One of my lessons today was on trusts and wills. The most important part of it was to remind me to remind my clients that everyone needs a Power of Attorney to take care of their affairs should they become unable to do so while living and also someone to take care of their affairs after a death.
I remember I was the person who handled my mother’s estate and I used the power of attorney paper a lot. Even if you don’t have lots of financial resources to leave someone, the power of attorney will save lots of headaches, time and money for those that have to deal with your affairs after you are gone. With all the new laws regarding privacy these days, it is very difficult to get access to your accounts without a written power of attorney form.
Wills and trusts are not always needed but if you have special items that you want to go to someone special, it is helpful to have that in writing. You don’t need an attorney to do this for you. Attorneys are needed if you have a large estate but for simple affairs you can write your own will. It needs to be notarized and have two witnesses sign it. This is something I will be able to help you with.
One of the kindest things you can do for the executor of your affairs is leave a notebook with all your financial records, bank account information, passwords, and directives that you want to see happen. Having everything organized is a real blessing for the people you leave behind. Your phone has a wealth of information in it but without a passcode to get in it, no one can access that information – i.e. your contact list. Putting together a notebook that contains all your pertinent information, including your end of life plan is a gift you can give your family. Make sure several know where you keep it so it can be found immediately so your final wishes can be carried out. Better yet, make sure those most important to you have a copy of your final life plans so they can be prepared to honor those wishes immediately upon your death.
When you are putting together your notebook, take some time and check who is your beneficiary on your banking accounts, etc. Is that person aware they are listed? I remember mom had an account and for what ever reason she only listed one of my siblings as the beneficiary. He wasn’t aware of it. The person at the bank couldn’t tell me who it was. The manager of the bank helped me narrow it down by having me play a guessing game of sorts. Technically he probably shouldn’t have done that but the balance was not very big and he was working hard to be helpful for me. It would have been helpful if mom had written it down for me. Maybe she had forgotten who she named – who knows. IF we hadn’t of figured it out, that money would have eventually been turned over to the state as unclaimed money and we would have had to go through their process to claim it.
Once you make your notebook, make a habit of reviewing it annually to see if anything has changed. Doing the review on your birthday makes it easy to remember to do. Check your driver’s license expiration date on that day too!
I only have a couple more review classes to do and then the classroom part of this first class with be done. Next up is waiting for my supplies to come in so I can do my case study which is working with a client setting up a complete end of life care plan. I also need to plan an event in the community to help spread the word about the importance of doing advanced directives. I then have a worksheet to submit my results of those two projects and a final written test to take and then I graduate.
While I am waiting on my supplies to come in, I will start working on one of the other three classes I have to take.
Just a heads up for those in are around the Emporia area. The wonderful Colorado peaches are here! The truck stand is in front of the mall just north of Walgreen’s. I picked up a case today. When Jim and I were on our trip earlier this month we actually drove through Palisade, CO and I got a few peaches then. They had just started picking them and didn’t have a full case to sell yet. They were so good!
When I was in Estes Park the local grocery store had some peaches – not from Palisade but they were good. I baked them for the first time. I melted butter and rolled the peach slices in the butter and placed them in a baking dish. I then sprinkled them with cinnamon and added some chopped pecans. I baked them for 30 minutes. Wow! They were SO GOOD! Legal for me to eat as I didn’t add sugar. I will have to be careful not to make them very often though as I could have eaten the whole pan of them. I served them with cream cheese on the side instead of ice cream as I can’t eat ice cream.
Grateful for fresh peaches, grateful for the beautiful sunset tonight, and grateful for a safe trip to and from Topeka today.