ex-spouse, you may want to change that. If you feel comfortable with the person you’ve just divorced making critical life-or-death decisions about your medical care, then you should keep them as your agent. If not, make the change. It is not always clear whether a state’s laws will automatically excuse your ex-spouse from his or her duties in your living will.

• Power of Attorney. Generally, depending on the state in which you live, if your spouse is your power of attorney and you divorce him or her, this grant of power will be revoked once the action for divorce is filed. However, the whole power of attorney is not revoked in its entirety. Your spouse may still be named as guardian, and that will not be revoked until the final decree.

• Will. Depending on when you made your will, the final decree of divorce will generally revoke any provisions in the will concerning your ex-spouse. This only applies to your ex-spouse. Your ex-spouse’s kids are not kicked off the will, so if that’s something you want to do, you cannot count on the rule of law doing it for you.

Post-Divorce: What You Need to Do

So, you’ve made it, and the final decree has happened. Now what?

Well, in your estate plan, you will likely have some gaps to fill, including power of attorney, agent, beneficiaries, and other roles from which you have removed your ex-spouse. You will need to restructure and re-do your estate plan to make sure those critical positions are covered. Schedule an estate planning consultation today, regardless of whether you are pre- or post-divorce.

Start Anew, Update Your Estate Plan

There’s one New Year’s resolution you should definitely make and keep: updating your estate plan. With each year comes new considerations, and your estate plan should reflect these. You might be tempted to put off your estate plan updates, but you never know what will happen. It’s better to be safe than sorry, as the old saying goes.

Here are some examples of life changes and how you may want to update your estate plan to reflect them.

New Year, New Beneficiaries

Has there been a new baby in the family? Have you recently stumbled upon a new charity to which you want to donate? In order to do so, you will need to update your estate plan. This way, after you pass on, your assets will be transferred where you want them, including to the new beneficiary.

It’s important to get started on this now and updating your estate plan to reflect the new individual. People come and go in our lives, and you don’t want to miss your opportunity to include who you want in your postmortem plans.

Rethinking Guardianship

If you have minor children, you’ve likely included a guardianship instrument in your estate plan that designates who will be the legal guardian of your kids in the event of something happening to you. If you’re still happy with the legal guardian you’ve chosen, that’s great. However, if you are not, you don’t want to wait to have that switched.

Things happen, and if you have reason to doubt the competency of the guardian you’ve chosen for your kids, you do not want to take a chance and put off updating it. Worst case scenario, something happens and your kids are left with someone who cannot take care of them. If you have doubts about your chosen guardian, make sure to update your estate plan.

Family Feuding

Similarly, there may have been other developments in your family that warrant you rethinking your estate plan. Divorce is an example. You will want to make sure that the estate plan does not include your ex-spouse (or the ex-spouse of another family member), if you do not want it to. Also, if you feel like you want to disinherit someone, that is another reason to update your estate plan.

It is best to think of the estate plan as a living document. It reflects changes in your family; it is not stagnant, nor should it be treated as such. Families have their own feuds and fighting. An estate plan needs to keep up with the dynamics, if need be.

The Imminent Arrival of the 2018 Tax Code

The 2018 tax code is bringing some new changes with it. And by “some,” we mean a lot. Two of these changes have to do with the estate and gift taxes. By 2024, there will be no estate tax. But, for now, if your estate is under $22.4 million as a married couple, you get an exemption. And, since the estate tax is often unified with the gift tax, that further extends the exemption on money you can give away. This new update is another reason you will likely want to look at your estate plan.

New year, new updates! Consult your estate planner to make sure that your plans reflect any changes in your life during the past year.