Wealth Planning Blog

Whether you are an expert in probate and have dealt with it on multiple occasions or a rookie, we can all agree on one thing: probate kind of sucks and should be and can be avoided. Let’s start with the basics: What is probate? Probate is a Court-guided process whereby a deceased individual’s financial affairs are wrapped up and the Court determines who the proper beneficiaries are of the deceased individual’s estate. The words “court-guided process” should automatically lead you to the accurate assumption that probate can be expensive both in time and money.

Historically, Missouri trust law prevented beneficiaries of a trust from replacing a trustee absent a showing that the trustee had committed a breach of trust. This law tended to insulate investors administering trusts from competition. Even if beneficiaries were dissatisfied with a corporate trustee who obtained average returns and charged high fees, they could not replace the trustee without proving misconduct. However, Missouri’s trust law has expanded beneficiaries’ power to remove trustees, so Missouri corporate trustees may soon face a more competitive environment.

So I’m an estate planner …well … what’s that mean? That’s a question I get all the time, whether by a prospective client or a neighbor or somebody sitting next to me at the bar. My answer: I make things easier for families during the worst possible situations. Whether that is a result of a loved one dying, becoming incapacitated, getting divorced… But let’s be honest, isn’t estate planning the easiest thing to put off and not talk about? I mean it’s morbid… sad to think about. 

When we meet with families, we not only try to recommend a customized estate plan that incorporates all of their desires, but we then proceed to hound them to get all of their “homework” done once their plan is in place. After all, signing the documents is only the first step. An “unfunded” estate plan is about as worthless as only having one sock. Although getting our clients to do their homework sometimes seems harder than teaching an old dog to do new tricks, we refuse to let our clients fail themselves. So, on the path of funding, we typically start with the house.

If you haven’t had the pleasure of administering someone’s trust estate yet, you are likely to either be involved in such an administration someday, or will have someone administering yours for you in the future. Many trusts being administered today, however, were drafted in the 80’s and 90’s and were never updated or revisited once they were put into place. This leaves children and grandchildren struggling to administer trust estates subject to terms that are either outdated or simply don’t make sense anymore for their families.