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Since the age of 16, when she burst onto the charts with her debut single, “…Hit Me Baby One More Time,” Britney Spears has been one of the world’s most famous and beloved pop stars. Yet despite her massive fame and fortune, Britney, who is now 39, has never truly had full control over her own life.

As most familiar with pop culture know by now, Britney has been living under a conservatorship for the past 13 years. Also known as “adult guardianship,” a conservatorship is a legal structure in which the court granted Britney’s father, Jaime Spears, and other individuals nearly complete control over her legal, financial, and personal decisions. The conservatorship was initially established in February 2008 after Britney suffered a mental breakdown, which resulted in her being briefly hospitalized.

A Total Loss of Control

Back in 2008, the court appointed Britney’s father and attorney Andrew Wallet as her co-conservators, as Britney was deemed mentally unfit to care for herself. The arrangement was only meant to be temporary, but in October of that year, the conservatorship was made long-term, and her father has remained in nearly complete control of Britney’s life ever since.

Under the conservatorship, Britney’s father has the power to restrict her visitors; he is in charge of arranging and approving her visits with her own children; he has the authority to make her medical decisions; and he has the final say in all of her business deals, including when she works, and the complete authority over all of her financial matters.

As it stands now, Britney’s current mental-health status remains unclear, and we can’t be sure whether or not she still requires someone to help her manage her financial and business affairs. But what is abundantly clear is that given the chance, Britney would have undoubtedly preferred to have some say in not only who should be in charge of making decisions on her behalf during her incapacity, but also how those decisions should be made.

Yet because Britney did not create legal documents indicating who should make decisions for her if she could not make decisions for herself, a judge decided for her—and as you’ll read below, this has resulted in immense trauma for Britney and destroyed her relationship with her father. With this in mind, here in this series of articles, we will first discuss the latest details on Britney’s conservatorship and the impact the arrangement has had on the pop star’s life and career. From there, we’ll discuss how you can prevent something similar from happening to you and your loved ones using proactive estate planning and our Family Wealth Planning process.

Years Of Abuse And Conflict

Although there has been widespread speculation that Britney’s conservatorship was abusive, the exact details of her conservatorship have been kept private. Moreover, until very recently, Britney had never spoken publicly about her life under the arrangement.

Britney’s father and others involved with the conservatorship have consistently maintained the arrangement saved Britney from herself and others looking to exploit her when she was at her lowest point. They described how the conservatorship helped pull Britney out of debt and allowed her to earn a fortune estimated to be worth nearly $60 million. Plus, representatives for the conservatorship have noted that Britney could move to end the conservatorship whenever she wanted.

However, two shocking developments within the past few weeks finally revealed just how much Britney has suffered under the conservatorship and how she has fought unsuccessfully for years to regain control of her life from her father. The first was a report published by the New York Times on June 22.

According to confidential court records obtained by the newspaper, Britney had expressed serious opposition to her conservatorship as early as 2014, and on multiple occasions, the pop icon pushed for her father to be removed from his position. The very next day in a public court hearing on June 23, Britney finally broke her silence, and what she described was stunning.

During an emotional 24-minute speech delivered via Zoom, Britney pleaded with Judge Brenda Penny to end the conservatorship under which she claimed she has endured years of abuse and exploitation, including having to take a powerful mood stabilizer that makes her feel drunk, being compelled to work while seriously ill, and being forced to remain on birth control, so she can’t have more children. (Read a full transcript of Britney’s testimony)

In response, Britney’s father vehemently denies any wrongdoing and insists he’s acting in his daughter’s best interests. In fact, a few days later, his lawyers filed a petition requesting the court investigate Britney’s allegations of abuse. According to the petition, if Britney’s claims prove true, then “corrective action must be taken,” and if not, then the conservatorship “can continue its course.”

A week later, Judge Penny denied Britney’s request to remove her father as conservator. However, the judge’s ruling was only in response to a filing by Britney’s lawyer made in November 2020 to have a wealth management company, Bessemer Trust, take over as sole conservator, and was not in response to Britney’s impassioned testimony. As it turns out, Britney’s court-appointed lawyer, Samuel Ingham, has yet to file a formal petition to terminate the conservatorship, but the judge said she would be open to such a filing.

