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With divorce occurring in roughly 50% of all marriages in the U.S. and life expectancy increasing every day, second—and even third—marriages are becoming quite common. And when people get remarried in mid-life and beyond, they often bring children from prior marriages into the mix. Such unions are often referred to as a “blended” family or a “Brady Bunch” family.

But blended families can also take other forms. Whether you have stepchildren, adopted children, children from a previous relationship, or you have someone you consider “kin,” even though that individual might not be classified as your legal relative in the eyes of the law, these are also examples of a blended family.

Whenever you merge two families into one, you are naturally going to encounter some challenges and conflict. To this end, blended families present a number of particularly challenging legal and financial issues from an estate planning perspective. Indeed, though all families should have an estate plan, planning is absolutely essential for those with blended families.

If you have a blended family and something happens to you, without a carefully considered estate plan, your loved ones are at risk for significant misunderstanding and conflict, and having your assets tied up in court, instead of passing to those you want to receive them. Unless you are okay with setting your loved ones up for heartache, confusion, and pain when something happens to you, you need an estate plan that’s intentionally designed by an experienced lawyer (not an online document service) to keep your loved ones out of court and out of conflict.

While you should meet with us, your Personal Family Lawyer® to plan for your particular family situation, here are a few of the most common issues blended families should keep in mind when creating or updating their estate plan.

1. Keeping Your Assets Separate

If you get remarried and have children from a previous marriage, you need to think about how you want to balance providing for your new spouse and ensuring the children from your previous marriage receive an inheritance from you, in the event of your incapacity or when you die.

If you intend to keep your assets separate, so each spouse can pass an inheritance to his or her own children, you’ll need to create and maintain separate financial accounts. For instance, one account contains the assets you want to pass on to your children, and the other can be either a separate or joint account that contains the assets you want to share with your new spouse.

Keep in mind, if you and your spouse commingle your income and assets, then the new spouse will have claim and control of those assets when you die, which can easily leave your kids with nothing. Moreover, joint accounts can be subject to claims from a former spouse and/or creditors, so unless you want your new spouse to share that risk, keep at least some of your assets separate.

And if you’re keeping assets separate, be sure to talk with us, your Personal Family Lawyer® about the best ways to do that, since it can get somewhat tricky, particularly when you are sharing some assets and buying new assets together with your new spouse.

2. Issues With Inheritance Timing

If you have children for whom you want to leave an inheritance, you need to consider how and when you want those assets to be passed on. For example, what would happen if you die prematurely or if your spouse is significantly younger than you? Do you want your kids to wait until your new spouse dies to receive their inheritance, or do you want them to receive it immediately following your death? Perhaps you desire to create a hybrid in which your children receive a small inheritance at the time of your death, and they receive the rest upon the death of your new spouse, which could be many years in the future.

Establishing trusts for each spouse’s children can protect those assets and stipulate when the kids receive their inheritance. You may want to provide your children with some of their inheritance, such as proceeds from a life insurance policy, upon your death, and then release the rest at some point in the future. Or if your kids are very young, you may decide to leave that decision up to your spouse or a third-party successor trustee, who can better determine the most advantageous time to pass on your children’s inheritance to them.

As your Personal Family Lawyer®, we will work with you, taking into account your unique family dynamics, assets, and potential areas of risk and conflict to help you determine the optimal time to pass on your wealth and other assets to your heirs to ensure it has the maximum benefit for everyone involved.

3. Carefully Consider Your Trustees

A common scenario for blended families is for one spouse to set up a revocable living trust that names themselves as the trustee during his or her lifetime, with the surviving spouse named as successor trustee once the first spouse dies. Yet, this would leave all decisions related to the trust assets to the surviving spouse, which could cause conflict with the children from your prior marriage.

For example, the new spouse may choose to invest the trust assets conservatively, ensuring he or she has enough money to live comfortably for a few decades, instead of investing the assets for growth. On the other hand, the children—particularly if they are younger—might be better off having the assets placed into higher-risk investments, which can offer better returns in the long run, but leave less income for the surviving spouse.

In this case, it could be best to name a neutral third-party as successor trustee, so both your children and surviving spouse’s interests can be balanced fairly.

4. Preventing Conflict

If you are in a second (or more) marriage, with children from a prior marriage, the conflicting interests of your children and spouse can create serious strife between them in the event something happens to you. To reduce the likelihood of conflict, your estate plan needs to contain clear and unambiguous terms, spelling out the beneficiaries’ exact rights, along with the rights and responsibilities of executors and/or trustees. Such precise terms help ensure all parties know exactly what you intended.

Additionally, it’s essential that you meet with all affected parties within your blended family while you’re still alive (and of sound mind) to clearly explain your wishes directly, if you hope for your loved ones to love each other after you are gone. Sharing your intentions and hopes for the future with your new spouse and children from a prior marriage can go a long way in preventing disagreements over your wishes for each of them.

As your Personal Family Lawyer®, we can even facilitate these meetings to help ensure your blended family maintains a harmonious relationship no matter what happens to you.

5. Planning For Incapacity

In addition to planning for your eventual death, you must also plan for your potential incapacity. In this case, you’ll need to discuss how planning vehicles for your incapacity, such as a durable financial power of attorney, medical power of attorney, and a living will will be handled.

For example, if you become incapacitated, who would you want making your legal, financial, and medical decisions for you? If your children are young, it’s best to leave those decisions up to your surviving spouse. However, if your children are older, you may want them included in the discussion of how such decisions will be made. Or you may prefer to name one of your adult children as your decision maker, or you might divide the different duties between your spouse and adult children.

Regardless of what you choose, we can support you to create an estate plan that ensures your incapacity will be managed exactly how you would want in every possible scenario.

Bringing Families Together

Along with other major life events like births, deaths, and divorce, entering into a second (or more) marriage requires you to carefully review and rework your estate plan. And updating your plan is exponentially more important when there are children involved.

As your Personal Family Lawyer®, we’ve been specially trained to counsel blended families on how to properly protect their assets in a manner that’s best for both the spouse and any children involved. We will ensure that you and your new spouse can clearly document and communicate your wishes to avoid any confusion or conflict over how assets and/or legal agency will be managed and passed on in the event of one spouse’s death or incapacity.

If you have a blended family, or are in the process of merging two families into one, sit down with us, your Personal Family Lawyer® to discuss your different planning options. Contact us today to schedule your visit.

This article is a service of a Personal Family Lawyer®. We do not just draft documents; we ensure you make informed and empowered decisions about life and death, for yourself and the people you love.

Proper estate planning can keep your family out of conflict, out of court, and out of the public eye. Are you ready to protect your loved ones and legacy? Check out my next presentation.

If you’re looking to collect life insurance proceeds as the policy’s beneficiary, the process is fairly simple. However, during the emotional period immediately following a loved one’s death, it can feel as if your entire world is falling apart, so it’s helpful to understand exactly what steps you need to take to access the insurance funds as quickly and easily as possible.

