FAMILY ESTATE PLANNING
Planning for Everyone You Love and Everything You Have
Do you know what would happen legally to you, your loved ones, your money, and everything else you care about – if something unexpected happened to you?
If you have an estate plan and it’s out of date, your assets could be lost to Hawaii's Unclaimed Property Program, or to an unnecessary Court process.
If you don’t know exactly what would happen to everyone you love and everything you own, then the first step is to find out exactly what would happen, legally and financially, so that you can decide if the current state of your affairs is okay with you.
How Do We Help You With Estate Planning?
We conduct a Family Wealth Planning Session, where we spend time together and you’ll get informed.
Before your Family Wealth Planning Session, you will complete a Family Wealth Inventory and Assessment, which will help you to get clear about what you own and what you have to think about when it comes to planning for the well-being and care of your loved ones and belongings.
If you decide the current state of affairs is unacceptable, and if we both decide that it’s a fit to work together, then we can design an estate plan that will best suit the needs of your family.
The foundation of your estate plan will often include a revocable living trust. You transfer your property into this trust for your benefit during your life.
One of the benefits of a revocable living trust is that when done correctly and maintained over time, your estate plan should help your family to avoid the cost and delay of the public probate process and minimize or eliminate estate taxes.
For people with additional needs, we provide advanced estate planning services.
Can I DIY My Estate Plan?
Unfortunately, most plans don't work because much of what passes for estate planning is little more than word processing.
You are asked a few questions and then the drafter decides which "plan" is right for you, and fits you into a template.
This is not estate planning; it is little more than a “search and replace” of your family’s name and then a hit of the “print” button which spits out form documents.
The assets you have acquired during your life and the ways that you own them are often far more complex than a standard legal document or online service can anticipate.
When you make that all-important decision to create a will or put your assets into a trust, you need an experienced estate planning attorney to guide you so that your wishes for life and death can be carried out without risk of your family getting stuck in court or conflict, when it’s too late.
Your incapacity or death will be an emotional time for your family.
During this time, they need guidance, not a set of documents, which may not have even been kept up to date or adequately cover after-acquired assets.
In certain cases such as being married multiple times, having minor children, having loved ones with special needs, or owning a small business, legal assistance is especially necessary.
There may also be a variety of different tax or asset protection implications for your inheritors.
The right lawyer can advise you on the best way to handle the different assets you own such as real estate, investments, a small business, or personal property.
Is a trust right for your situation? Is there a way to transfer an asset before you pass so that it will be protected from claims, creditors or taxation?
A cheap online document preparation company can't help you with that.
We will educate you, take the time to get to know you, your family, your concerns, your goals, and your issues, and will gladly and patiently answer all your questions to produce an estate plan that is exactly right for you and will keep your loved ones out of court and out of conflict.
If you are a family with young children, then your estate plan should begin with a foundation that ensures your children would always be taken care of, no matter what happens.
One of our areas of greatest expertise is protecting minor children.
Not in Honolulu? No problem. I offer virtual estate planning services statewide.