According to CNN, Britney has since instructed Ingraham to immediately file the necessary paperwork in order to formally terminate the conservatorship once and for all. If filed, the judge could rule on Britney’s petition and her father’s request for an investigation in the next court hearing on the conservatorship, which is scheduled for next week on July 14.

A Broken System

Britney’s story highlights the real potential for abuse that exists within the conservatorship and guardianship system. In fact, as we’ve covered in previous articles, there have been dozens of highly publicized reports in recent years involving corrupt professional guardians, who exploit those under their care for their own financial gain. Yet, in those cases, the victims have nearly all been elderly, and their abusers were strangers. But Britney’s situation makes it clear that people of any age can fall prey to these restrictive legal arrangements, and the abusers can even be your own family members.

Furthermore, and perhaps the most puzzling part of the whole situation, is why someone as young and active as Britney is still living under a conservatorship. Conservatorships and guardianships are typically used to protect the elderly and mentally disabled who are incapable of making their own decisions and caring for themselves, and they often remain in effect until the person dies.

Although Britney may have initially needed the conservatorship to protect her from her own poor decisions and others looking to take advantage of her in the aftermath of her breakdown in 2008, since then, the Grammy winner has worked almost nonstop and earned millions of dollars. In fact, over the past decade during which she was deemed “incapable of making her own decisions,” Britney has released four albums, headlined multiple world tours, performed nearly 250 shows in a Las Vegas residency, and served as a judge on the TV show “The X Factor.”

That said, due to the private nature of her conservatorship and the fact that Britney has never fully disclosed the specifics of her diagnosis, we don’t know the full circumstances of her mental health. Although there have been rumors and speculation that Britney is suffering from bipolar disorder, this has never been substantiated, and her medical records are sealed.

What’s more, although it was reported in 2019 that Britney checked herself into a mental health facility and was prescribed lithium, an older medication that’s used to treat bipolar disorder, according to court records obtained by the New York Times, this wasn’t entirely true. In 2019, Britney testified that she was forced into the facility against her will, and during her most recent testimony, she told the judge that she was forced to take the lithium against her wishes as well.

In the end, if Britney does petition to terminate her conservatorship, she will need to prove to the court that she currently possesses the capacity to handle her own life, health, and financial choices. In order to do this, however, Britney will almost certainly have to undergo another mental health evaluation, which would likely involve a court hearing and testimony from mental health professionals.

In an interview with the culture and music website Vulture, Tamar Arminak, a conservatorship attorney who worked on a similar conservatorship involving 27-year-old actress Amanda Bynes, said that the process to prove Britney’s capacity would likely involve a “mini-trial” to determine whether the conservatorship continues to be in the singer’s best interest.

“You have to present evidence and show a changed circumstance,” said Arminak. “You will have to have testimony from doctors, psychiatrists, therapists, and witnesses who will testify for you that you shouldn’t be under this conservatorship.”

Unfortunately, undergoing yet another mental health evaluation is something Britney is hesitant to do. Indeed, in her recent testimony, she made this point clear. “I truly believe this conservatorship is abusive… I want to end the conservatorship without being evaluated,” Britney told the judge.

According to Vanity Fair, a source close to Britney said the reason for Britney’s reluctance to undergo another mental health examination is due to the fact that she has had such poor experiences over the years with the doctors hired by her father.

“She doesn’t have much trust for the doctors that she has worked with so far,” the source said. “She feels like they have failed her.”

The source went on to say that Britney’s reluctance to be evaluated is also one of the reasons her lawyer has yet to formally file the petition to end the conservatorship. After her past experiences with mental health professionals, it’s understandable that Britney would be hesitant to trust yet another doctor hired by her father or appointed by the court.

However, if Britney wants to finally be free and have full control over her life, that might be the only choice she has.

Avoid Britney’s Fate With Incapacity Planning

Whether it’s mental illness, age-related dementia, or a serious accident, we are all powerless to prevent the potential for incapacity. However, with the proper estate planning, you can at least have control over how your life, healthcare, and assets will be managed if something does happen. Moreover, such planning can also prevent your family from enduring the bitter conflict and expense that can result when you leave control over your life in the hands of the court like Britney did.

Working with us, your Personal Family Lawyer®, we can put an array of estate planning vehicles in place that would make it practically impossible for a conservator or legal guardian to ever be appointed—or even need to be appointed—against your wishes. In part two, we’ll outline those options in more detail, but to learn more, contact us today.