Not to mention, if you’ve been dependent on the person who died for financial support and/or you are responsible for paying for the funeral or other expenses, the need to access insurance money can be downright urgent. Plus, unlike other assets, an estate’s executor typically isn’t involved with collecting life insurance proceeds, since benefits pass directly to a beneficiary, so this is something you will need to handle yourself.

With this in mind, we’ve outlined the typical procedure for claiming and collecting life insurance proceeds, along with discussing how beneficiaries can deal with common hiccups in the process. However, because all life insurance policies are different and some involve more complexities than others, consult with us, your Personal Family Lawyer® if you need any support or guidance.

Filing A Claim

Death benefits are not automatically paid out from a life insurance policy. In order to collect the proceeds, you must first file a claim with the life insurance company. But before you start the claims process, you must first identify the beneficiary of the policy: are you the beneficiary, or is the policy set up to be paid to a trust?

We often recommend that life insurance proceeds be paid to a trust, not outright to a beneficiary. This way, the life insurance proceeds are protected from lawsuits, creditors, and even a divorce that a beneficiary may be involved with at the time they collect the funds.

In the event a trust is the beneficiary, contact us, your Personal Family Lawyer®, so we can create a certificate of trust that you (or the trustee, if the trustee is someone other than you) can send to the life insurance company, along with a death certificate, when it becomes available.

In any case, you (or the trustee) will notify the insurance company of the policyholder’s death, either by contacting a local agent or by following the instructions on the insurance company’s website. If the policy was provided through an employer, you may need to contact the insured’s workplace first, so they can put you in touch with the appropriate insurance representative.

Many insurance companies allow you to report the death over the phone or by sending in a simple form and do not require the actual death certificate at this stage. Depending on the cause of death, it can sometimes take weeks for the death certificate to be available, so this simplified reporting option can dramatically speed up the process.

From there, the insurance company typically sends the beneficiary more detailed forms to fill out, along with further instructions about how to proceed. Some of the information you’re likely to be asked to provide during the claims process include the insured’s date of birth, date and place of death, their Social Security number, marital status, address, as well as other personal data.

Your state’s vital records office creates the death certificate, and it will either send the certificate directly to you or route it through your funeral/mortuary provider. Once you’ve received a certified copy of the death certificate, you’ll need to send it to the insurance company, along with all of the other forms the insurance company requires you to complete.

Multiple Beneficiaries

If more than one adult beneficiary was named, each person should provide his or her own signed and notarized claim form. If any of the primary beneficiaries died before the policyholder, an alternate/contingent beneficiary can claim the proceeds. In that case, however, he or she will need to send in the death certificates of both the policyholder and the primary beneficiary.

Minor Beneficiaries

Although policyholders are free to name anyone as a beneficiary, when minor children are named, it creates serious complications, since insurance companies will not allow a minor to receive life insurance benefits directly until they reach the age of majority, which varies between states—in some it’s 18, and others it’s 21.

If a minor child is named as a beneficiary, you would need to go to court to be named as the child’s legal guardian in order to manage the funds until the child comes of age—and this is the case even if you’re the child’s natural parent. This is because unless you are specifically named as the guardian of the minor’s estate, you are not automatically considered the guardian of the child’s financial assets, even as their parent.

This is why you should never name a minor child as a life insurance beneficiary, even as a backup to the primary beneficiary. Rather than naming a minor as the beneficiary, it’s often better to set up a trust to receive the proceeds. In that case, the proceeds are paid into the trust, and whomever is named as trustee will collect the insurance proceeds and manage the funds for the child’s benefit until he or she comes of age.

Moreover, within the terms of the trust, you can also spell out exactly how you’d like the trustee to manage the money for the child and even how the child can use the funds once they’ve reached adulthood.

In any case, you should consult with us, your Personal Family Lawyer® to determine the best options for passing on your life insurance benefits and other assets to minor children.

Insurance Claim Payments

Provided you fill out the forms properly and include a certified copy of the death certificate, insurance companies typically pay out life insurance claims fairly quickly. In fact, some claims are paid within one to two weeks of the start of the process, and rarely do claims take more than 60 days to be paid. Most insurance companies will offer you the option to collect the proceeds via a mailed check or transfer the funds electronically directly to your account.

Delayed Payouts

The payout of life insurance proceeds can be delayed for a number of reasons. Beneficiaries often face delays if the policyholder dies within two years of the policy being issued. This is due to the fact that most life insurance policies contain a contestability period.

Most contestability periods are typically between one to two years, and if the insured dies during this period, the insurance company can investigate the claim to ensure that the policyholder didn’t commit fraud on the policy application by lying about underlying health problems, family medical history, or other conditions.

That said, provided the insurance company doesn’t discover fraud or other issues with the application, it will most likely pay the claim once the investigation is wrapped up. If problems with the application are discovered, the insurance company might pay a reduced benefit or even deny the claim, depending on what is uncovered.

Payout may also be delayed when homicide is determined to be the insured’s cause of death and the beneficiary is a suspect. In this case, the payout is typically delayed until the beneficiary is cleared of any involvement in the insured’s death.

A few other common reasons insurance payouts may be delayed include:

• The insured committed suicide within two years of the policy being issued.
• The insured died during the course of illegal or criminal activity, such as a robbery or driving while intoxicated.
• The insured omitted risky activities, such as smoking or skydiving, on the policy application.

Additional Information

Sometimes an insurance company will request you to send in a completed W-9 form (Request for Taxpayer Identification Number and Certification) from the IRS in order to process a claim. Most of the time, a W-9 is requested if there is some question or issue with the records, such as having an address provided in a claim form that doesn’t match the one on file.

That said, a W-9 is simply a way for the insurance company to verify certain information in order to prevent fraud, so don’t be alarmed if you’re asked for one. This is a common verification practice, and it doesn’t automatically mean the company suspects you of fraud or plans to deny your claim.

We’re Here To Help

While collecting life insurance proceeds is often a simple process, don’t hesitate to reach out to us if you have questions or need support in any way. As your Personal Family Lawyer®, we are here to ensure the process goes as smoothly as possible for you during what is likely to be an extremely trying time. Contact us today to learn more.

This article is a service of a Personal Family Lawyer®. We do not just draft documents; we ensure you make informed and empowered decisions about life and death, for yourself and the people you love.

Proper estate planning can keep your family out of conflict, out of court, and out of the public eye. Are you ready to protect your loved ones and legacy? Check out my next presentation.

Law Mother was selected by Colorado Parent Magazine as a 2022 Family Favorites Top 3!

​Proper estate planning can keep your family out of conflict, out of court, and out of the public eye. Are you ready to protect your loved ones and legacy? Check out my next presentation.

As we are about to wrap up another Pride Month, the LGBTQ+ community faces an increasingly uncertain legal landscape. In the wake of the Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade, ending the recognition of a constitutional right to abortion, many are worried that other rights, especially those enjoyed by same-gender couples, might also be under threat.

In fact, with Roe overturned, legal experts warn that the Supreme Court’s new Republican majority may come for landmark LGBTQ-rights decisions next, including marriage equality established by Obergefell v. Hodges. In light of this potential challenge, it’s critical that same-gender couples ensure their estate plans are carefully reviewed and updated by an estate planning lawyer who understands the special needs of LGBTQ+ planning to address any such developments.

