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Estate Planning
Do you have an estate plan?
Is it presently operating or will it become properly operative at your death?
AFSC does not and cannot give legal advice. It can and does recommend that you seek and obtain the best available guidance for the proper and economical disposition and distribution of the property that you may own or control at your death. Consult the nearest Legal Assistance Officer to firm up your ideas. If arrangements beyond the level provided by legal assistance appear necessary, retain a competent estate attorney or the trust officer of your bank.
Your financial condition and family circumstances change with time. Laws affecting your estate also change. Moving from one jurisdiction to another can change the legal effect of actions you have previously taken for the protection of your loved ones.
Your adviser can discuss with you plans to diminish or avoid estate taxes, possibly reduce income taxes and even avoid probate or administration proceedings on your estate. Among matters that should be discussed are:
1. How to provide for the appointment of a guardian of the persons and property of your minor children in the event both parents die while the children are still young and need parental guidance.
2. The correlation of your spouse's estate with your own, and the effect on each if a common disaster causes the death of both of you.
3. The effect on your plan if you move from a common law jurisdiction state into a community property jurisdiction state, or vice versa.
4. How the estate would best be managed during your or your spouse's lifetime in the event that either of you became legally incompetent to manage your own affairs.
5. Insurance beneficiary designations and settlement options and ownership of the insurance policies.
6. The advantages or disadvantages of having record title to your home in your name with that of your spouse as "joint tenants with common law right of survivorship" ("tenants by the entireties").
7. The advantages or disadvantages of having any other property such as stocks, bonds, notes, bank accounts, mutual funds, automobiles, etc., in your sole ownership, as co-owners with your spouse or another, as "tenants in common," as "joint tenants with common law right of survivorship" or in any of the various types of trusts.
8. The most desirable way for your U.S. Savings Bonds to be registered.
9. The tax consequences of any of the actions taken or proposed to be taken by you.
10. The costs, taxes, probate fee and/or administration expenses which may or will be assessed against your estate under the many options and combinations of options available to you.
11. The importance of a will--for you, and for your spouse.
Do not let yourself be influenced unduly by every article you read on "estate planning." Once you plan your estate properly, major revision will be necessary only if your family situation is altered or if substantial changes are made in tax and descent laws. Avoid hasty action based on outdated and inadequate information.
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