We’ll continue with part two in this series on Britney Spears’ conservatorship and how you can avoid the potential for abuse, conflict, and expense of court-ordered conservatorship using estate planning.

​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.

Estate planning is an obvious concern for all parents, but if you have a child with special needs, it’s crucial that you are aware of the unique considerations that go into planning for a child who may be dependent on you at some level for their lifetime. If your child has special needs, you must understand exactly what’s necessary to provide for the emotional, physical, and financial needs of your child, in the event of your own eventual death or potential incapacity.

When creating your estate plan, there are two major considerations for you to focus on: 1) Who would care for your child if and when you cannot (also known as guardianship), and 2) How will your child’s financial needs be met when you are not there to meet them.

Naming Legal Guardians for a Lifetime of Care

The first and most critical step in ensuring the future well-being of your child with special needs is to name both short and long-term legal guardians to take custody of and care for your child in the event of your death or incapacity. And as you well know, if your child will never become fully capable of independently caring for him or herself, your parenting responsibilities will continue on long after your child reaches adulthood.

Although this lifetime responsibility likely feels overwhelming, we’ve been told repeatedly by our clients who have a child with special needs that naming legal guardians and knowing their child will be cared for in the way they want, by the people they want, creates an immense sense of relief. Not only that, but we often build in unique plans through which the named guardians are carefully instructed—and even incentivized—to give your child the same level of attention and care you provide.

For example, we’ve created plans in which the named guardian is compensated for taking your child to dinner and the movies every week or participating in some similar activity if this is something your child enjoys doing with you. However, without written instructions (and perhaps compensation) built into your estate plan, fun activities like this are often neglected once you are no longer there.

For guidance on selecting the individual(s) best suited to serve as legal guardians and creating the proper instructions for them to provide your special needs child with the same level of care as you, consult with us as your Personal Family Lawyer®.

Providing For Your Child’s Financial Future: Special Needs Trusts

Beyond naming legal guardians for your child with special needs, you’ll also need to provide financial resources to allow your child to live out his or her life in the manner you desire. And this is where things can get tricky for children with special needs.

In fact, it may seem like a “Catch-22” situation—you want to leave your child enough money to afford the care and support he or she needs to live a comfortable life, yet if you leave money directly to a person with special needs, you risk disqualifying that individual for much-needed government benefits like Medicaid and Supplemental Social Security Income (SSI).

Fortunately, the government allows assets to be held in what’s known as a “special needs trust” to provide supplemental financial resources for a physically, mentally, or developmentally disabled child, without affecting his or her eligibility for public healthcare and income assistance benefits. However, the rules for such trusts are complicated and can vary greatly between states, so you should always work with us, your Personal Family Lawyer® in order to create a comprehensive special needs trust that’s properly structured and appropriate for your child’s specific situation.

Setting Up The Trust

Funds from a special needs trust cannot be distributed directly to your child, and instead must be disbursed to a third party who’s responsible for managing the trust. Given this, when you initially set up the trust, you will likely be both the Grantor (trust creator) and Trustee (the person responsible for managing the trust), and your child with special needs is the trust’s Beneficiary.

You’ll then name the person you want responsible for administering the trust’s funds upon your death or incapacity as the Successor Trustee. To avoid conflicts of interest, overburdening the legal guardian with too much responsibility, and providing a system of checks and balances, it may be a wise decision to name someone other than your child’s legal guardian as a Trustee.

As the parent, you serve as the Trustee until you die or become incapacitated, at which time the Successor Trustee takes over. Each person who serves as Trustee is legally required to follow the trust’s terms and use its funds and property for the benefit of your special needs child.

Additionally, you should name multiple Successor Trustees—which can even be a trust company, bank, or another professional fiduciary—as backups in case something happens to prevent the individual you’ve named as primary Trustee from serving.

There are two ways to set up a special needs trust. In the first option, we build it into your revocable living trust, and it will arise, or spring up, upon your death. From there, assets that are held in your living trust will be used to fund your child’s special needs trust.

In the other option, we can set up a special needs trust that acts as a vehicle for receiving and holding assets for your child right now. This option makes sense if you have grandparents or other relatives who want to give your special needs child gifts sooner rather than later.

