Just when you think you can’t take another thing, something else pops up (like Murder Hornets).

The last thing you want to have to worry about when going through a stressful time, like the loss of a loved one, is making sure that their finances and estate are in order.

You wouldn’t want to go to probate court to receive your loved ones benefits and fight through a frustrating process during such an uncertain time.

At Marler Law Partners, we are committed to helping our community through hard times. In April and May, we ran the “100 Wills For Goodwill” campaign to help essential workers and those facing financial hardship prepare their wills and estate plans.

These documents are critical for anyone – estate planning is not just for people with a lot of money!

Even a simple estate plan can save you an immense amount of time and money.

Although we are not offering the free will signings currently, we are still holding free consultations year-round for our community.

Read below on how to best maximize your Marler Law Partners free will and estate planning consultation.

Essential Estate Planning Documents

An estate plan can be made up of many things. Most people think of the last will & testament as the most essential part of an estate plan; however, there are many other pieces included that you may already have in the works. These include:

Advanced Directive

If you’ve ever had major surgery, a hospital has likely provided you with an advance directive packet.

The purpose of this document is for you to state your preferences as to the use or non-use of extraordinary life-sustaining measures in the event of your imminent death or other similar situations.

For example, you are unconscious with no prospect of waking up or you have lost your thinking capacity with no prospect of regaining it. Essentially, your Do Not Resuscitate.

Medical Power Of Attorney

Although similar to your advanced directive, the medical power of attorney appoints another individual to make decisions about your health.

In the event you are incapacitated and unable to make decisions on your own behalf, this individual would direct the doctors on your care and wishes.

It is best to have the tough conversations with this person on your wishes regarding the extreme measures taken to save your life.

Durable Power Of Attorney

The person who is given your durable power of attorney is in charge of your finances in the case that you are incapacitated mentally or physically.

They would handle your finances until you recover or until your death.

IRA & Retirement Benefits Packages

Many times, when you are filling out benefit packages for work, you have to designate who you would like the funds or benefits to be given in the case of your death.

Bringing any documents like this can be useful to determine which of your benefits have and have not been directed to someone.

Important Information About Your Loved Ones

Consider which loved ones you would like your funds and belongings directed to. In order to fill out the necessary paperwork, you may need information like their date of birth, social security number, current address, etc.

If you are married, it makes the most sense to direct everything to your spouse.

However, you may want to consider having other friends or family listed in the event your spouse passes away before you.

Or, if you have children with someone other than your current spouse, you may want to direct some of the funds directly to your children. Consider these nuances before your meeting.

And if you’re still unsure? That is what your attorney and your estate planning consultation are for. They have crafted many estate plans and will know the right questions to ask to build the best estate plan for your family and your unique circumstances.

Digital Assets

Something that has been added to many modern wills and estate plans is the transfer of digital assets.

Consider all of your online accounts: social media accounts, email addresses, online billing and banking, digital storage, just to name a few.

It’s important that someone is put in charge of either disabling, archiving or deleting those accounts upon your death.

Many platforms, like Facebook, have a “legacy plan” for their users where they can designate someone to take over their page in an event that their death has been reported to the platform.

Others, like financial institutions, will deactivate any accounts once they begin working with the family on the transfer of assets.

Estate Planning Protects Your Legacy For Your Family

We hope you find our tips helpful!

If you decide to formally sign a will and protect your assets for your loved ones, we’ve got your back!

Book a free estate planning consult with one of our attorneys to learn more about the process and how it can make your life easier.

The post Why Estate Planning Is Essential To A Stress-Free Future appeared first on Marler Law Partners.

However, family Law covers many domestic issues relating to family outside of divorce. Below are some of the many ways Marler Law Partners can serve you in family law:

• Divorce
• Child Custody
• Domestic Violence / Orders of Protection
• Adoption / Step-Parent Adoption
• Legal Separation
• Child Support
• Child Visitation
• Establishing Paternity / Father’s Rights
• Annulments
• Same-Sex Divorce
• Motions to Modify
• Objection to Relocation
• Contempt Motions
• Family Access Motions
• Temporary Restraining Orders
• Pre-Nuptial Agreements
• Post-Nuptial Agreements
• 3^rd-Party Custody
• Grandparents Rights
• Guardianship
• Property Division / Partition
• Adult Name Change
• Minor Child Name Change

While the list is fairly extensive, we can cover the primary reasons we see clients for family law, outside of divorce.

Adoption and Guardianship

Marler Law Partners can assist with one of the happiest moments of your life – the adoption of your child! Whether you are adopting as a stepparent, a LGBTQ couple, a foster parent or any other situation, you can trust us to help.

Similarly, we can help you obtain guardianship, which gives the legal authority to make decisions on another person’s behalf.

A “guardian” is the person appointed by the court to make decisions for someone else. This is often sought by family members (aunts/uncles or grandparents) when the parents of the child are hospitalized or otherwise unable to care for their children for a period of time, but they could retain custody at a later date.

However, guardianships can be applied to adults too. Sometimes, when an adult child is mentally incapacitated or not in the right mind to make decisions for themselves, parents or others may seek guardianship over an adult.

Additionally, you may see a child applying for guardianship over their parents due to dementia or other mentally aging diseases.

Alimony & Child Support

The attorneys of Marler Law Partners can help you when any issue arises with ongoing alimony (maintenance as it is referred to by courts in Missouri) or child support agreements. Alimony is payment made from one ex-spouse to another for financial support, decided upon by a judge or agreed to by the parties. Child support payments are necessary for many reasons, one of which can be to supplement the finances of one parent or equalize the finances of both parents to benefit the minor child.

If you or your ex-spouse’s financial situation changes, you may need to seek a modification to your alimony or child support order. Or, if you haven’t received payments, an attorney can help you with the enforcement or recoupment of payments.

Pre- And Post-Nuptial Agreements

It is more common today for people to get married later in life. What this looks like for the modern marriage is a smaller registry at the wedding, increased assets to merge and in some cases, keep divided.

Since both parties are entering into a union with assets, it’s increasingly more common for couples to get a pre-nuptial agreement so that the division of assets is less messy if a divorce were to occur.

Additionally, many millennials getting married now witnessed their parents go through divorce and probably want to safeguard against the worst.

Read here on the latest trends in pre- and post-nuptial agreements.

Family law is an extensive practice area that covers much more than just divorce. If you need help with a domestic relations issue, contact us today.

Have a question about family law we haven’t answered for you on our website?

Call Marler Law Partners Today For A Free Consultation

The post Family Law More Than Just Divorce appeared first on Marler Law Partners.

An estate plan can mean many things – some refer to it as a trust while others call it a will – but an estate plan is essentially just instructions on what happens to your assets after your death.

Just about everyone has some sort of estate that needs to be protected. You likely need an estate plan if any of the following applies to you:

• You have children

In the event of an extreme hospitalization or your death, you need to make sure that the proper accounts or any benefits are transferred to their name.

An estate plan gives you the power to decide next of kin as opposed to the state or hospital. You can also choose who you want to have power of attorney, which is the person who gets to make life-changing decisions on your behalf.

Additionally, for children with special needs, you may need to protect their future financial gains and designate someone to oversee their government benefits, such as Medicaid.

This can affect yourself as well by leaving instructions on how your children care for you if you lose mental facilities.

• You’ve recently been married/ divorced

After any big life change, such as marriage or divorce, it is best to re-evaluate your will and update your beneficiaries. If you have an existing estate plan, you need to update it after any major change.

For domestic partnerships or same-sex couples, it is important to have your partner listed as a benefactor in your estate plan.

Since the legal framework is ever changing and varies state to state, it is best to outline everything in your estate plan instead of leaving it up to the courts to decide.

• You own property

Assets could be your house, car, or anything else valuable you would want distributed to someone else after your death.

This can also include DIGITAL property, such as usernames and passwords to your online accounts.

An estate plan can determine who has access to those accounts in your passing and instructions for deactivation/continued moderation depending on what you want.

• You want to protect your privacy

The living trust is often marketed as a vehicle that allows you to “avoid probate” upon your death.

Probate is the court-supervised process of administering your estate and transferring your property at death pursuant to the terms of your will. Probate court records are also public records.

To ensure the privacy of your holdings and property, consult with an attorney and consider an estate plan to ideally avoid probate entirely.

• You have retirement or life insurance benefits

Although most plans have you designate a beneficiary upon set up, having the information in your will can assist in speeding up the benefits transfer, serve as a reminder for you to make updates periodically, or include additional instructions for distribution.

For example, if the benefactor is a minor at the time they inherit; will there be an additional trustee or administrator?

Southeast Missouri Estate Planning With Marler Law Partners

Do any of these factors apply to you?

Then you may want to consider consulting with the skilled estate planning attorneys of Marler Law Partners to learn what you need to do to start your estate plan today!

Contact Marler Law Partners For Free Estate Planning Consultation Today >>

The post Estate Planning: Why Everyone Needs A Plan appeared first on Marler Law Partners.