I don’t know about you but I did not grow up wealthy. Talking about money, Wills, and final wishes was just not something our family talked about around the dinner table. As an adult things changed. My circle of friends and colleagues expanded and so did my understanding of why families that strive to leave the next generation better off financially have these conversations and make a plan to leave whatever assets they have to the family members they love instead of the families of companies, governments and state agencies. I have seen and heard the painful stories of those who made a decision not to create a plan to pass their assets on to the next generation and how that greatly affected the emotions, peace, health and finances of the very people they loved and left behind. I did not want that to be the story I left for my children. So before my first child was born we made a plan. When my second child was born we changed it to include her and when life changed again we updated it to reflect our new wishes. Here’s the thing. It was totally unlike what I thought the experience would be. It was comfortable, it was easy, it gave me a sense of peace and a sense of empowerment. I wasn’t going to be lulled into a sense of false security that somehow things would end up the way I wanted if I did not write and notarize my Will and paperwork.
Without a Will You have no say where your assets such as money in the bank, property, land, cars, jewelry, special items that are of personal importance will go. The court will make that decision and it is likely that you would not have agreed with the decisions they make. Dying without Will is time consuming and costly to your family. The court process is not free and the costs associated with those court costs means less of the value of your assets would go the very people you had every intention of it going to.