Finally, it is important to ensure that the trust will have sufficient funds to last throughout the life of your child. One common method to provide funding is for you (or another loved one) to name the special needs trust as the beneficiary of your life insurance policy. Another way is for family members and friends to make donations or gifts to the trust and/or include it as a beneficiary in their will.

Meet with us, as your Personal Family Lawyer®, to discuss all of your available options for ensuring your child’s special needs trust has sufficient funds to last for his or her lifetime and for guidance on the estate planning vehicles best suited for passing money to the trust.

The Trustee’s Role

Once the trust is funded, it’s the Trustee’s job to use the trust funds to support your child without jeopardizing eligibility for government benefits. To ensure this is handled properly, the Trustee must have a thorough understanding of how eligibility for such benefits works and stay current with the ever-changing laws. The Trustee is also required to pay the beneficiary’s taxes, keep detailed records, invest trust property, and stay current with the beneficiary’s needs.

Given this immense responsibility, it’s often best that you name a legal or financial professional who’s familiar with the complexities of the law as Trustee or Co-Trustee, so they can properly handle the duties and not jeopardize your child’s eligibility for government benefits. Alternatively, we can advise your named personal Trustee on how to manage the Trust.

Your Trusted Source For Special Need Planning

If you have a child with special needs, meet with us, as your Personal Family Lawyer®, for trusted guidance and support in creating a special needs trust and other estate planning vehicles for your child. We offer an array of estate planning strategies that are designed to accommodate the unique needs presented by a child with special needs and their families.

We will assist you in passing on the financial assets needed for your child to have a rich quality of life, without jeopardizing his or her eligibility for government benefits. We’ll also support you in finding and appointing a legal guardian and/or Trustee to ensure your child is protected and provided for in the exact manner you wish when you die or if you become incapacitated. Contact us, your Personal Family Lawyer® today to get started.

​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.

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Whether you are married or not, if you are involved in a committed partnership with another individual, estate planning is about so much more than planning for death—it’s about planning for life and ensuring your beloved will be protected and provided for no matter what happens to you. And if you are a member of the LGBTQ+ community, estate planning is even more critical, especially if you have complex family relationships.

Although same-gender marriage is legally recognized in all 50 states, long-held prejudice at both the political and family level continues to create complications for both married and unmarried same-gender couples. Indeed, while the federal government recognizes same-gender marriage, there are plenty of cities, businesses, and people who still refuse to recognize these unions. Moreover, a recent survey found that roughly four of every 10 LGBTQ adults say they have been rejected by a family member because of their sexual orientation or gender identity.

As we discussed last week in part one, such discrimination can create unique estate planning challenges, and regardless of your marriage status, if you are an LGTBQ adult in a committed partnership, you should be aware of several issues that can affect your planning strategies. Specifically, we discussed how relying on a will alone may not provide sufficient protection for your partner/spouse, and we explained why incapacity planning is particularly crucial if you want your partner/spouse to have a say in your medical treatment and the ability to access and manage your assets in the event you are hit with a debilitating illness or injury.

Here we’ll address the final issue you should be aware of when creating your estate plan—securing parental rights for the non-biological parent of minor children.

3. Estate Planning Offers Alternative to Adoption

Although married same-gender couples now enjoy nearly all of the same rights as opposite-gender couples, there is one key right that’s still up in the air—the automatic right to be legal parents. While parental rights are of course automatically bestowed upon the biological parent of a child, the non-biological spouse/parent still faces a number of challenges when it comes to obtaining full parental rights.

Since the Supreme Court has yet to rule on the specific issue of the parental rights of the non-biological parent in a same-gender marriage, there is a tangled, often contradictory, web of state laws governing such rights. If you are a married same-gender couple, for example, some states consider the non-biological partner a legal parent based solely on your marriage, while other states do not.

Given the conflicting nature of state laws, many same-gender couples have turned to second-parent adoption to gain parental rights for the non-biological parent, since the Supreme Court has ruled that the adoptive parental rights granted in one state must be respected in all states. However, it can be extremely difficult for same-gender couples to adopt. In fact, 11 states currently permit state-licensed adoption agencies to refuse to grant an adoption, if doing so violates the agency’s religious beliefs. In other states, the law specifically forbids such discrimination, but given the Supreme Court’s ruling last week in Fulton v. City of Philadelphia, even those laws are susceptible to legal challenge.

