
In a recent Kiplinger newsletter, Erin Bendig reviewed ten pieces of advice solicited from various legal experts on what items not to include in your will when estate planning. For example, leaving assets to a person with special needs should be done through a Supplemental Needs Trust. Also, since the will may not be reviewed until after the funeral, funeral instructions should be included in a different document. Another recommendation was to avoid including guns in a will, since owners must meet state and federal minimum age and mental capacity requirements. Retirement plan accounts and life insurance might already have named beneficiaries; listing these assets in the will might invite challenges in settling the estate.
Kiplinger’s Top Ten Don’t-Include-in-Your-Will items:
- gifts to special needs individuals
- provisions for pet care
- non-probate assets
- terms leaving unrealistic dollar amounts to individuals
- conditional gifts
- funeral instructions
- guns
- disparagements (reasons for disinheriting someone)
- business interests
- secure information (a will is a public document)
At our Indiana estate planning law firm, we were frankly surprised that one very important not-to-include item was not included in the list – digital assets. Estate planning is no longer about just death, death taxes, and beneficiary naming, we remind clients at Geyer Law. Technology, we point out, has everything to do with complicating our affairs, and our digital assets should be high on the list of private, sensitive information that should not be included in the probate process, but which needs to be part of any effective estate plan.
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Digital assets include email and vendor accounts, video and picture sites, social networking accounts, games, documents, and encryption keys, plus the physical assets (tablets, readers, flash drives, laptops, desktop terminals). A digital asset inventory includes access codes such as user names and passwords, and answers to “secret” questions. “Digital assets now are a major cause of problems settling and distributing estate,” Bob Carlson writes in Forbes.
Protecting digital assets can become crucial long before a will is probated. “It is crucial to give a trusted agent authority to manage your digital assets if you become incapacitated,” Shae Irving, of the UC Berkeley school of Law stresses, recommending a document called a durable power of attorney for finances. We also highly recommend our clients set up Legacy Contacts on their smart phones to ensure easy access to information and photos should you become incapacitated or die.
With life increasingly being lived online, don’t overlook that eleventh item, the one NOT to include in your will, but definitely important to include in your estate planning!
– By Ronnie of the Rebecca W. Geyer blog team