A crucial, often overlooked piece of the puzzle
It’s important to plan for your retirement and for other major financial goals. But what happens to your money when you pass away? Where do you want it to go? What kind of legacy do you want to leave behind? Estate planning can help address all of those questions.
Many of our clients, including those currently working at the University of Michigan and other public institutions, know that they need to be thinking about what happens after they stop working. But many haven’t taken the extra step to think about what comes after that. An estate plan will help answer questions such as:
- Who are the beneficiaries of your estate? Your children? Your siblings? Your spouse? Charities or organizations?
- Considering the size of your assets, is a trust a better option for you than a last will and testament?
- Are you familiar with Michigan probate laws?
- Who would you want to make decisions about your finances and your health if you were incapacitated? What are your health care directives?
- If you pass away tomorrow, are your heirs in a good position to manage your estate?
- Will your family be able to stay in your home if you pass?
- Who will inherit what assets, from property to jewelry to savings accounts, upon your passing?
- Is your estate planning approach set up optimally considering recent changes in tax laws? How can you maximize what you leave to charity or to your family?
A partner to you and to your family
Alongside your attorney, a financial advisor can help you plan your legacy. Going through estate planning with a trusted partner provides a certain peace of mind, as does the knowledge that your RIS advisor will step in to help your family when you’re gone. We’ve advised on estate plans for generations of clients and we consider it a great honor and truly meaningful work.
Part of being a long-term financial partner is knowing when we have the right kind of expertise to offer you and when we don’t. When clients come in without a will, trust, power of attorney, or other key estate planning documents, we refer them out to estate planning attorneys in the Ann Arbor area. We then continuously partner with the lawyers of our clients’ choosing, along with their accountants, tax preparers, and insurance agents, to manage their financial picture and their estate planning decisions.