An estate plan is the process of preparing legal documents to control what happens upon death or incapacity, to assure that your family is taken care of in the event something happens to you and to guarantee that your personal wishes are followed upon your death. Despite how important estate planning is to all of us, most of us put it off because we do not want to think about dying or becoming incapacitated, do not think we have enough assets to make putting a plan in place worthwhile or perhaps feel we aren’t old enough for an estate plan.
The main goals of estate planning are to (i) maximize wealth transfer; (ii) protect against disability; (iii) minimize the difficulty, expenses and family feuds associated with transferring property at death; and (iv) to be able to control the disposition of our assets when we pass away.