Your Life Changes.
Your Estate Plan Should Keep Pace.
Creating an estate plan is an important step, but it isn’t necessarily a one-time event.
The plan you created years ago reflected your family, finances, property, relationships, and priorities at that moment. As those things change, your estate plan may need to change with them.
You don’t need to revisit your documents every time something in your life changes. But certain milestones are good reasons to take another look and make sure the decisions you made then still reflect the life you are living now.
Nine Reasons to Take Another Look
Any of these moments is a good reason to make sure your plan still fits your life.
Marriage, Divorce, or Remarriage
Changes in marital status can have significant implications for an estate plan.
Marriage may introduce a new spouse, new property, new beneficiaries, and new decisions about who should inherit or make financial and health care decisions on your behalf.
Divorce or remarriage can make a review especially important. Existing documents and beneficiary designations may no longer reflect your wishes, and blended families can introduce questions about providing for a spouse while also protecting the interests of children from a previous relationship.
A review gives you an opportunity to make sure your plan reflects the family you have today.
A New Child or Grandchild
Welcoming a child or grandchild often changes the way people think about planning.
For parents of minor children, an estate plan can address who you would want to care for your children and how assets should be managed for them if you are no longer there.
As children become adults and grandchildren arrive, you may also want to reconsider how and when assets are distributed, whether a trust makes sense, and who should take on important roles within your plan.
Buying or Selling Significant Property
A new home, vacation property, rental property, or other significant real estate acquisition can change the composition of your estate.
How property is titled can also affect how it passes, so buying or selling real estate is a natural time to make sure your ownership arrangements and estate planning documents continue to work together.
This can be particularly important for clients who own property in more than one state.
Starting, Buying, or Selling a Business
For a business owner, an ownership interest is often both a significant asset and an important source of income for the family.
Starting, acquiring, growing, or selling a business can affect the value and structure of your estate. It may also raise questions about succession, ownership, management, and what should happen to the business if you become incapacitated or die.
Your business planning and estate planning should not operate independently of one another.
Significant Growth or Changes in Your Assets
The financial picture you have today may look very different from the one you had when your estate plan was created.
Growth in investments or retirement assets, an inheritance, the acquisition of investment property, or another significant change in wealth can affect whether your existing plan still accomplishes what you intend.
A review can also uncover assets or accounts that may not coordinate with the rest of your plan.
Changes to Beneficiaries or the People You Have Chosen to Act for You
Estate plans depend on people.
You may have named an executor, trustee, guardian, financial agent, health care agent, or other decision-maker years ago. Relationships and circumstances change, and the person who once seemed like the obvious choice may no longer be the person you would choose today.
The same is true of beneficiaries. Families grow and relationships evolve.
Periodically asking “Would I make these same choices today?” is one of the simplest ways to determine whether your plan deserves another look.
Moving to North Carolina or South Carolina
A move across state lines is a particularly good reason to review an existing estate plan.
Documents created in another state may still have legal effect, but that does not necessarily mean they are the best fit for your new domicile, current assets, or present intentions. State-specific laws, property ownership, powers of attorney, and other considerations can affect how a plan operates.
If you have recently moved to North Carolina or South Carolina, we can review the documents you already have and determine whether they should remain in place, be updated, or be replaced.
Retirement or Another Major Life Transition
Retirement can bring changes in income, investments, real estate, business ownership, and the way assets are held.
It can also be a natural point to think differently about the years ahead: who should be able to help with financial or health care decisions if necessary, what you want to leave to family, and whether your existing plan still reflects your priorities.
Other major transitions, including the death or incapacity of a spouse, beneficiary, or someone named to serve in your plan, can also make a review important.
And Sometimes, Enough Time Has Simply Passed
You don’t need a major life event to justify reviewing your estate plan.
If you pull out your documents and realize you barely remember what they say, the people named in them surprise you, or your life looks substantially different from when you signed them, that’s useful information.
Even when no changes are ultimately necessary, a periodic review can confirm that your plan still reflects your wishes and that the pieces continue to work together as intended.
A Review Doesn’t Mean Starting Over
One reason people put off reviewing an estate plan is the assumption that doing so means recreating everything from scratch.
It doesn’t.
Sometimes an existing plan continues to work well. Sometimes a few targeted changes are appropriate. In other situations, changes in family, assets, laws, or circumstances may make a more substantial update worthwhile.
The first step is simply understanding what you have, what has changed, and whether the two still fit.
Don’t Forget What Happens Outside Your Estate Planning Documents
Reviewing an estate plan shouldn’t stop with your will or trust.
Beneficiary designations, account ownership, real estate titles, business interests, and other assets can affect how property ultimately passes. A plan that looks right on paper may not work as intended if those pieces point in different directions.
That is why our review looks beyond individual documents to consider how the pieces of your plan work together.
When Life Changes, Start With a Conversation
You don’t need to know whether your estate plan needs to be changed before contacting us. That’s what a review can help determine.
If your family, finances, property, business, or priorities have changed, or it has simply been a while since you looked at your plan, we can help you understand whether what you have still fits the life you’re living today.