Although we will have to wait and see whether the Supreme Court ultimately decides to rule on marriage equality, same gender couples can act right now to put in place a number of proactive estate planning measures to ensure their relationships have the maximum legal protections.

While you should meet with us, your Personal Family Lawyer® to address your specific circumstances, here are answers to some frequently asked questions related to LGBTQ+ estate planning.

Q: My partner and I are in a registered domestic partnership in our state, but we are not married. Do we qualify for the same rights and benefits available to married couples?

A: No, domestic partnerships, civil unions, and other alternative legal relationships to marriage only offer rights and protections in the states that recognize them. Marriage is the only relationship that is recognized by the federal government.

Moreover, the rights and protections offered by domestic partnerships and civil unions can vary widely from state to state. In some states, for example, domestic partnerships and civil unions do not affect property rights between the two partners, while in other states they do.

If you want all of the rights and protections that come with having your relationship recognized by the federal government, marriage is your only option.

However, you can replicate almost all of the benefits of marriage through a comprehensive estate plan—what we call a Life & Legacy Plan—so give us a call and let’s discuss how we can support you in getting the right legal documents and plan in place for you and your partner.

Q: My partner and I have been living together for 10 years, but we are not married and have no desire to get married. I’ve created a will, but my partner has no estate plan at all. What would happen to me in the event my partner dies or becomes incapacitated?

A: If you are unmarried and your partner dies without any estate plan, your partner’s assets will be distributed to his or her surviving family members according to our state’s intestate succession laws. Those laws only apply to relatives in the eyes of the law, so you would have no right to inherit any of your partner’s assets.

If not remedied immediately, this could have catastrophic effects for you. For example, if your partner dies, and you are not named on the deed to a home you live in together, you could even be left homeless should the family member who inherits the house decide to kick you out.

Similarly, in the event of your partner’s incapacity, you would have no automatic right to make medical decisions on their behalf, nor would you be able to access any financial accounts that are solely in their name. Your partner’s family could even prevent you from visiting your partner in the hospital.

In light of these facts, if you are in an unmarried relationship and you want your partner to inherit any of your assets upon your death or have any say in how your healthcare and/or finances are managed in the event of your incapacity, it’s absolutely crucial that each of you create a Life & Legacy Plan that addresses both death and incapacity.

Q: What kind of estate planning tools typically make up an effective incapacity plan for LGBTQ+ or any unmarried couple?

A: Estate planning isn’t just about planning for your eventual death; it’s also about planning for your potential incapacity due to serious injury or illness. Creating an effective incapacity plan allows you to name the person (or persons) you would want to make your healthcare, legal, and financial decisions for you if you are incapacitated and unable to make such decisions yourself.

If you haven’t planned for incapacity, the choice is left up to the court to appoint a legal guardian to make these decisions on your behalf. If you are unmarried and the court appoints one of your relatives as your guardian, your family could leave your partner totally out of the medical decision-making process and even deny him or her the right to visit you in the hospital. And even if you are married, it’s not guaranteed that your spouse would have the ultimate legal authority to make such decisions.

Though the court typically gives spouses priority as guardians, this isn’t always the case, especially if unsupportive family members challenge the issue in court. To ensure your partner/spouse has the ability to make these decisions for you, you must grant him or her the legal authority to do so using medical power of attorney and durable financial power of attorney.

A medical power of attorney gives your partner/spouse the authority to make healthcare decisions for you if you’re incapacitated and unable to do so yourself. Similarly, a durable financial power of attorney gives your partner/spouse the authority to manage your financial, legal, and business affairs, including paying your bills and taxes, running your business, selling your home, as well as managing your banking and investment accounts.

Additionally, you should also create a living will, so that your partner/spouse will know exactly how you want your medical care managed in the event of your incapacity, particularly at the end of life. Finally, don’t forget to provide your partner/spouse with HIPAA authorization within the medical power of attorney, so they will have access to your medical records to make educated decisions about your medical treatment.

As your Personal Family Lawyer®, we will support you in putting in place a robust estate plan that will ensure that your partner/spouse has the maximum rights possible if you are ever struck by a debilitating accident or illness.

Q: My partner and I are married, and we both have a will. Is this a sufficient level of planning?

A: Although a will is a foundational part of nearly every adult’s estate plan, we recommend that couples who have assets—even those who are married—create both a will and a trust, if you want to ensure your loved ones stay out of court upon your incapacity or death.

A will does not work in the event of your incapacity, which could happen at any time before your death. Should you become incapacitated with only a will in place, your spouse may not have access to needed funds to pay bills, or they might even be forced to leave your home by a family member appointed as your guardian during your incapacity.

Furthermore, upon your death, a will is required to go through the often long, costly, and potentially conflict-ridden court process known as probate. In contrast, assets that are properly titled in the name of your trust would pass directly to your spouse upon your death, without the need for probate or any court intervention.

If your relationship is not supported by one or both families, avoiding court is especially important. If a family member doesn’t support your relationship, they are more likely to contest your will during probate. If your will is successfully contested, this could prevent your spouse from receiving assets you left in your will. Not only that, but the process of contesting a will is extremely time-consuming, costly, and emotionally draining for your surviving spouse.

Finally, when an attorney drafts your will, it is typically not set up to protect your assets after they are passed to your spouse from creditors or lawsuits. However, leaving your assets in a trust that your spouse can control would ensure the assets are protected from creditors, future relationships, and/or unexpected lawsuits.

Q: How can I ensure that my unmarried partner is able to carry out my wishes for my funeral arrangements?

A: To make certain that your partner has the legal authority to control your funeral arrangements, you should create a funeral directive, also known as a disposition of remains directive. This directive, which describes how you want your funeral or cremation arrangements carried out, can be included as part of your will, or it can be a separate stand-alone document.

Absent any estate planning, state law dictates who has the right to dispose of your remains and control your funeral, and if you are unmarried, this authority is typically given to your surviving family members. However, a properly drafted funeral directive allows LGTBQ+ couples to opt out of this default and designate the person you want to control your final arrangements.

Q: How can the non-biological parent in an LGTBQ+ relationship gain parental rights and avoid custody battles in the event of the biological parent’s death?

A: To ensure the full rights of a non-biological parent, many legal experts advise same-gender couples to undergo second-parent adoption. But in many states, it can be extremely difficult for same-gender couples to adopt. Some states even permit employees of state-licensed adoption agencies to refuse to grant an adoption if doing so violates their religious beliefs. And given the Supreme Court’s new conservative majority, such legal discrimation is likely to continue.

However, using a variety of estate planning strategies, as your local Personal Family Lawyer® we can provide non-biological, same-gender parents with some protection of their parental rights. Starting with our Kids Protection Plan®, LGBTQ couples can name the non-biological parent as the child’s legal guardian, both for the short-term and the long-term, while confidentially excluding anyone the biological parent thinks may challenge their wishes.