In that case, the city canceled a contract with Catholic Social Services (CSS), a taxpayer-funded, faith-based foster care and adoption agency, after it refused child placement with LGBTQ families in violation of a city law prohibiting anti-LGBTQ discrimination. CSS sued the city, arguing that requiring it to follow the nondiscrimination policy violated its free exercise of religion since working with same-sex couples would go against its religious opposition to homosexuality.

In a unanimous judgment, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of CSS and found Philadelphia’s contract with CSS to be unenforceable. However, the ruling was narrowly focused on specific contractual language, and it does not create a broad free-exercise exemption from nondiscrimination laws, as many in the LGBTQ+ community feared.

That said, the Fulton case and others like it that are sure to follow, demonstrate that when it comes to same-gender couples seeking parental rights, second-parent adoption is not a panacea. Fortunately, same-gender couples do have an alternative to adoption—estate planning. Indeed, using a variety of estate planning strategies, as your Personal Family Lawyer®, we can provide a non-biological, same-gender parent with nearly all parental rights, even without formal adoption.

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. In this way, if the biological parent becomes incapacitated or dies, their wishes are clearly stated, so the court can do what the parent would’ve 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 health care 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.

Experience You Can Rely On

In light of these issues, it’s vital for LGBTQ+ couples, especially those with children, to always work with experienced estate planning lawyers, and avoid using generic online documents at all costs. As your Personal Family Lawyer®, we have the experience of creating plans specifically designed to prevent your plan from being challenged in court by family members who disagree with your relationship.

Indeed, with the proper planning, we can ensure that no matter what happens to you, your partner and family will be protected and provided for in the exact manner you wish, rather than being stuck in a financial and legal nightmare. What’s more, our specialized planning services can help ensure that non-biological parents in LBGT partnerships have as many parental rights as possible, without resorting to second-parent adoption. Contact us, your Personal Family Lawyer® today to get started with a Family Wealth Planning Session.

​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.

Whether you are married or in a committed partnership, estate planning is about much more than planning for death—it’s about planning for life. It’s the way to ensure your beloved will be protected and provided for in the event of your death or incapacity. Especially if you are a member of the LGBTQ+ community, estate planning is even more critical.

Although same-gender marriage is legally recognized in all 50 states, long-held prejudice at both the political and family level continues to create complications for both married and unmarried same-gender couples. For example, suppose you have family members who are opposed to your marriage. In that case, your estate plan may be more likely to be disputed or even sabotaged by unsupportive relatives. This could mean that family members are more likely to contest your wishes, or it might result in custody battles over non-biological children in the event of the biological parent’s death.

Unsupportive family members may even try to block the ability of your partner to make medical decisions on your behalf should you become incapacitated by accident or illness. Even worse, your family members could try to kick your partner out of a shared home, if you are in an accident or fall ill, or they may even block your partner from seeing you if you require hospitalization.

Additionally, if you and your partner are unmarried, your partner would have no rights or protections should you become incapacitated or die without any planning in place, which leaves your partner vulnerable to several potentially dire risks.

Given these issues, if you are in a committed partnership, you should be aware of several unique considerations regarding your estate plan. While you should meet with us, your Personal Family Lawyer®, to address your specific circumstances, here are three of the most pressing concerns to keep in mind.

1. A Will Alone Might Not Be Enough

Suppose you’re unmarried and die without any estate plan. In that case, your property will be shared with your surviving family members according to your state’s laws through intestate succession. The state’s laws would not protect your unmarried partner, so if you want your partner to receive any of your assets upon your death, you need to—at the very least—create a will.

However, having an estate plan that consists solely of a will often doesn’t provide sufficient protection for your spouse/partner, and we often recommend that same-gender couples—even those who are married—create both a will and a trust. Although a will is a foundational part of nearly every estate plan, for a variety of reasons, having just a will could leave your partner/spouse at risk.

Most importantly, 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 partner/spouse may not have access to needed funds to pay bills, or they might even be kicked out of 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 partner/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 probate 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 surviving partner/spouse from receiving assets you left in your will. The process of contesting is extremely time-consuming, costly, and emotionally draining for your surviving partner/spouse.

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

2. Incapacity Planning is Especially Vital

As we touched on earlier, estate planning is not just about planning for your eventual death; it’s also about planning for your potential incapacity due to injury or illness. Proactive estate planning 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 through a medical power of attorney.

