Wills And Trusts

An advanced directive is an important estate planning document that discusses someone's medical preferences. People may want to avoid certain medications because addiction runs in their family or may have specific wishes about resuscitation or life support after a...

Proper estate planning requires various “what if” scenarios. Creating documents that adheres to your priorities is the initial step while accounting for a certain level of flexibility in case circumstances change. Open lines of communication with children helps them...

A trust is a legal entity that you create to fulfill a specific purpose. Trusts often serve to hold, invest and distribute assets during someone's golden years or as part of the administration of their estate. Although people often dismiss the idea of a trust as...

When you have a child, you likely understand that you are now responsible for them even if something happens to you. Becoming a parent is one of the most commonly cited reasons people give for finally creating an estate plan. You can ensure that your children will...

When you work on your estate plan, it’s with the intention of protecting yourself and those you care about. You probably know that a will is the first document most people discuss and create. A will isn’t the only document you’ll need, though. Relying on just a...

If you have always thought about estate planning as something to do when you get older, now may be the time to sit down and reconsider that. It is inevitable that everyone will eventually need help and support as they age. While the need for nursing home care or...

Maybe you just finished your own estate plan because your spouse is pregnant with your first child. Perhaps you just watched your best friend struggle through a difficult estate administration process when their only parent died unexpectedly. There are numerous...

The amount of wealth in the United States can be fairly hard to comprehend. The numbers blur together and distinctions between even major amounts of money -- a billion and a trillion, for instance -- can be difficult to grasp with the proper sense of scale. However,...

People often put off their estate planning. When you hear talk about how most Americans don’t have a will, the implication is that they don’t want one or never plan to get one. For most people, though, that’s not true. They generally do want to make an estate plan and...

Middle-aged adults can find themselves in a really difficult social situation. They may have young children, teenagers or college students who still depend on them while they also find themselves worrying about their parents' health. If your parents have serious...