Estate planning is a subject that most don’t like to think about
“Perhaps you need to put it into perspective and ask yourself the question what would happen to your estate if you died or became incapacitated yesterday.”
Would your assets, belongings and your wishes be dealt with in the way you wanted them to explicitly be dealt with?
Estate planning protects more than just your assets – it protects your family and loved ones who may need access to your investments to help them continue to cover their living expenses. In a time of grief, it can also make the process of managing your estate as easy as possible.
Some of the things that are covered in an Estate plan
- Naming your beneficiaries – You’re able to name all of the people you want to receive your assets or a continued income stream to reduce confusion and uncertainty in a time of great stress, and the wishes in your estate plan are legally binding.
- A minimisation of taxes – Your estate plan can be structured so that as little as possible of your estate is lost in taxes when they pass to your beneficiaries.
- Putting all your affairs in order – Estate planning gives you the peace of mind that you have recorded all of your wishes and set plans in place for those wishes to be carried out and reduces the chances that your family will have to deal with expensive administration processes.
- A will – Part of your estate plan includes you writing or updating your will to include your executor(s), gifts, current beneficiaries, assets and wishes.
- General or Enduring Power of attorney – You also need to assign power of attorney to someone and that allows them the authority to manage your financial or medical affairs when you become unable to do so yourself.
