What to Expect at your Estate Planning Appointment
When you make an appointment for an estate planning consultation, you will be mailed or may download some documents to review and complete. One reviews your finances, another reviews your family situation. Please take this seriously; our advice to you is only as good as the information you provide to us.
Please bring to the appointment with you:
- the financial form and questionnaire (copies can be downloaded below); and
- your current estate planning documents. This includes Wills, Trusts, Powers of Attorney, and deeds to property owned.
If you cannot complete the forms, come in anyway. We will do our best with the information we have.
Your appointment with the attorney will last between an hour and an hour and a half. During this time, the attorney will review the information you have provided; will determine what your specific questions or concerns are regarding your family, your health, and your plans for health and financial management in case of your incapacity or death; and will advise about whether it appears that a Will-based or a Trust-based plan will best meet your needs.
You will be offered a retainer, normally fixed fee, outlining our planning recommendation and the documents which support it, and the cost.
- Will-based plans: Our Will-based plans are usually composed of a Will, a Durable Power of Attorney, an Advance Medical Directive, and a Medical Release. Most of our Will-based plans will be completed in two appointments, the consultation and the signing. Following the consultation you will be mailed drafts so you will have time to review the documents and advise us of any changes before you come in to sign your documents. Our Will-based plans are normally completed within three weeks from the date of the consultation.
- Trust-based plans: Our Trust-based plans are usually composed of a Trust, a Will, a Durable Power of Attorney, an Advance Medical Directive, a Medical Release, and often a deed. Most of our Trust-based plans will be completed in three appointments: the consultation, a draft review, and a signing and funding appointment. Our trusts are normally completed within six weeks from the date of the consultation.
- Documents "on the fly": If you only need a simple document and have all of the information we need to complete it, and if we have the administrative support to allow it, we may do the document "on the fly" so that it is completed at the consultation. However, this is the exception, not the rule.
A common question is whether you can bring family with you to the appointment. We welcome your family to the appointment, but must preserve certain legal formalities. Your family may be invited into the appointment at the beginning (to summarize the situation) and / or at the end (to explain the decisions made). However, during much of the appointment, your family will be asked to wait outside. You must be free to communicate with your attorney without concern about hurt feelings, and we must preserve the attorney-client privilege. Additionally, if the documents we draft for you are challenged by a disappointed family member, it is critical that we can testify that you met with the attorney privately, and you were not under the improper influence of any other person.
Susan I. Jean & Associates LLC
