Creating an estate plan is one of the most important steps you can take to protect yourself and your loved ones. An estate plan saves your loved ones the expense and burden of managing your affairs. At the Law Office of Sofia Guzman, P.A., we help you form an estate plan designed to fit your unique needs and goals. Our goal is to protect your interests and your legacy through various tools such as wills, trusts, health care directives, living wills and powers of attorney.
Last Will and Testament
A Last Will and Testament is a document informing authorities what should happen to your possessions when you die. It can be any length and it must be witnessed by others who agree that you have the mental capacity to make your own decisions.
If you have minor children, your Last Will and Testament will designate their legal guardian or with whom your children would live, and sometimes a financial guardian who would make sure that your assets are distributed to your kids appropriately through their minor years and in full when they reach legal age or another designated date. Upon your death, a Last Will and Testament must be verified as valid in probate court, which is a court of law that deals specifically with Wills and estates.
A trust is a document through which property intended for the benefit of one party, the beneficiary, is held by another party, the trustee. The trustee and the beneficiary can also be the same person. There may be many beneficiaries and/or many trustees. Trusts allow your assets and possessions to skip the probate court process and go directly to intended recipients, saving time and money spent on court cost and attorney fees. Trusts can be prepared in a way to avoid various types of taxes in accordance to laws currently in effect. However, if the law changes by the time you die, aspects of the trust governed by former laws may no longer result in the best tax outcome.