A will is a very important legal document for all adults irrespective of their financial standing. It allows you to establish an orderly transfer of your property and caretaking of your minor children per your desire should something unforeseen happens to you. Having a will also empowers you to implement your decisions while not being around.
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A will allows you to put checks and balances on your property transfer which you would enforce in case you were still around. For example, you would not want the creditors of your beneficiary go after the property you gave to this beneficiary. You can also build other rules and conditions if they are not met, then a property is not transferred to a beneficiary. Writing a will also gives you an opportunity to express your gratitude to those who cared for you. Through this document you can transfer a particular property in part or whole to an individual who you think will appreciate and respect it as you had desired.
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Not having a will leaves everything to a court's interpretation of laws of the state you live in. A court decided distribution of your property or designation of your minor children may not be what you would have desired. Imagine a situation, you and your spouse meet with a fatal accident and you have a minor child. Who you think will court assign to take care of your child, someone on your parents side or someone on your spouse's parents side? This is why, what you write in a will could be dramatically different from what the court prescribes.
To make sure your dependent children, especially minors (Under the age of 18 or 21 depending on the state) are taken care of per your wishes, you could set up a custodial account for each child through your will. This allows you to decide the custodian who will make decisions on how money is spent on their needs e.g. schooling. The custodial account ownership automatically transfers to the beneficiary child once he/she turns a major. The only downside to this arrangement is if your child turns out to be a big spender, this money may not be spent per your desire. Once the child is in full control of this account, the assets are also not protected from child's creditors. To avoid this risk, setting up a trust offers much more control.
The preparation of a will is fairly easy and not a very expensive. It is recommended to have it prepared by an estate attorney and have it registered. Estate attorneys typically charge a few hundred dollars.
If you can't afford an attorney, then you can think about preparing a will on your own. Irrespective of how you prepare a will, it is important to keep it in a safe, yet easily retrievable place. A periodic review and an update of your will is strongly recommended. Some of the common scenarios when a will should be revised include, a change of address, life events e.g. a birth or death, or someone getting disabled in your family.
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If you decide to prepare the will on your own, make sure you have a few witnesses sign it. The witnesses should not be related to you and should not be benefited by your will. Close friends can be used as witnesses. If you don't want to share it with your friends either then you could also get it notarized by a notary public. It is generally not a good idea to have joint will with your spouse.
Here are some of the key topics that a typical will includes.
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Lately, there have been many cases where a person was declared terminally ill by doctors. A terminally ill patient is one who, according to the doctors, would survive for 6 months or less. Such cases get into various legal and family issues. Whereas a surviving spouse may prefer the life sustaining tube to be removed, the state law or family of terminally ill patient may not agree with it. It leads to a lot of emotional pain, sufferings, and often strained relationships among the loved ones . As a result, it is important to put your thoughts in writing via a 'Living Will'.
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A living will is a legal document and describes that you don't want a life sustaining treatment. Although it is recommended to get a living will prepared by an estate attorney, you can also prepare it on your own. A living will document should cover the following:
Other considerations: Check your state specific law around living wills. You can also elaborate on other details e.g. you may need life-sustaining treatment for x days, types of treatments you don't want to receive e.g. antibiotics, blood transfusions, invasive tests etc. You can also specify where you want to spend your last days e.g. at home rather than in a hospital, if it does not jeopardize the chance of your recovery. Some people like to include a declaration of donations of tissues and organs for advancement of medical or dental science/research.
You can amend certain provisions of a will in a separate document called codicil. A codicil allows you to change your will without actually rewriting the will. A codicil allows you to capture your wish list i.e. who should get what personal item that belongs to you.
