A few days ago, I finished reviewing and approving my third Will & Testament.
I have revised my Will three times — at 25, 42 and 50. It's just part of the normal process we all need to go through.
We all have the same worries about taking care of our family. Reviewing a Will also means reading related documents. I have a few partnerships and trusts, plus my medical and financial Power of Attorney forms. Creating these documents occurred at different times.
Finally, all of these documents have to be in sync. 211 pages. Ugh!
However, the review focus of a Will & Testament plus related documents hinges on more than tax and legal stuff. We all need to consider our assets, philosophy of our money, and our family.
Not easy.
As a co-founder of Wealth Advisors Trust Company, I hold myself accountable to the best estate planning practices. We all learn by sharing processes, successes, and failures.
This is what the review process looks like for your Will & Testament.
Will & Testament Review Process
I delayed the Will & Testament review by 11 months. Rather than delay any further, after Christmas 2017, I set aside 4 hours of reading and thinking time.
It took a while to frame out the review process and the end result. The trickiest part revolved around the philosophy of my assets and my family.
Any Will & Testament needs to provide enough guidance without too many restrictions — a tough balance. Nevertheless, examples exist all around us of horror stories from over- or under-planning a Will.
The photo below shows a rough sketch of my approach to analyze my current Will and related documents. Notwithstanding this analysis, it needed to be communicated to my estate planning attorney.
Will & Testament Communication Process
Attorneys of all sorts love words. Some are economical with their words like John Steinbeck, and other are verbose like Charles Dickens.
(I try to mimic John Steinbeck.)
This provides two advantages. Firstly, the attorney spends less time and money understanding your goals, questions, and observations. Secondly, you force yourself to provide clear and thoughtful guidance, questions, and information to the attorney.
I have found this provides a great outcome. It works for me. Naturally, everybody has their own style.
The illustration below shows the rough example of the email to my attorney. It provided all the Will & Testament analysis, questions, issues, and more.
Final Step
All it takes is one phone call for 15 minutes, and you can make a Will & Testament that works for you and your family.
A one-hour meeting.
Consequently, new documents arrived about two weeks later.
Conclusion
People who are not familiar with this stuff can still follow the rough pattern and process.
Nevertheless, the key point for everyone rests on reading ALL the documents.
Above all, be aware and honest that you will follow every step in the Will & Testament plus related documents. If you don't, they may not work as intended.
I have set-up a task on Salesforce.com to review it again at 57 unless something big changes.
This cobbler's kids do have shoes.
I hope this helps shed some light on very real and personal issues we must deal with.