Preservation | Family Wealth Protection & Planning

For the parents of students entering college this fall, you may have a long checklist of to-do items already. It’s possible you are missing one of the most important items, though: Having your child sign estate planning documents.

On April 24, 2017, Missouri launched MO ABLE, the state’s Achieving a Better Life Experience disability savings program. Missourians with disabilities may now open an ABLE account to save and invest, tax-free, without jeopardizing federal needs-based benefits such as SSI and Medicaid. For more information about the ABLE Act, which Congress passed in December 2014, and about ABLE accounts in general, please see our prior e-alert.

In most states, including Missouri and Illinois, 18 is the legal age of majority. At that age, a person becomes an adult in the eyes of the law and gains all of the rights that go along with adulthood. Any person under 18 is a minor and, generally, does not have the legal capacity (or right) to control or manage his or her assets, including an inheritance.

If you are like most people, you have a clear idea about who should receive your assets upon your death. However, selecting who will be responsible for ensuring your estate plan is faithfully carried out may be more challenging. When your estate plan includes a trust that directs the distribution of your assets, the person (or entity) you choose for this important job is called a trustee. Your trustee will have the obligation to act in the best interests of your beneficiaries and to manage and protect the trust assets on their behalf.

After months of emotional and financial turmoil, a finalized divorce can be a welcome end to a stressful time. Now what? Before you move on with your life, make sure you truly sever all financial ties to your former spouse by updating, or even creating, your estate plan. Failure to do so can lead to unintended beneficiaries such as your former spouse claiming your assets at your death, resulting in costly litigation that can drag on for years after you die.

If you are one of the countless parents sending a child to college this year, you have a lot on your mind. Packing clothes, buying dorm room accessories and learning how to do laundry are probably only a few of the items on your child’s college checklist. Odds are that signing estate planning documents is not near the top of that list, but it should be. 

An Alabama probate judge entered an order recently sealing the probate court file, including the will, of Harper Lee, the famed author of “To Kill a Mockingbird.” Attorneys for the estate successfully argued public access should be restricted, in part, because the author would not have wanted her private financial information to be a matter of public discussion. Interestingly, despite being a notoriously private person, Lee chose to direct the disposition of her estate through a last will and testament, a historically public process.