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DON’T LET YOUR FAMILY FIGHT OVER GUARDIANSHIP

advance planning

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Getting a General Durable Power of Attorney is one of the most important things that you can do as part of your overall estate plan. You should consider the possibility that you might be incapacitated and unable to look after your own interests in the latter years of your life. If you do not plan ahead, then someone else will have to go to court and ask for guardianship over you to protect your interests.

If you think that having a relative asking a court for guardianship is not that big of deal, a recent case illustrates the problem with that approach. Sometimes, your relatives might not agree about all aspects of the guardianship and who should be the guardian. Usually, that argument is left in court, which can be bad enough. In the case of the Fox family, the disagreement resulted in a 63 year old high school counselor punching his 74 year old uncle after a court hearing.

Fortunately, not every family feud over guardianship will end up in criminal charges. However, any family disagreement over the issue is unnecessary and avoidable. All that you need to do is have an attorney prepare a General Durable Power of Attorney so that everyone knows who you want to look after your interests when you are no longer able to do so.

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College is extremely expensive and the cost keeps rising. Parents and grandparents routinely struggle with how they will pay for their children or grandchildren’s college education. If you plan ahead, you can make paying for the college education a part of your larger estate plan. You have many different options.

The traditional way to pay for a college education is by setting up a Trust. This allows you to set up the account long before it will be needed and let the Trust assets earn interest. However, there are other ways to pay for college if you have not planned far in advance. Parents and grandparents can directly pay tuition to the education institution. Money paid directly to an accredited school is not subject to the gift tax. You can then give living expenses to the student directly up to the gift tax limit. Another option is to set up a 529 college savings plan. However, like a Trust, that should be done long before it is needed.

Paying for college is important and most people want to see their children and grandchildren go to college without having to worry about how it will be paid for. Talk to an estate planning attorney about making your loved ones’ college expenses part of your estate plan.