As your family prepares for another school year, have you thought about what would happen if an emergency changed the routine you have carefully put in place?
Parents spend plenty of time updating school forms, emergency contacts, pickup lists, medical information, and activity schedules. Those details matter, but the beginning of a new school year is also a good opportunity to look at the larger plan protecting your family. If you became seriously ill, were injured, or were suddenly unable to care for your children, would the right people know what to do?
For parents throughout Alabama, reviewing an estate plan can help ensure that important decisions about children, finances, and healthcare have not been left to chance. Alabama Elder Law Center, LLC helps families create and maintain plans designed to provide protection through every stage of life.
Review Your Choice of Guardian
For parents of minor children, one of the most important decisions in an estate plan is the nomination of a guardian.
Think about whether the person you previously selected is still someone you would trust to care for your children. Relationships, health, family circumstances, and geographic locations can change over time.
If you have never formally addressed guardianship in your estate planning documents, the start of the school year can be a helpful reminder to do so. Clearly documenting your wishes can provide important guidance if the unexpected occurs.
Make Sure Your Children's Inheritance Is Protected
Leaving assets to minor children requires careful planning.
Young children generally cannot simply receive and independently manage a substantial inheritance. Parents should consider who would be responsible for managing assets for their children and how those assets should be used.
Depending on your family's circumstances and goals, trust planning may allow you to establish instructions for how and when assets are managed and distributed to your children.
The goal is not simply to leave an inheritance. It is to create a structure for protecting it until your children are prepared to manage it themselves.
Look at Your Beneficiary Designations
Your last will and testament or trust is only one part of your overall estate plan.
Life insurance policies, retirement accounts, and certain other financial assets may be transferred according to beneficiary designations. Those designations should be reviewed periodically to make sure they coordinate with the rest of your estate plan.
This can be particularly important for parents with minor children. Naming beneficiaries without considering how the assets will be managed after your death may create unintended complications.
A coordinated Alabama estate plan considers how all of these documents work together.
Review Your Incapacity Planning Documents
Estate planning is not only about what happens after death.
Parents should also consider what would happen if an illness or injury temporarily or permanently prevented them from handling their own affairs.
A durable financial power of attorney can authorize a trusted individual to handle certain financial matters when appropriate. An advance directive for health care can provide guidance concerning healthcare decisions and identify the individuals you trust to participate in those decisions.
Keeping these documents current can help reduce uncertainty for your family during an emergency.
Update the Information Your Family Would Need
Think about everything someone would need to know if they suddenly had to step into your daily responsibilities.
Important information may include insurance details, financial accounts, estate planning documents, healthcare information, school contacts, and the names of trusted professionals.
Parents do not need to leave sensitive information unsecured. However, the appropriate people should know that important documents exist and understand how to access them if necessary.
A carefully prepared Alabama estate plan is much more useful when the people responsible for carrying it out know where to begin.
Consider What Has Changed Since Last School Year
A year can bring significant changes to a family.
Perhaps you welcomed another child, moved to a new home, changed jobs, experienced a marriage or divorce, acquired new assets, or saw a significant change in your financial circumstances.
Even changes that seem unrelated to estate planning can affect an existing plan.
Making an estate plan is not something that should be completed once and forgotten. Reviewing your documents periodically helps ensure that the plan protecting your family today still reflects the life you are actually living.
Put Family Planning on Your Back-to-School List
A new school year represents another milestone for your children and another year of change for your family. Along with preparing for classrooms, activities, and new routines, consider whether the estate plan protecting your children has kept pace.
Taking time to review guardianship choices, beneficiary designations, trust provisions, incapacity planning documents, and important family information can help provide greater confidence as you begin the year ahead.
Alabama Elder Law Center, LLC helps Alabama parents create estate plans designed to protect the people who depend on them most. If your family has experienced changes or it has been some time since your estate plan was reviewed, contact Alabama Elder Law Center, LLC today to discuss your plan and make sure it continues to reflect your family's needs.