By doing so, if the biological parent becomes incapacitated or dies, his or her wishes are clearly stated, so the court can do what the parent would have wanted and keep the child in the non-biological parent’s care.

Beyond that, there are several other estate planning vehicles—living trusts, power of attorney, and advance healthcare directives—we can use to grant the non-biological parent additional rights. We can also create “co-parenting agreements,” which are legal agreements that stipulate exactly how the child will be raised, what responsibility each partner has toward the child, and what kind of rights would exist if the couple splits or gets divorced.

An Advocate For LGTBQ+ Rights

Given these uncertain times, it’s more important than ever for LGBTQ+ couples, especially those with children, to have a carefully prepared estate plan that’s been created by a lawyer with experience dealing with these issues, and avoid using online document services at all costs. As your Personal Family Lawyer®, you can trust us to create an estate plan that’s specifically designed to prevent court challenges by family members who disagree with your relationship, and provide your partner/spouse with the maximum legal and financial benefits possible.

Using our Life & Legacy Planning Process, us, your Personal Family Lawyer® can ensure that no matter what happens to you, your beloved will be protected and provided for in the exact manner you wish, rather than being stuck in a financial and legal nightmare. Furthermore, we can help ensure that non-biological parents in same-gender partnerships have as many parental rights as possible, without resorting to second-parent adoption. Contact us, your Personal Family Lawyer® today to learn more and get your plan started.

This article is a service of a Personal Family Lawyer®. We do not just draft documents; we ensure you make informed and empowered decisions about life and death, for yourself and the people you love.

Proper estate planning can keep your family out of conflict, out of court, and out of the public eye. Are you ready to protect your loved ones and legacy? Check out my next presentation.

These days, more and more young people are delaying—if not totally foregoing—a life that involves marriage and parenting. The lack of jobs, crushing student debt, multiple recessions, and the pandemic have pushed many young people into a life path that leaves little room for settling down with a partner and getting married—and even less room for having children.

Yet, for other young adults, staying single and childless is simply a matter of choice. Regardless of the reason, as more young adults opt for non-traditional lifestyles, the number of single childless households is likely to steadily increase in the coming years.

While most adults don’t take estate planning as seriously as they should, if you are single with no children, you might think that there’s really no need for you to worry about creating an estate plan. But this is a huge mistake. In fact, it can be even MORE important to have an estate plan if you are single and childless.

If you are single without kids, you face several potential estate planning complications that aren’t an issue for those who are married with children. And this is true whether you’re wealthy or have very limited assets. Indeed, without proper estate planning, you’re not only jeopardizing your wealth and assets, but you’re putting your life at risk, too. And that’s not even mentioning the potential conflict, mess, and expense you’re leaving for your surviving family and friends to deal with when something unexpected happens to you.

With this in mind, if you’re single and childless, consider these three inconvenient truths before you decide to forego estate planning.

1. Someone Will Have to Handle Your Stuff

Whether you’re rich, poor, or somewhere in between, in the event of your death, everything you own will need to be located, managed, and passed on to someone, which can be a massive undertaking in itself—one that few families are properly prepared for.

In fact, following a loved one’s death, American families spend an average of 500 hours and $12,700 over the course of 13 months (20 month if probate is required) to finalize the person’s affairs and settle their estate, according to the first annual Cost Of Dying report released this March by tech startup Empathy in partnership with Goldman Sachs. Look for additional articles in the coming weeks covering the Cost Of Dying and the new role Empathy is playing in the end-of-life industry.

On top of the logistical complications involved with finalizing your affairs, without a clear estate plan, including a will or trust, your assets will go through the court process of probate, where a judge and state law will decide who gets everything you own. In the event no family steps forward, your assets will become property of the state.

Why give the state everything you worked to build? And even if you have little financial wealth, you undoubtedly own a few sentimental items, maybe even including pets, that you’d like to pass to a close friend or favorite charity.

However, it’s rare for someone to die without any family members stepping forward. It’s far more likely that some relative you haven’t spoken with in years will come out of the woodwork to stake a claim. Without a will or trust, state intestacy laws establish which family member has the priority inheritance. If you’re unmarried with no children, this hierarchy typically puts parents first, then siblings, then more distant relatives like nieces, nephews, uncles, aunts, and cousins.

Depending on your family, this could have a potentially troubling—and even deadly—outcome. For instance, what if your closest living relative is your estranged brother with serious addiction issues? Or what if your assets are passed on to a niece with poor money-management skills, who is likely to squander her inheritance?

And if your estate does contain significant wealth and assets, this could lead to a costly and contentious court battle, with all of your relatives hiring expensive lawyers to fight over your estate. In the end, this could tear your family apart, while making their lawyers rich—all because you didn’t think you needed an estate plan.

As your Personal Family Lawyer®, we will work with you to create an estate plan that ensures that your assets will pass to the proper people, while avoiding both unnecessary court proceedings and family conflict.

2. Someone Will Have Power Over Your Healthcare

Estate planning isn’t just about passing on your assets when you die. In fact, some of the most critical aspects of estate planning have nothing to do with your money at all, but are aimed at protecting you while you’re still very much alive.

Proactive planning allows you to name the person you want to make healthcare decisions for you in the event you are incapacitated and unable to make such decisions yourself. This is done using an estate planning tool known as a medical power of attorney.

For example, if you’re incapacitated due to a serious accident or illness and unable to give doctors permission to perform a potentially risky medical treatment, it would be left up to a judge to decide who gets to make that decision on your behalf.

If you have a romantic partner but aren’t married and haven’t granted him or her medical power of attorney, the court will likely have a family member, not your partner, make those decisions. Depending on your family, that person may make decisions contrary to what you or your partner would want.

And if you don’t want your estranged brother to inherit your assets, you probably don’t want him to have the power to make life-and-death decisions about your medical care, either. But that’s exactly what could happen if you don’t put a plan in place.

Furthermore, your family members who have priority to make decisions for you could keep your dearest friends away from your bedside in the event of your hospitalization. Or family members who don’t share your values about the type of food you eat, or the types of medical care you receive, could be the one’s making decisions about how you’ll be cared for.

To address these issues, you need to implement an estate planning tool that provides specific guidelines detailing exactly how you want your medical care to be managed during your incapacity, including critical end-of-life decisions. This is done using an estate planning vehicle known as a living will.

Bottom line: If you are single with no kids, you need to create an estate plan in order to name healthcare decisions-makers for yourself and provide instructions on how you want those decisions made should you ever become incapacitated and unable to make those decisions yourself.

3. Someone Will Get Power Over Your Finances

As with healthcare decisions, if you become incapacitated and haven’t legally named someone to handle your finances while you’re unable to do so, the court will pick someone for you. The way to avoid this is by granting someone you trust durable financial power of attorney.

A durable financial power of attorney is an estate planning vehicle that gives the person you choose the immediate authority to manage your financial, legal, and business affairs if you’re incapacitated. This agent will have a broad range of powers to handle things like paying your bills and taxes, running your business, collecting your Social Security benefits, selling your home, as well as managing your banking and investment accounts.

