3 CONSEQUENCES YOU CAN AVOID BY UPDATING YOUR ESTATE PLAN
As we’ve mentioned in previous newsletters, the COVID-19 pandemic made the importance of having an estate plan ready to go even more vital. That said, having an estate plan is only half the battle toward making sure your beneficiaries will be truly taken care of after you pass away. After you first create your estate plan, you need to regularly review it to make sure information is up to date. Otherwise, your heirs could end up facing one of the following consequences of an out-of-date estate plan.
circumstances can cause a lot of undue and avoidable confusion among your surviving family.
A CHANGE IN ASSET OWNERSHIP
When you name specific assets for beneficiaries in your estate plan, such as houses, vehicles, stock investments or other valuable property, make sure to update your estate plan as your ownership of those things changes. If you sell your house, you don’t want one of your beneficiaries left with a property you don’t actually own anymore. Just like changes in beneficiaries that weren’t accounted for, bequeathing assets you no longer own can lead to a lot of confusion and hurt feelings. INCONSISTENCIES BETWEEN ESTATE PLAN DOCUMENTS You can name beneficiaries in a will, but you also have to name beneficiaries in IRAs and on insurance policies. All of
these are important documents that can ultimately determine who inherits your assets, and when they contradict each other, it can mean the courts will prioritize the beneficiaries on one document over other beneficiaries for inheritance. Make sure all your estate planning documents work in concordance with one another for a smooth legal process following your death. Of course, for any questions you have about your estate plan and how to make sure your family will be taken care of as you wish after you pass away, please call Obiorah Fields at 404-994-6218.
A CHANGE IN BENEFICIARIES
From the time you first create your estate plan and name your beneficiaries to the time you pass away, there’s a good chance you may have changed your mind about whom you want to receive your assets. Some of your beneficiaries may have gone through divorces, and some of them may have died. Failing to update your beneficiaries based on changes in life
At Obiorah Fields, LLC, we’re not your standard, run-of-the-mill law office. We don’t just do what’s required of us — we go the extra mile to make sure justice is served in every case we take on. If you’ve worked with us before and you know somebody who could benefit from taking us on as their legal team, please don’t hesitate to give them this newsletter and show them who we are! We want to help as many people as we can. We’re just one phone call away from new potential clients. If they contact us through our website and give us their name, contact info, and a brief description of their situation, we will give them a free case evaluation and report. Don’t hesitate to refer us! DO YOU KNOW SOMEONE WHO NEEDS OUR HELP? GIVE THEM THIS NEWSLETTER!
NEED A SPEAKER? If you are interested in having Teri Fields speak to your organization about legal issues, please contact us at 404-994-6218.
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