As the year winds down, your thoughts might drift to the future. And, as part of that future, you may be thinking of where your financial assets will end up. You’ve worked hard to accumulate them, and you’ll certainly need some of them to support your retirement, but what about the rest? What’s the best way to pass them on to your loved ones?
There’s no single path for everyone to follow. But you might consider establishing a trust, which offers some key benefits. For example, your estate can avoid the time-consuming, and highly public, process of probate. Plus, you can be highly specific about how your assets will be distributed.
To establish a trust, you will need to work with a qualified estate- planning attorney. And while you’ll discuss many issues, here are three key questions that will certainly need to be addressed:
