Long Island Elder Law & Estate Planning

attorney drawing up a willThe legal document called a last will or last will and testament is an estate planning tool that is widely utilized, and most people have heard of this document. You can use a last will to facilitate asset distributions to your heirs after you are gone.

If you have minor children, you can also use a will to nominate a guardian to care for the children if a guardianship was ever to become necessary

A last will can be acceptable under simple circumstances, but there are other asset transfer vehicles out there, and you should explore them thoroughly before you make any final decisions.

In addition to the last will, there are some other types of wills that are used in the field of estate planning. Let’s look at these wills and examine the reasons why you may want to include them in your estate plan.

End-of-Life Planning

Many people become unable to communicate decisions in real-time toward the end of their lives. You can account for this through the inclusion of estate planning documents called advance directives for health care.

A living will is one of these directives. Doctors can sometimes keep terminal patients alive indefinitely through the utilization of artificial means. With a living will, you state your life support preferences. Physicians would be compelled to follow your wishes if you ever become unable to communicate.

Whether you would want medical professionals to implement life-sustaining measures is a personal decision. You can make sure that your own wishes are honored if you include a living will in your estate plan.

Pour-Over Will

Revocable living trusts are very popular among people who want to facilitate efficient asset distributions. If you were to establish a living trust, the successor trustee that you name in the trust declaration would be empowered distribute assets to the heirs to the estate in a timely and efficient manner.

However, you do not lose control of the assets in the trust while you are living, because you can act as the trustee and the beneficiary while you are alive and well.

You do not have to allow for lump sum distributions when you establish and fund a living trust. If you want to make sure that the beneficiaries receive smaller distributions for an extended period of time, you can leave behind these instructions when you create the trust declaration.

When you establish a living trust, you may not convey all of your property into the trust for one reason or another. To account for this, you could add a document called a pour-over will. This type of will would allow the trust to absorb assets that were in your direct personal possession at the time of your passing.

Ethical Will

The last will we will look at here is the ethical will. This type of will is utilized to pass along your moral and spiritual values, and ethical wills have been used for centuries. If you author an ethical will, your wisdom and guidance will always be available to your loved ones, even after you are gone.

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About Eghrari Wealth Training Law Firm

Mark S. Eghrari is an attorney in private practice in Smithtown, New York. He has been in practice since 1988. Mark S. Eghrari provides extensive estate and tax planning services to individuals and businesses. Mr. Eghrari’s primary focus is helping clients avoid probate, minimize or eliminate Federal and State Estate taxes and protect their assets from the high cost of nursing care, if they become ill.