If you haven’t planned for incapacity, the choice is then left to the court to appoint the person(s) to make these decisions on your behalf. If you’re 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 them 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 them the legal authority to do so using medical power of attorney and durable financial power of attorney.

A durable financial power of attorney gives your 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.

In addition to creating a will and trust, be sure to also create a living will, so that your 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 care.

As your Personal Family Lawyer®, we can 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.

Next week, in part two, we’ll discuss the final estate planning consideration for LGBTQ couples—securing parental rights for the non-biological parent of minor children.

​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.

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When you are a kid, finding a suitable gift for Father’s Day can be a struggle. You want to get Dad something he’ll enjoy, but few young people can afford a new set of golf clubs or a shiny new grill, so you end up settling once again for the standard necktie and socks.

And even after you become an adult, that struggle for the perfect Father’s Day gift often continues, albeit in a slightly different way. When it comes to expressing your love and appreciation for everything Dad has done, more “stuff” doesn’t cut it.

If your father is like most, he’d tell you that the greatest gift you could give him would be for you to abide by the values and principles he taught you and share them with your children.

We may go to great lengths to protect and pass on our family’s financial wealth. Still, very few of us take the time to even document, much less preserve, our family’s legacy. The stories, values, insights, and life lessons of our parents, grandparents, and those who came before them— are typically lost forever when a beloved father figure passes away.

With this in mind, give your father a tribute to the role he has played in your life by preserving his legacy for generations to come with a Family Wealth Legacy Passage.

Family Wealth Legacy Passages: Sharing Your Family’s Story

As your Personal Family Lawyer®, we know that estate planning isn’t just about protecting and passing on your financial wealth and tangible assets when you die. When done right, estate planning supports you to pass down the most precious assets of all—your life stories, lessons, insights, and values, intentionally.

We do this with a unique service we’ve developed known as Family Wealth Legacy Passages. We will personally guide your father to create a customized recording to share his most insightful memories and experiences. We will provide you with the recording digitally to rest assured it will survive long after he—and even after you—are gone. The Family Wealth Legacy Passage is at no additional cost to you since it is part of each estate plan.

Including Family Wealth Legacy Passages in your estate planning ensures the most valuable assets never get lost and the process of documenting them is as easy and convenient as possible. We use a series of helpful questions and prompts, which makes the process both easy and enjoyable.

Many of our clients tell us that going through this process helps rekindle life moments they would otherwise not share with their loved ones during their lives. This unique process can enrich your family with something far more valuable than material wealth. After the interview, many of our clients have told us they feel as if they’ve become better, more conscious parents along the way. And the best part is, it takes less than an hour.

In the end, your family’s most precious wealth is not money, but the memories you make, the values you instill, and the insights and lessons you hand down. If left to chance, these assets are likely to be lost forever.

Create A Lasting Legacy

During the month of celebrating Dad, take this opportunity to ensure that all of the wisdom and experience your father has gained during his life won’t be lost once he’s gone. Even if your father is no longer with us, perhaps you have a figure in your life that you can honor with this process. No matter the father figure in your life, meeting with us, your Personal Family Lawyer®, will benefit future generations. Contact us today to schedule your appointment.

​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.

With the arrival of summer, young people across the country are about to reach a key milestone: high school graduation. If you have a child claiming their diploma, now is the time to prepare them for life after leaving the nest.

Graduating high school is a significant accomplishment. However, it comes with serious responsibilities that your child probably isn’t thinking much about right now. Once your child turns 18, they become a legal adult, and specific areas of their lives that were once under your control will be solely their responsibility.

While your child will now be a legal adult, you still have essential parental duties. Yet, if you don’t support your child to step into adulthood with legal documents to help both of you, it can be challenging and costly for you to help them in the event of an emergency.

For instance, should your child get into a severe car accident and require hospitalization, you would no longer have the automatic authority to make decisions about his or her medical treatment or handle their financial matters. In fact, without legal documentation, you wouldn’t even be able to access his or her medical records or bank accounts without a court order.

To address this vulnerability and ensure your family never gets stuck in an unnecessary court process, before your kids move out or head off to college, have a conversation about estate planning and have them 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 decisions for themselves.

For example, the medical power of attorney would allow you to decide about your child’s medical treatment if he or she is knocked unconscious in a car accident or falls into a coma due to a debilitating illness.

