February 2014 Moms
sdlaura
member
Estate Planning
sdlaura
member
This topic has been on the to-do list for over two years, and we're finally getting around to it.
We've been quoted $2,600-$3,000 for basic estate planning in CA. For those of you that have done it, does that seem standard? It seems like a lot, but I know lawyers' time is expensive.
Also, do you have your kids' guardians and the executors of your estate as the same person, or different people? And did you name the same person as the person who would make healthcare decisions for you?
I know that everyone's situation is different - just trying to get help with thinking through the planning...
BFP #1 9/2010 (lost our baby at 21 weeks)
BFP #2 8/2011 (ectopic pregnancy)
BFP #3 10/2011 (chemical pregnancy)
BFP #4 12/2011 (Abigail born 8/15/12)
BFP #5 5/2013 (Griffin born 1/23/14 with heart defects, now repaired!)
This discussion has been closed.
Re: Estate Planning
I thought so, too. But I got two quotes and they were both about the same. It includes a revocable living trust, will, healthcare power of attorney, financial power of attorney, HIPAA authorization form, and "funding work" to ensure that the trust is properly funded. The lawyer explained to me that this cost is much lower than the cost of the legal process that would happen if we were to die without a will and trust and everything has to go through the courts.
Our executors are different than our kids' guardians. Healthcare decisions are same people as executors.
I thought so, too. But I got two quotes and they were both about the same. It includes a revocable living trust, will, healthcare power of attorney, financial power of attorney, HIPAA authorization form, and "funding work" to ensure that the trust is properly funded. The lawyer explained to me that this cost is much lower than the cost of the legal process that would happen if we were to die without a will and trust and everything has to go through the courts.
I live in CA too and was quoted 3-5k! So what you were quoted for all that sounds great. It is definitely cheaper that having to go through probate. My brother and I had to do that when my parents died and it was a nightmare. It took 9 months and 20k.
I also suggest making sure your checking and savings accounts are joint with your spouse or that they have beneficiaries who are your executors so that they have money to pay for your funeral etc.
Thanks. Does the cost depend at all on number of assets or amount of assets, or both?
We did this after DD was born, early 2010, and paid about $2,500 and that was with a discount for teachers. Since we live in the same area and given we did it almost 5 years ago, it sounds like your quote is about right. We got the exact same services you describe.
We chose a first, second and third choice for guardian and a different set of three choices for executor. We have lots of life insurance and if we die, our kids will get a LOT of money and even though we trust the potential guardians100% we just felt better having someone else be in charge of the money.
The medical decision makers were different for each of us, I selected DH first and then my siblings, he selected me and then his sibs. We ended up named lots of people for different things. I'm not sure if that makes it harder or easier. We just didn't want to burden one person with every decision and choice.
This thread reminded me that I need to update our info now that we've had LO. Thanks for the reminder. Feel free to message me if you want more info or the name of our attorney. He's near the North County Courthouse.
Mom to Lily and Colin!
I just looked into this a little too as my main priority was to make sure a guardianship was set up for LO. I spoke with a friend of mine that is an attorney and she said it really depends upon the state in which you live as the laws and requirements tend to vary quite a bit from state to state.
She said that her and her husband actually just ended up using the Quicken Willmaker program, and so DH and I decided to do the same thing. It basically works like Turbo Tax - you enter your state and it walks you through various questions to generate your will/health care directive and then tells you what you need to do in terms of next steps to finalize it. I haven't totally finalized ours yet, but I was happy with it so far - it was easy to use and gave a fair amount of guidance.
That said, our estate is not very complex (at all) so I felt pretty comfortable investing $49 in the software vs. $2k-$3k in legal fees. Obviously it all depends on everyone's individual circumstances.
Another option that I also considered was to hold off until our open enrollment at work and then sign up for our Legal Care benefit. Like PP mentioned, that's likely a way to make it more cost effective too.