Without a signed durable financial power of attorney, your family and friends will have to go to court to get access to your finances, which not only takes time, but it could lead to the mismanagement—and even the loss—of your assets should the court grant this authority to the wrong person.

What’s more, the person you name doesn’t have to be a lawyer or financial professional; it can be anybody you choose, including both family and friends. The most important aspect of your choice is selecting someone who’s imminently trustworthy, since they will have nearly complete control over your finances while you remain incapacitated. And besides, with us as your Personal Family Lawyer®, your agent will have access to our team as their trusted counsel should they need guidance or help.

Don’t Leave So Much At Risk

Given these potential risks and costs for yourself and those you care about, it would be foolhardy if you are single without kids to ignore or put off these basic estate planning strategies. Identifying the right estate planning tools is easy to do, and it begins with a Family Wealth Planning Session. During this session, us, your local Personal Family Lawyer® will consider everything you own and everyone you love, and guide you to make informed, educated, and empowered choices for yourself and your loved ones.

In the end, it will likely take just a few hours of your time to make certain that your assets, healthcare, and finances will be managed in the most effective and affordable manner possible in the event of your death or incapacity. Don’t leave your life and assets at risk or leave a mess for the people you love; contact us, your Personal Family Lawyer® to get your estate planning handled today.

This article is a service of a Personal Family Lawyer®. We do not just draft documents; we ensure you make informed and empowered decisions about life and death, for yourself and the people you love.

Proper estate planning can keep your family out of conflict, out of court, and out of the public eye. Are you ready to protect your loved ones and legacy? Check out my next presentation.

If a family member or friend has asked you to serve as trustee for their trust either during their life, or upon their death, it’s a big honor—this means they consider you among the most honest, reliable, and responsible people they know.

That said, serving as a trustee is not only a great honor, it’s also a major responsibility, and the role is definitely not for everyone. Serving as a trustee entails a broad array of duties, and you are both ethically and legally required to properly execute those duties or you could face liability for not doing so.

In the end, your responsibility as a trustee will vary greatly depending on the size of the estate, the type of assets covered by the trust, how many beneficiaries there are, and the document’s terms. In light of this, you should carefully review the specifics of the trust you would be managing before making your decision to serve.

Remember, you don’t have to take the job. That said, depending on who nominated you, declining to serve may not be an easy or practical option. On the other hand, you might actually enjoy the opportunity to serve, so long as you understand what’s expected of you.

With this in mind, here we’ll give you a brief overview of what serving as a trustee typically entails. For help in making your decision, contact us, your Personal Family Lawyer®, so we can detail exactly what your specific trust would require of you. And as we’ll discuss more below, if you do accept, we can also help you carry out your responsibilities, so rest assured, you won’t have to handle things all by yourself.

A Trustee’s Primary Duties

Although every trust is different, serving as trustee comes with a few core requirements. These duties primarily involve accounting for, managing, and distributing the trust’s assets to its named beneficiaries as a fiduciary.

As a fiduciary, you have the power to act on behalf of the trust’s creator and beneficiaries, always putting their interests above your own. In fact, you have a legal obligation to act in a trustworthy and honest manner, while providing the highest standard of care in executing your duties.

This means that you are legally required to properly manage the trust and its assets in the best interest of all the named beneficiaries. And if you fail to abide by your duties as a fiduciary, you could face legal liability. For this reason, you should consult with us for a more in-depth explanation of the duties and responsibilities a specific trust will require of you before agreeing to serve.

But regardless of the trust or the assets it holds, some of your key responsibilities as trustee include:

• Identifying and protecting the trust assets
• Determining what the trust’s terms require in terms of management and distribution of the assets
• Hiring and overseeing an accounting firm to file income and estate taxes for the trust
• Communicating regularly with beneficiaries
• Bringing in the right investment management team to manage the trust assets
• Being scrupulously honest, highly organized, and keeping detailed records of all transactions
• Closing the trust and distributing the assets when the trust terms specify

Experience NOT Required

It’s important to point out that being a trustee does NOT require you to be an expert in law, finance, taxes, or any other field related to trust administration. In fact, trustees are not only allowed to seek outside support from professionals in these areas, they’re highly encouraged to do so, and the trust estate will pay for you to hire the support you need.

So even though serving as a trustee may seem like a daunting proposition, you won’t have to handle the job alone. And you are also able to be paid to serve as trustee of a trust should you choose to accept the role.

That said, many trustees, particularly close family members, often choose to forgo any payment beyond what’s required to cover the trust expenses, if that’s possible. The way you are compensated as a trustee will depend on your personal circumstances, your relationship with the trust creator and beneficiaries, as well as the nature of the assets in the trust.

We’re Here To Help

Because serving as a trustee involves such serious responsibility, you should meet with us, your Personal Family Lawyer® for help deciding whether or not to accept the role. We will offer you a clear, unbiased assessment of what’s required of you based on the specific trust’s terms, assets, and beneficiaries.

And if you do choose to serve, it’s even more important that you have someone who can assist you with the trust’s administration. As your Personal Family Lawyer®, we will guide you step-by-step throughout the entire process, ensuring you properly fulfill all of the trust creator’s wishes without exposing the beneficiaries—or yourself—to any unnecessary risks. Contact us today to learn more.

This article is a service of Pam Maass, Personal Family Lawyer®. We do not just draft documents; we ensure you make informed and empowered decisions about life and death, for yourself and the people you love. That’s why we offer a Family Wealth Planning Session™, during which you will get more financially organized than you’ve ever been before and make all the best choices for the people you love. You can begin by calling our office today to schedule a Family Wealth Planning Session and mention this article to find out how to get this $750 session at no charge.

Proper estate planning can keep your family out of conflict, out of court, and out of the public eye. Are you ready to protect your loved ones and legacy? Check out my next presentation.

When creating an estate plan, people are often most concerned with passing on the “big things” like real estate, bank accounts, and vehicles. Yet these possessions very often aren’t the items that have the most meaning for the loved ones we leave behind.

Smaller items, like family heirlooms and keepsakes, which may not have a high dollar value, frequently have the most sentimental value for our family members. But for a number of reasons, these personal possessions are often not specifically accounted for in wills, trusts, and other estate planning documents.

However, it’s critical that you don’t overlook this type of property in your estate plan, as the distribution of such items can become a source of intense conflict and strife for those you leave behind. In fact, if you don’t properly address family heirlooms and keepsakes in your estate plan, it can lead to long-lasting disagreements that can tear your family apart.

Heirlooms & Keepsakes: Little Things With Big Value

Heirlooms and keepsakes are both prized for their sentimental value, but these possessions are slightly different from one another in terms of the manner in which the items are passed on.

Heirlooms: Heirlooms are passed down among family members for generations, and the passing of heirlooms sometimes involves traditions. For example, the first daughter to marry inherits grandmother’s heirloom wedding ring.

Keepsakes: Keepsakes, on the other hand, are possessions that are given or kept specifically for sentimental or nostalgic reasons, and these items may only get passed on once. For example, photo albums are a typical keepsake that are treasured by many families. If a keepsake gets passed on multiple times, it may eventually become a family heirloom.