Without a medical power of attorney in place, if your child suffers a severe accident or illness that requires hospitalization and you need access to 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 due to HIPAA laws, once your child becomes 18, no one—not even parents—is legally authorized to access his or her medical records without prior written permission. But an adequately drafted medical power of attorney will include a signed HIPAA authorization, so you can immediately access their medical records to make informed decisions about their treatment.

2. Living Will

While the 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. These are specifications on how your child’s medical decisions should be made, 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 requests their medical care managed, a living will also include instructions about who should visit them in the hospital and even what kind of food they would want to have provided. For example, if your child is a vegan, vegetarian, gluten-free, or takes specific supplements. These are all things that should be considered and recorded in their living will.

Finally, speak with your child about the unique medical decisions related to the coronavirus, particularly in intubation, ventilators, and experimental medications. Your child’s quality of life decisions should also be outlined in their living will. You can find in our previous article, COVID-19 Highlights Critical Need for Advance Healthcare 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 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 such authority.

Start Adulthood The Right Way

Before your kids head out into the world, make sure they’ve got the proper planning in place. By doing so, you are modeling good financial stewardship and setting them up right from the start. Financial and legal illiteracy is an epidemic that you can quickly address, starting with yourself and your own family.

As your Personal Family Lawyer®, we can not only help you create these vital documents, but we can also facilitate a family meeting to discuss the importance of planning. We will begin what we hope will be a life-long relationship with your children as they take this crucial first step into adulthood. Contact us today to ensure that if your child ever does need your help, you’ll have the legal authority to provide it.

​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.

Meredith Andersen first discovered her passion for real estate after her husband read Flipping Houses for Dummies. At the time, Meredith and her husband were living on a sailboat off the coast of Mexico. They originally returned to the states to flip houses with the ultimate goal of collecting passive income to put towards future sailing adventures. And while Meredith’s dream of permanently living at sea never materialized, she nevertheless developed a love for real estate that has stuck with her to this day.

After entering the real estate world, Meredith was originally working 24/7. She explains that this wasn’t a burden for her, since she truly enjoys what she does. However, once she started building a family, it became harder for her to balance real estate responsibilities with raising her kids. Meredith found a solution in building out her team, which now consists of four agents and a full time administrative assistant. Meredith describes this transition as entering a new season of her life. While she started in a season of full-time work mode, she has since moved to a season of leadership, in which she can help her agents get what they need to thrive AND take care of her two young kids. Meredith’s number one tip for working moms is to accept that life is a journey of balancing rather than finding finite balance. Viewing this balancing process as active and ongoing has helped relieve a lot of pressure for Meredith as she navigates the challenges of working motherhood.

Meredith not only helps her clients buy and sell properties, but she also capitalizes on the benefits of real estate investment in her own life. When asked why real estate is a good investment for families, Meredith explains that real estate pays you in three ways: (1) equity, (2) passive income, and (3) tax write offs. She urges listeners to find a real estate agent they like, trust, and who knows the area well before entering the market. Tune into this week’s episode of The Working Moms Podcast to learn more about Meredith’s career in real estate, her recommendations for real estate investors, and her tips for working moms trying to achieve more balance in their lives.

Quotes:

• “There’s a saying that you’re not trying to go for a completely balanced life. It’s not balanced; you’re balancing….You’re never going to be to this point where it’s done and I’m there. You kind of have that theory in your head sometimes or it’s kind of like you’re reaching for this unattainable ‘balanced.’ So I liked that idea that it’s ok…that I’m always balancing the things that I want to see in my life.” (0:42-1:22)
• “I was working basically 24/7….It was because I love it. I love what I do, I want to hustle, and I want to grow and help people. So I found it really challenging because I have all that desire and I have all that drive and when you become a mom, there’s a sense of, ‘Do I still get to have those things? Am I still allowed to have that much drive and that much desire because I have these girls that depend on me now?” (10:16-10:45)
• “I’m really passionate about helping people figure out what it is they want, realize that they deserve what they want (because a lot of times that’s a big hurdle – feeling deserving of everything that you want), and then getting it.” (24:02-24:20)

Links Mentioned:

https://www.andersenhomegroup.com/

Facebook Group:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/theworkingmoms

Pamela Maass on Linkedin:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/pamela-maass/

Law Mother Website:

https://www.lawmother.com

Podcast production and show notes provided by FIRESIDE Marketing