If one of the few times you have your adult children gathered in one place is over the holidays, you may find this the best time to discuss your estate plan. If you’re anticipating putting your plan in place in the new year, it can be helpful to everyone to share your goals and get their wishes and thoughts before you codify anything.
This doesn’t mean the estate planning conversation should take over your holiday get-together. However, you can schedule some time to sit down and talk. Let them know in advance so that they can come prepared with questions or concerns.
Key documents to address
Every family discussion will be different. However, some key elements to discuss would likely be:
- Your will and potentially your living trust
- Your advance directive for health care and designated health care agent (which you should already have in place), along with your financial power of attorney (POA)
- Any special trusts you’re planning to set up
- Items that you want to gift to individual children or grandchildren rather than include in your will
You don’t have to give them precise details and dollar amount (which will likely change anyway). However, it’s good to give your loved ones some idea of how you plan to divide your assets. You’ll also want to discuss any large assets like your home to determine whether to leave it to someone or direct that it be sold.
What else should everyone know?
Talk about whom you’ve chosen to administer your estate and why. Be sure that at least your chosen executor knows where you plan to store your estate plan and other important documents (both hard copies and digital files) and that they can locate the necessary passwords and other login information.
This is also a good time to talk a little about what kind of legacy you want to leave. For example, if you’re leaving a significant amount of your assets to a non-profit, you may want to discuss why this organization is important to you.
Remember that the “estate planning talk” isn’t an end-of-life talk in most cases. You may need to reassure your family that you’re healthy and just want to get this in place so you have one less thing to worry about.
If you have legal guidance as you begin to put your estate plan in place, this can help you determine how best to approach various topics with your children and others given your own unique family dynamics.