Although just about any personal possession could be considered an heirloom or keepsake, some of the most common examples of these items include the following:

• Jewelry
• Photographs
• Books
• Art
• Musical instruments
• Furniture
• Clothing
• Bibles
• Recipes
• Family documents (such as birth certificates, baptism records, and citizenship papers)
• Collections (such as sports memorabilia, coins, stamps, and doll collections)

Issues Raised By Passing On Heirlooms & Keepsakes

In the legal world, both heirlooms and keepsakes are considered “non-titled personal property.” As mentioned earlier, when there is no plan in place for the distribution of these items following the owner’s death, it can create bitter conflicts among family members. Indeed, fights over heirlooms and keepsakes can cause close family members to never speak with one another again.

In her book “Who Gets Grandma’s Yellow Pie Plate?” Professor Marlene S. Stum, an expert in family social science at the University of Minnesota, warns of the infighting that can occur when there’s no plan for who inherits these personal effects.

“What surprises many people is that often the transfer of non-titled personal property creates more challenges among family members than the transfer of titled property,” says Stum. “Research has shown that disputes over inheritance and property distribution are one of the major reasons for adult siblings to break off relationships with one another.”

Given the potential trouble the distribution of heirlooms and keepsakes can cause for your heirs, you’ll want to take extra care in seeing that these family treasures are passed on properly. And this means incorporating them into your estate plan in one way or another.

Strategies For Peacefully Distributing Heirlooms & Keepsakes

While there is no one perfect way to distribute these items in your estate plan, your primary goal should be to maintain harmony among your loved ones during an already emotional time. As with most sensitive issues, clear communication is vital to this process.

Because your family members can have vastly different values associated with certain heirlooms and keepsakes and you may have little idea about how each person feels, you should speak with each family member in advance. By talking with family members about their feelings and expectations regarding your possessions ahead of time, you will have a much better idea how to distribute these items to your loved ones with the least amount of conflict.

Additionally, you should decide ahead of time if you need to have any of your heirlooms or keepsakes appraised. In doing so, you provide your heirs with the necessary documentation to gauge the monetary value of these items, and you can save them from extra work while they are mourning your death.

Again, the manner in which you distribute your heirlooms and keepsakes will depend largely on the items you have to pass on and your specific family situation. That said, here are a few estate planning strategies to consider when passing on these precious possessions.

Gifting during your lifetime: Of course, you don’t have to wait until you die to pass on your heirlooms and keepsakes, and you may prefer to give away certain special items while you are still living. By doing so, you get to personally witness the joy your loved ones experience when they receive the gift, and you can also personally explain the reasons you want each person to have a particular item.

If your heirlooms and/or keepsakes have a high monetary value, you should keep gift tax issues in mind when you give them away. That said, the IRS has a high annual gift tax exclusion ($16,000 in 2022) and an equally high lifetime exclusion ($12.06 million in 2022), so few people will need to worry about such taxes.

Keep in mind, the lifetime exclusion amount will revert back to its pre-2018 level of around $5 million per individual in 2026, so if you are considering gifting high-value possessions, you may want to do it sooner, rather than later. In any case, if you have possessions you want to give away that might trigger gift taxes, meet with us, your Personal Family Lawyer® to discuss your options.

Include items in your estate plan using a personal property memorandum: As with other assets you want to pass on after your death, you should include heirlooms and keepsakes in your estate plan by adding them to your will or trust. The best way to do this is by using what’s known as a personal property memorandum.

A personal property memorandum is a separate document that is referenced in your will or living trust. The memorandum allows you to list which items you wish to leave to each individual and detail the reasons you are giving each item. In many states, if it’s properly incorporated into your will or trust, a personal property memorandum is a legally binding document.

Furthermore, unlike a will or trust, you can create and update your memorandum without a lawyer’s help. You can change your memorandum as many times as you like, just make sure you sign and date it each time to ensure authenticity. Your memorandum can be as long or short as you like, which allows you to account for even the smallest or seemingly insignificant possessions.

Most types of tangible personal property can be included in your memorandum, but it’s important to note that you cannot list certain assets in a memorandum, including titled property, such as real estate and vehicles; assets with a beneficiary designation, such as life insurance, 401(k)s, and bank accounts; or intellectual property, such as works protected by a copyrights or trademark. If you are unsure if you should include a certain possession in your personal property memorandum, consult with us.

Although you don’t need a lawyer to create or modify your personal property memorandum, if you need any help or support with yours, reach out to us, your Personal Family Lawyer®. That said, you should always enlist our assistance if you’d like to create or update your will or trust.

Pass on the values & stories behind the possessions: You may want to consider making audio recordings to accompany your heirlooms and keepsakes. In this way, your loved ones not only get to hear your voice, but they will also be able to learn the stories behind the possessions, as well as the reasons why you gave each person a particular item.

These stories not only help connect you with future generations, but having a strong family narrative also helps young people develop strong personal identities and boosts their self esteem. In the New York Times article, “The Stories that Bind Us,” author Bruce Feiler comments on this phenomenon: “The more children knew about their family’s history, the stronger their sense of control over their lives, the higher their self-esteem, and the more successfully they believed their families functioned.”

Best of all, you don’t have to worry about creating these recordings yourself, as we offer this exact service during our Family Wealth Legacy Interviews. In every estate plan we create for our clients, we will personally guide you to create a customized recording for the people you love, and then we will provide you with the recording digitally to ensure it will survive long after you are gone.

Don’t Let Anything Fall Through The Cracks

Of course, if no one can find your heirlooms and keepsakes, they aren’t going to do anybody any good. For this reason, it’s vital that you create and maintain a comprehensive inventory of all of your assets, including each of your family heirlooms and keepsakes. Fortunately, this is another service we offer all of our clients at no additional charge. Indeed, we will not only help you create a comprehensive asset inventory, we have systems in place to make sure your inventory stays consistently updated throughout your lifetime.

To learn more and get your inventory started for free right now, visit the Personal Resource Map website to watch a webinar by Ali Katz, founder of Personal Family Lawyer®. Then, schedule a meeting with us, your local Personal Family Lawyer® to incorporate your inventory with your other estate planning strategies.

Keep The Peace After You Are Gone

To ensure your heirlooms and keepsakes don’t create any unnecessary conflicts among your heirs, make sure that your estate plan includes all of your assets, especially your family heirlooms and keepsakes. As your Personal Family Lawyer, we can support you to ensure these precious treasures are protected and preserved as part of your Life & Legacy Plan, and that they pass to each of your loved ones in exactly the manner you would want, without causing a family feud. Contact us today to learn more.

This article is a service of a Personal Family Lawyer®. We do not just draft documents; we ensure you make informed and empowered decisions about life and death, for yourself and the people you love.

Proper estate planning can keep your family out of conflict, out of court, and out of the public eye. Are you ready to protect your loved ones and legacy? Check out my next presentation.

