Estate planning and will drafting often turn out to be confusing for individuals with little to no knowledge about the legal formalities of estate planning. If this sounds similar to your case, you’re prone to make drastic mistakes during estate planning. Especially, if you don’t have an estate law attorney by your side, you are more prone to make mistakes while deciding your beneficiaries or creating your will.
Anyway, being familiar with the common mistakes and pitfalls associated with family estate planning may reduce your chances of encountering them. This article can be considered an introductory guide to the common estate planning mistakes that most property owners tend to make. Alongside, you’ll come to know about how you can fix the mistakes you do unknowingly.
Improper estate planning or no planning
In most cases, property owners don’t tend to take the necessary steps to create a well-constructed will or estate plan. They take estate planning as a casual task and end up in trouble related to the future of their properties. Nobody wants his real estate assets or properties to get handed over to unstable hands. Delaying estate planning will make the process more complicated for you. Therefore, it’s advisable for you to hire a will estate lawyer as soon as possible to reduce the risk factors related to your properties.
Lack Of Interactions With Friends And Family
Designating someone as your estate beneficiary is what you control completely. But you can’t overrule the relevance of discussions on your real estate planning with your close ones. Needless to specify, you don’t want any of your close relatives to get deprived of what he/she deserves. You’re free to make your decisions but inform your family about your decision and ask whether all of them are happy with your decision or not. When you do this beforehand, you don’t have to deal with the post-will dilemmas and confusions.
Designating Single Beneficiary
One of the worst estate planning mistakes is designating a single person as the beneficiary of all your assets and properties. In such a case, your property or estate assets won’t be secure if the designated beneficiary encounters an accidental death or a normal death.
If you’re blessed with a single child, you will nominate your child as your beneficiary without any doubt. But that decision may not be secure completely. To be on the safe side, you should set a few more people as contingent beneficiaries while designating your child as the primary beneficiary.
No Power Of Attorney
You put yourself at great risk as you refrain from declaring someone as your power of attorney. In such a case, nobody will be authorized to take charge of your assets during your medical emergencies and other ongoing issues. To kick out this issue, you must determine who you want to be your power of attorney and declare him officially.
Digital Assets Are Important
Besides your physical assets, your digital assets need to be taken into consideration too during estate planning. Not including the shares of your digital assets in your family trust will is an inconsiderate decision indeed as your digital assets may go to waste in your absence. So, be sure to include your digital assets in your estate planning to avoid unwanted circumstances.
Charities May Be Significant
Almost everyone wants a portion of his assets to go for charity purposes. Surprisingly, you stand chances to overlook the charity shares as beneficiaries while drafting your estate will. Changing the statement of your will and validating the changes repeatedly is quite bothersome. So, ensure that you don’t forget about the charity beneficiaries you’re connected to while continuing your estate planning.
Take Taxes Into Consideration
Real estate tax liability is something most property and estate owners fail to remember while creating their wills. Eventually, the tax liabilities increase too much and become burdens for their heirs in the future. Though real estate tax liabilities are not much of a headache, you should consider the taxes while drafting your will. That will help you reduce problems for your heirs and beneficiaries. Especially, if you are the owner of a massive estate, considering estate taxes should be your priority.
Updating A New Will On And Off
There’s no point in being in a state of confusion when you’re through estate planning. Updating a new will every other month can mess up your plans related to the future of your real estate assets completely. Therefore, don’t change your mind frequently and update a new will to complicate things more.
Final Words
So, the issues mentioned above are the mistakes you should take care of during estate planning. The article has mentioned tips to resolve the mistakes as well. So, keep them in your mind and draft your real estate plan accordingly.
