Married Nuclear Family With Children

When you are married and you and your spouse only have children with each other, estate planning seems pretty straightforward.

You want your spouse making decisions for you if you are incapacitated, and you want your assets go to your spouse when you die and then to your children after you and your spouse are gone.

Seems simple, right?

If only our probate courts weren’t clogged with the impact of the complexity of money, family, and expense, with sometimes as much as 5.5% of the value of the estate going to various probate fees and expenses. Then there is the issue of making sure that no assets are forgotten about or lost to the Missouri Treasurer’s Department of Unclaimed Property, which at the time of this email holds $1 billion dollars largely from unclaimed financial accounts and safe deposit boxes.  And finally, what if the children experience the horrendous loss of both parents at the same time – who will step in to take care of them, and what happens to the treasures left behind to care for them if they are too young to hold title in their name?

Some serious and important tactical decisions need to be made and properly documented in a comprehensive and curated estate plan, usually in the form of a protective trust, to ensure your family is well taken care of and stays in love, out of court and out of conflict in the event of your incapacity or death, and that your treasures go to who you choose to receive them, not to who the State’s plan defaults to in the absence of your own plan, or to their Department of Unclaimed Property. 

We know you are busy, and our mission is to help you get this important rite of passage taken care of, and to make the process as simple and easy for you as possible.