As we head into summer, many parents will see their children graduate high school and prepare to leave home to attend college or pursue other life goals. This can be an exciting and emotional time, and with so much going on, estate planning probably isn’t at the front of your (or their) mind right now.

However, estate planning should actually be a top priority for both you and your kids.

Here’s why: Once your kids turn 18, they become legal adults, and many areas of their life that were once under your control will become entirely their responsibility, whether you take action or not. To this end, if your kids don’t have the proper legal documents in place, you could face a costly and traumatic ordeal should something happen to them.

If your child were to get into a serious car accident and require hospitalization, for example, you would no longer have the automatic authority to make decisions about his or her medical treatment or the ability to manage their financial affairs. Without legal documentation, you wouldn’t even be able to access your child’s medical records or bank accounts without a court order.

To deal with this vulnerability and ensure your family never gets stuck in an expensive and unnecessary court process, before your kids leave home, have a conversation about estate planning and make sure they sign the following three documents.

1. Medical Power of Attorney

The first document your child needs is a medical power of attorney. A medical power of attorney is an advance healthcare directive that allows your child to grant you (or someone else) the immediate legal authority to make healthcare decisions on their behalf if they become incapacitated and are unable to make these decisions themselves.

For example, a medical power of attorney would allow you to make decisions about your child’s medical treatment if he or she is incapacitated in a car accident or falls into a coma due to a debilitating illness like COVID-19.

Without a medical power of attorney in place, if your child suffers a severe accident or illness that requires hospitalization and you need to access their medical records to make decisions about their treatment, you’d have to petition the court to become their legal guardian. While a parent is typically the court’s first choice for a guardian, the guardianship process can be slow and expensive—and in medical emergencies, time is of the essence.

Not to mention, due to HIPAA laws, once your child becomes 18, no one—not even their parents—can legally access his or her medical records without prior written permission. However, a properly drafted medical power of attorney will include a signed HIPAA authorization, so you can immediately access your child’s medical records to make informed decisions about his or her treatment.

2. Living Will

While a medical power of attorney allows you to make healthcare decisions on your child’s behalf during their incapacity, a living will is an advance directive that provides specific guidance about these decisions, particularly at the end of life.

For example, a living will allows your child to advise if and when they want life support removed should they ever require it. In addition to documenting how your child wants their medical care managed, a living will can also include instructions about who should visit them in the hospital and even what kind of food they would want provided. For example, if your child is a vegan, vegetarian, or takes specific supplements, these things should be considered and documented in their living will.

Additionally, given the pandemic, speak with your child about the unique medical decisions related to COVID-19, particularly intubation, ventilators, and experimental medications. At the same time, your child’s living will should also outline their quality of life decisions to ensure their emergency medical treatment doesn’t end up doing more harm than good.

Although you’ll find a variety of medical power of attorney, living will, and other advance directive documents online, your child has unique needs and wishes that can’t be anticipated by these fill-in-the-blank documents. Given this, we recommend you and your child work with us, your Personal Family Lawyer® to create—or at the very least, review—their advance directives.

3. Durable Financial Power of Attorney

Should your child become incapacitated, you may also need the ability to access and manage their finances and legal affairs, and this requires your child to grant you durable financial power of attorney.

Durable financial power of attorney gives you the authority to manage their financial and legal matters, such as paying their tuition, applying for student loans, paying their rent, negotiating (or re-negotiating) a lease, managing their bank accounts, and collecting government benefits if necessary. Without this document, you’ll have to petition the court for this authority.

Start Adulthood On The Right Track

Before your kids leave the nest, discuss the value of estate planning and make sure they have the proper legal documents in place. By doing so, you are helping your family avoid a costly and emotional court process, while also demonstrating the importance of good financial and legal stewardship, which sets your kids on the right track from the very start.

As your Personal Family Lawyer®, we will not only help you draft these documents, we can also facilitate a family meeting to discuss the importance of estate planning with your kids. From there, we hope this will begin a life-long relationship with your children, as they start on their journey into adulthood and beyond. Contact us today to schedule your appointment.

This article is a service of a Personal Family Lawyer®. We do not just draft documents; we ensure you make informed and empowered decisions about life and death, for yourself and the people you love.

Proper estate planning can keep your family out of conflict, out of court, and out of the public eye. Are you ready to protect your loved ones and legacy? Check out my next presentation.

The road to retirement is a long one, and as with any journey, it helps to have a few key milestones along the way to help gauge your progress. While your individual retirement plan and goals will be unique to your income, family situation, and desired lifestyle, most Americans share a number of common retirement milestones.

These milestones are based on your age, along with important dates and deadlines related to Social Security benefits, Medicare, and tax-advantaged retirement plans. Although you should work with us, your Personal Family Lawyer® and financial advisor to develop a comprehensive retirement strategy as part of your overall Life & Legacy Plan, we include several of the key milestones here.

That said, if you are a business owner, your primary investments are going to be in your business, so you can turn it into a machine that can run without you for extended periods of time. At first, this may be just to take vacations or handle family emergencies, but eventually, you’ll want to have the freedom to retire entirely, sell the company, or transfer it to the next generation. If this is your situation, your retirement milestones will be much different than those shared here, and they should be considered in the context of our LIFT (legal, insurance, financial, and tax) Planning for your business. If you own a business, please contact us for support with LIFT planning.

However, if you work for someone else, or your income is otherwise dependent on being employed, here are several key milestones to consider as your plan for retirement.

Age 21 to 49: Make savings a habit

The key to having a comfortable retirement is by saving as much as possible as early in your career as possible. Time, tax breaks, and compounding interest all add up, and by getting into the habit of saving when you are young, it will be exponentially easier to reach vital retirement goals as you get older.

With this in mind, one of the most important things you can do at this age is to take full advantage of employer-sponsored retirement accounts, such as 401(k)s, 403(b)s, IRAs and other tax-advantaged plans, especially if your employer offers a match. A common rule of thumb is that you should save at least 15% of your pre-tax income each year. If that’s not possible, then save as much as you can—and at least enough to get the full benefit of your employer’s matching contribution if one is offered.

For 2022, you can contribute up to $20,500 to your 401(k) or 403(b) plan, while the contribution limit for both traditional IRA and Roth IRAs is $6,000. Since you are likely to be in the workforce for several decades, you’ll have a higher tolerance for market volatility and risk, so you will likely want to consider investing with a focus on maximizing growth, rather than taking a more conservative approach.

Age 50: Catch-up contributions begin

Once you reach 50, you are likely in your peak earning years, so you should be maxing out your contributions to tax-advantaged retirement accounts. To help you achieve this, the IRS allows those age 50 and older to make an extra annual “catch-up” contribution.

In 2022, the catch-up contribution limit for a 401(k) or 403(b) is $6,500, which gives you a total contribution limit of $27,000 annually. For traditional IRAs and Roth IRAs, the catch-up contribution is capped at $1,000, which equates to a total limit of $7,000 annually.

Since you are likely nearing retirement age, you will have less tolerance for risk, so you may want to consider revisiting your retirement portfolio to determine if it’s the right time to start making a gradual shift from investing primarily for growth to a more conservative strategy that’s focused primarily on generating income. And if you haven’t already, now is the time to find a financial advisor, who in conjunction with us, can support you in planning for and reaching your retirement savings goals.

