There was a great post recently by Jennifer Sawday, an estate planning attorney in California, in which she talks about some of the reasons people don’t make an estate plan. The three she came up with were: price, fear and not knowing the consequences of not making a plan.
I would add to this list: difficulty in making the decisions to form the plan. There are a lot of decisions that need to be made for your estate plan: who will make your health care decisions for you, who will make financial and other decisions for you, who will act as the guardian of your children, how will you divide your property, who will act as the trustee for your trust? For some people these are easy decisions, for some they are more difficult. But the harder they are to make, the more important it is for you to make them. If you can’t decide who you want to act as guardian for your children, what would happen if that need arises? Will your families be in Court fighting over custody and letting the judge make the most crucial decision?
All of these obstacles to making an estate plan can be overcome by talking to an attorney. Your attorney can let you know the price of the estate plan so that you can begin to work it into your budget, your attorney can reassure you that drafting an estate plan will not cause bad things to happen to you, and your attorney can explain the consequences of not executing an estate plan. In addition, your attorney can facilitate some of the decision making that needs to be done by letting you and your spouse or partner know the decisions that will need to be made, what the different roles are of the people you will be appointing, and asking questions to help you explore the areas where you might be stuck. It might take some time, but by starting the process you are half way there.
(I like to add pictures to my posts, and today’s picture is of my niece, Audrey June, at the Public Gardens in Boston wearing a dress and pants that I made for her.)
Leanna, I agree! Difficulty in making decisions can be a barrier for estate planning. I hear this from single individuals more than couples or those who do not have children. I was going to follow-up on this post yesterday and add “busy” as another reason. People are really busy these days. But is it an excuse or does it relate to unawareness? If they knew how important it was, they’d make time for it, right? Anyway, I like your additional comments.