This article from Forbes Magazine, entitled What Could Happen If You Write Your Own Living Trust provides an interesting glimpse into the challenges faced by heirs or by someone still alive when attempting to draft their own estate plan. Hiring an attorney upfront to draft an estate plan can often be a more cost effective process than if you do nothing and allow your heirs fight it out.
In addition, particular when dealing with real estate as the article discusses, there can be mistakes that can cause unneeded time and money to be spent to correct the mistakes. Even if you have drafted your own estate plan, you could bring it to an attorney to review to ensure that it will properly fulfill your wishes.
Everyone has a different estate plan, so it is difficult to get a one size fits all estate plan that you can purchase or draft yourself from a form. At a minimum you should discuss your estate plan with an attorney and then decide to hire an attorney to draft or do it yourself.
Attorney Anthony Marinaccio offers a free initial consultation to discuss your estate plan. Please contact him at (818) 839-5220 to set up an appointment.
