Why should you contact us at Estate Planning Attorney Utah to assist you with your Estate Planning? We offer the revolutionary Estate Plan Portfolio. Our Estate Planning Portfolio was developed over a 20 year period by a few of the best Estate Planning Professionals across the country! Our system is an easy to use, online platform that walks you through the entire process of creating and funding your Estate Plan. What the Estate Plan Portfolio offers: A streamlined Estate Planning process making planning faster for you. You can create your documents in about one hour and you can do it at your computer It is very flexible. You can change your documents later if your decisions change or if your circumstances change.Estate Planning Utah The documents are comprehensive. It’s a full Estate Planning package. Documents include a Revocable Living Trust, a Last Will and Testament (Pour-Over Will), Durable Powers of Attorney (so that you can decide who makes decisions, financial decisions, healthcare decisions in the case you are not able to), Advance Medical Directives (so that you can give directions on whether you would like to be put on life-sustaining support or what you would like to do if you’re terminally-ill, etc). Plus many, many more documents. We provide secure online storage. The whole process is done electronically which allows for convenient, secure online storage. You can download and print them out. You can email then to someone. Heck you can email them to an attorney if you want to have them look your plan over. It’s completely online. You can do your Estate Planning in the privacy of your own home It’s very affordable! Other Estate Planning methods can cost thousands of dollars (i.e. Probate can cost thousands to tens of thousands) The fact is: Most People Need To Have An Estate Plan. According to Smart Money Magazine, if you have some assets (maybe just a car and some nice furniture or minor children) you will need an Estate Plan even if taxes are not an issue. 56% of Americans do not have any Estate Planning documents in place and only 23% of American adults over age fifty have a trust. So why is it that so few people engage in active Estate Planning? Well, there are a few reasons: They just don’t think they have enough assets Some believe that Estate Planning is only for the rich It costs too much. They think you have to pay an attorney thousands of dollars to get an Estate Plan in place It is an uncomfortable topic. No one wants to Plan their mortality They think it is just too complicated. They don’t understand the process or what it takes to get the job done. Let me tell you a little secret about Utah Estate Planning…. Everybody already has an Estate Plan. It’s either your Plan or the government’s Plan for you. So let me ask you some important questions: Who do you want to make the decisions over your assets while you are alive and after you die? Do you want to decide who makes choices over your health care, over your family’s future? Or would you like the government to make those decisions for you? How much of your Estate do you want to be paid to courts and lawyers after you die as opposed to having that money go to your family, your beneficiaries, your favorite charity? What happens if you don’t have Estate Planning documents or if you only have a will? Well, your Estate is going to go through a process called probate. Probate is a court Estate Planning Attorney Utahaction that determines what happens to your assets after you die. Essentially the courts decide who receives your assets. Now if you have a will, they’re going to follow your will but you still have to go through the probate process which is a public proceeding. During this proceeding all your private asset information, your private financial information, become public record. Depending on what state you live in, the process can take 3-6 months or even longer in some cases. Most states have minimum periods of time where creditors need to receive notice and have the opportunity to respond. So your family has to wait months before receiving the assets. If you have assets in more than one state (let’s say a house in one state and a time share in another state), well, when you pass there will have to be 2 or more probate actions started (probate actions in each state in which assets are located). Probate is expensive and can cost thousands of dollars in costs and fees. One of the costs of probate is filing fees. The fees vary depending on the state the assets are located in. In California, it can cost $395.00, in Florida, $400.00. You may need to give legal notices for creditors and other parties or you may have to post a bond. All of these cost money. There may be fees for personal representatives or attorney’s fees (that’s usually a very large chunk of the cost of probate). There may need to be appraisals done for your assets. So the total cost of probate, the ballpark range depending on what state you live in and the size of your Estate, could be 1%-8% of the total value of your Estate. So if you have a $300,000.00 Estate, and by Estate I mean the overall value of everything you own, your total cost of probate maybe in the range of $3,000.00 to $24,000.00. It could be less than that or it could be even more than that. That’s the general rage. In California, which has a particularly high cost of probate, a $100,000.00 Estate can easily cost $8,000.00 or more in fees plus there’s the cost of time (the time that your family has to wait). There’s loss of privacy. All while the government is making the decisions for you instead of you getting to make those decisions. This is one of the many reasons why we have created the Estate Planning Portfolio. We have made Estate Planning more accessible for families just like yours. So why do an Estate Plan?Funding your assets into a trust allows you to own and control the assets of the trust while you are alive. You are the trustee and the beneficiary of the trust. You can move assets in and out of the trust. Basically, you continue to do what you’ve always done as far as supplying assets, selling assets (you know living your life as already do). Then it gives specify direction about what happens to your assets after you die. You get to control the process.One of the HUGE areas of benefit is avoiding probate which a Will alone does not do. By avoiding probate you: save money (again it could be thousands or tens of thousands of dollars),save time (not putting your family and loved ones through months of probate) and also all of the hassles that can come up during probate (all the paperwork that family has to go through or they have to hire an attorney to go through).The documents remain private. You and your family’s financial information remains private.Your money goes to your family without taking a big chunk out of it to pay the courts and the attorneys, as is what happens with probate.Another benefit is: YOU GET TO DECIDE! You get to decide, not the court, who receives your hard-earned assets. It answers the questions: Where do you want your assets to go? When do you want your beneficiaries to receive them? At what age do you do you want your kids to receive their distribution? At age 21 or 25? Or you want to specify how they receive them. Maybe you want them to receive a lump sum or maybe over time. Maybe one part at age 21 or 25 and the rest at age 30. You also get to decide who makes the decisions if you are incapacitated. Who decides financial matters? Who decides healthcare matters for you if you’re ill? Do you want to be placed on life support systems if you’re terminally ill? Who will carry out your wishes regarding your health, your assets and your family? Who will get to manage the assets for minor children? Who will raise your children if you die?Utah Estate PlanningAnd really, it’s an ultimate gift. Its peace of mind for you and it eases burdens for your family. It’s hard enough when a relative dies. Your family is going to need time and space to grieve. The fewer decisions for them to make the better. If you’ve given instructions on what they should do, that gives them peace of mind knowing that they are following your last wishes which is something they obviously would want to do.Do it now while you’re healthy and capable. It is some much more difficult and stressful when someone’s in a hospital and they’ve been told they only have a few years or a few months to live and have to make important decisions. Don’t do that to yourself or to your family. Don’t wait for a tragedy before acting. Do it now! Take control over your assets and make sure that you create your Estate Plan and not have the default of the government deciding what happens to your assets (the assets that you have worked your whole life for). Decide what happens to those assets and make sure that you, not to government, makes these decisions for your peace of mind and your families peace of mind also. So take action now! Don’t delay!Whether you are looking to find Estate Planning Salt Lake City, Estate Planning Utah County or anywhere in Utah, we can assist you from the comfort of your own home. If you have any questions or need additional information contact us: (801) 692-0169
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