Estate plans are like smoke detectors with dead batteries far more often than people realize. What I see in my work — sitting across from women in the middle of a divorce or a spouse’s death — is that the paperwork said the right things once. Life just kept moving. The beneficiary designation that was never updated. The trust that was never funded. The accounts titled in a name that no longer exists. The plan was there. The coordination was not. This is exactly the conversation worth having before the call comes.
Estate plans are like smoke detectors with dead batteries far more often than people realize. What I see in my work — sitting across from women in the middle of a divorce or a spouse’s death — is that the paperwork said the right things once. Life just kept moving. The beneficiary designation that was never updated. The trust that was never funded. The accounts titled in a name that no longer exists. The plan was there. The coordination was not. This is exactly the conversation worth having before the call comes.
Yep, just like a financial plan, an estate plan needs to be monitored and updated regularly to accommodate life's changes and surprises.