Age 55: 401(k) withdrawals possible under the Rule of 55

Although you generally must wait until age 59½ to make withdrawals from your 401(k) without incurring a 10% penalty, the IRS allows for a “separation of service” exception for certain workers. Also known as the Rule of 55, if you quit, were laid off, or otherwise terminated from your job during or after the year you turn 55, you can take withdrawals from your 401(k) or 403(b) penalty-free from the account associated with that job.

That said, you are still required to pay income taxes on any withdrawals from your 401(k) or 403(b) in the year they were taken. Moreover, IRAs are not eligible for this exception, and for those accounts, you must wait until age 59½ to take withdrawals without any penalty.

Age 59 1/2: Penalty-free retirement account withdrawals begin

Outside of the “separation of service” exception, this is the age when you can begin taking withdrawals from your retirement accounts, such as a 401(k), 403(b), and IRAs, without the 10% early withdrawal penalty. While you are free to make penalty-free withdrawals from your retirement account starting at this age, you are not required to make any withdrawals until age 72.

Though not subject to a 10% penalty, all withdrawals from your retirement accounts are subject to federal income taxes in the year you make them. Given this, you may want to consider setting aside some of the withdrawals to pay taxes.

Age 62: Social Security eligibility begins

This is the earliest age you can begin claiming Social Security retirement benefits. However, if you take Social Security early, your monthly benefit will be reduced by as much as 30%, depending on your date of birth. Conversely, your benefit amount increases each year until you start claiming benefits, or when you reach age 70, whichever comes first.

The age at which you are eligible for 100% of your Social Security benefit is known as your full retirement age. The full retirement age used to be 65, but in 1983, the law changed and gradually pushed the full retirement age up to 67, depending on the year you were born. As such, the dates below show your full retirement based on your birth date.

Year of birth: Age to receive full Social Security benefits

1943-1954: 661955: 66 and 2 months1956: 66 and 4 months1957: 66 and 6 months1958: 66 and 8 months1959: 66 and 10 months1960 or later: 67

Age 64 3/4: You can enroll in Medicare

You can enroll in Medicare at any point during the seven-month period that begins three months before the month you turn 65. Medicare is our government’s basic health insurance program for those age 65 or older.

Unless you are still covered by the health insurance of your employer or your spouse’s employer, you should consider enrolling in Medicare during this seven-month window to cover expenses related to inpatient hospital care, doctor visits, outpatient care, and prescription drugs. If you do not enroll during this initial window, you may have to pay higher premiums for life should you choose to enroll later on.

That said, if you still have health insurance from your employer or your spouse’s employer, you can postpone enrolling in Medicare until that coverage ends, without having to pay higher premiums.

Age 65: Medicare begins and you can enroll in Medigap

If you enrolled in or are receiving Social Security, you qualify for Medicare coverage on the first day of the month in which you turn 65, regardless of whether or not you are retired. On that same day, the six-month enrollment window for the Medicare supplemental insurance known as Medigap also begins. Medigap is private insurance that helps you cover a portion of the out-of-pocket copays and deductibles of traditional Medicare.

If you plan to continue working after age 65 and are covered by your employer’s health insurance plan (or your spouse’s), speak with the employer and your benefits coordinator to see how signing up for Medicare would affect that coverage. Depending on the size of the employer, you may be entitled to a special enrollment period of up to eight months after the employer-tied coverage ends to sign up for Medicare with incurring a penalty.

Age 70: File for Social Security, if you haven’t already

As mentioned earlier, the longer you wait to claim Social Security between your full retirement age and age 70, the higher your benefits will be. In fact, your benefits increase by 8% for each year you wait between your full retirement age and 70. But once you reach 70, your benefits no longer increase, so don’t put off filing for Social Security past this age.

Age 72: Required minimum distributions (RMDs) begin

Once you reach 72, you are required by law to begin taking distributions from tax-deferred retirement accounts, such as a 401(k), 403(b), and traditional IRA. These are known as required minimum distributions (RMDs), and your first distribution must be taken by April 1 of the year you turn 72. Thereafter, annual withdrawals must be taken by December 31 of each year.

Note: RMDs don’t apply to Roth IRAs, because contributions to these accounts are made with after-tax dollars.

It’s extremely important to stay on top of your RMDs, because if you miss one, you could owe a penalty of up to 50% of the amount you should have withdrawn. The amount you must withdraw for your RMD depends on the balance in your account and your life expectancy as defined by the IRS.

To calculate your RMD, visit the IRS website, and refer to the table in IRS Publication 590-B. From there, locate your age in the table, and find the “life expectancy factor” that corresponds to your age. Then, divide your retirement account balance as of December 31st of the previous year by your current life expectancy factor. This should give you the amount of your RMD.

Start Planning For Retirement Now & Consider Creating a Work-Until-You-Die-Happy Plan

While all of these recommendations relate to you saving enough for retirement, your best bet to ensure your retirement years are as plentiful as possible is to create a reality with your work life that you never have to retire from. Instead, consider how you can invest in education and training that will support you to happily contribute your skills and continue to get paid through the rest of your life.

Work-until-you-die might sound like a terrible plan, but only if you don’t love your work. If you do love your work, contributing your talents until you die (and getting paid for it) is a great plan for a life worth living and a legacy worth leaving. And it will keep you younger and healthier far longer than working at a job you dread, but have to stay in to earn a living.

If you are relying on a work-until-you-die plan (rather than saving enough to stop working), make sure you have plenty of long-term care and disability insurance in place to cover your needs in the event that you cannot work. We’ll write future articles on long-term care insurance and disability insurance that will help you to choose the right coverage. And if you need a referral to a great insurance advisor for these types of coverage, please contact us, as we provide this support to all of our clients.

Consider What’s At Stake

When preparing for your senior years, it’s not enough to simply hope for the best. You should treat retirement planning as if your life depended on it—because it does. Without an effective plan, you risk a future of poverty, penny-pinching, dependence, and even early death due to unhappiness. The stakes could hardly be higher.

While the best way to ensure a comfortable retirement is to start planning (and saving or building a work-until-you-die-happy plan) as soon as possible, it’s also critical to seek the guidance and support of professionals, who can help you develop strategies to maximize your investments and savings, while minimizing taxes and avoiding common pitfalls. As your local Personal Family Lawyer®, we will work with you and your financial advisor to educate and empower you to choose the most effective planning strategies to ensure your journey to retirement is as smooth as possible.

And if you need help finding a financial advisor, we will introduce you to the experienced professionals we trust most. With their support and ours, you will have peace of mind that you and your family will be well-protected and well-planned for no matter what. Contact us today to get started.

This article is a service of a Personal Family Lawyer®. We do not just draft documents; we ensure you make informed and empowered decisions about life and death, for yourself and the people you love.

Proper estate planning can keep your family out of conflict, out of court, and out of the public eye. Are you ready to protect your loved ones and legacy? Check out my next presentation.