Oregon Estate Planning Blog

4 Ways to Ensure That You Leave a Lasting Legacy

This past Sunday, I saw on the news that a pillar of our community passed away suddenly at age 38 of a heart attack, leaving behind a wife and 5 children.  This man leaves behind a legacy of helping many vulnerable members of our society through the work that he did, and he leaves behind a legacy of personal values for his family, many of which were penned in a monthly column he did for a local magazine.  It's sad that such a good person had to leave this world at such a young age.  His life makes me think of my own, and what I can do in the next 5 years to start to leave the kind of legacy that I want to leave.  

A legacy is so personal.  Everyone has different ideas about the kind they want to leave.  Some people want their legacy to involve charitable work.  Some want their legacy to involve personal achievement, such as writing a book or qualifying for and running the Boston Marathon.  Some people just want to be the best mother, father, or friend that they can be.  All of these ideas about what constitutes a legacy are legitimate.

For parents, I would urge you to do at least 4 things to make sure that YOU leave a good legacy behind for your family:

1.  Designate someone to care for your children if something happens to you.

Taking the time to designate guardians for your kids saves your family time, money, and a lot of heartache and drama.  When you don't designate guardians, a judge has to decide, and this means that your family will spend time and money in court, that your kids may be wards of the state until the situation is sorted out, and that the kids may end up with someone you'd never choose.  Make sure you name guardians to care for your kids.

2.  Create a financial plan that allows your family to live comfortably if you're gone.

Either your income or your care (or both) will need to be replaced if something happens to you.  If you are a working parent, most financial planners will suggest that you purchase a life insurance policy worth 10 times your annual income to supplement your lost earnings.  If you are a stay-at-home parent, you need to purchase life insurance, keeping in mind that your surviving spouse would probably take time off work and have the added expense of childcare and possibly housekeeping costs.  Not only do you want to replace income, but you also want to make sure that your money and assets will be available to your family if something happens to you.  The only way to find out for sure what things would look like for your family if something happened to you is to meet with an estate planning attorney and have them show you what things would look like.  If it looks like money and assets will be tied up, there are many different ways to plan to avoid that, and to make things as easy as possible for your family.

3.  Protect the assets and money you leave behind from creditors, lawsuits, divorces, and immaturity.

Many surviving family members will lose their inheritance or spend it quickly because it is not protected.  You have the option to leave your family's inheritance in a way that protects it from any creditors, lawsuits, divorces, and immaturity.  Ask your lawyer if this is advisable in your situation.  It will depend largely on your individual circumstances and how much you are leaving behind.

4.  Leave behind guidance for your kids and their guardians and trustees.

An often overlooked element of an estate plan is the personal guidance.  It's important to let your kids and their guardians and trustees know how you want them raised and how you want their money spent.  Your family should have a personal account of your educational, financial, religious, and family values.  When the guardians or trustees need to make a decision, they should be able to consult with the information that you have given them and easily make a decision that reflects your values, as if your hand is still there guiding your family.

Keep these four principles in mind, and you will leave a lasting legacy for your kids.

To your family's health & prosperity,

Candice N. Aiston

P.S.  Want to get started on the most important planning you'll ever do for your family?  Give our office a call at (503) 235-5150 to get started.  You'll be glad you did.

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Candice N. Aiston is an Estate Planning Attorney for families in the Portland, Oregon area.  She helps loving parents to prepare their families for a lifetime of security, prosperity, and guidance.  If you would like to receive her free report, "The 9 Common Planning Mistakes Parents Make," please visit http://candiceaistonlaw.com/.

 

Portland Trusts Attorney Discusses Passing on Your Values and a Legacy.

As an Estate Planning Attorney, I come across several interesting articles about estate planning every day.  This past week was different though.  This week, I have been bombarded with huge messages about legacy, and most of these messages were not from any of my estate planning memberships or colleagues.

One of my colleagues did alert me to an interesting article written by Paul Sullivan and published by the New York Times, titled, "A Child's Legacy Is More Than Money," and the author did a fantastic job of describing how working with an attorney on the document-portion of planning is the easy part.  He says that the most crucial part of planning is teaching his children how to live in the world, to pass on his and his wife's values, and he surmises that it may take 30+ years to impart these values.

Of course, sometimes you don't have 30+ years, and what is a parent to do then?  Our clients, and the clients of many of my colleagues, all have the opportunity to record a message (called a Family Treasures Conversation at our firm) to their family that outlines a variety of topics, such as their most important values and how they want the guardians to raise their children.  The recording will be treasured whenever it is heard by the kids.  It will of course be important if the parents die too soon, but it will also be cherished if the parents die after a long life.  It will encapsule a moment in time when the kids were young and the parents did everything they could to make sure that they took care of everything in the best way possible.

Additionally, I read a really touching article by Mary Lou Quinlan in Real Simple magazine last week called, "The God Box."  I tell all of my clients that one of the things that has affected me the most about my mother's death when I was 2 1/2 was that she didn't leave anything behind to tell me who she was as a person.  (This is the main reason why I implemented the Family Treasures Conversation with my clients.)  In this article, the author talks about how, throughout most of her adult life, her mother used what she called "The God Box."  This was a box where she'd put little papers with prayers on them, from monumental ones about her husband's stroke, to seemingly trivial ones about everyday decisions to be made.  The prayers all had dates on them, and sometimes she would insert little thank you notes when a prayer was answered.  She would fill a box up and then start a new one, so by the time of her death, there were several boxes.  These boxes served as a light into the mother's soul after she was gone.  The author went through all the boxes and laughed as she found prayers about the author's difficult coworkers, and she cried as she saw prayers that her mother had written about her own (secret) physical pain.  This was such a unique way for the author to be able to know who her mother was, and it really got me thinking about what "thing" my kids will remember most about me. 

Over the weekend, I watched a movie called Freedom Writers, starring Hilary Swank.  It was a true story about a teacher in California who reaches her inner-city students by having them write in journals.  She eventually gets the kids to read The Diary of Anne Frank, and while they find the end to be very upsetting, they discover that Anne has never died, because her story lives on.  The kids all find a lot of hope in this, since many of them face death and despair every day.  They continued to write in their own journals, which were eventually published into a book called The Freedom Writers Diary.  A foundation was formed by the teacher and the students to carry on the work in other classrooms.  Many of the students went on to be the first in their families to graduate high school and go to college.  Talk about a legacy!

All of these items that I came across in the past week really got me thinking about legacy, and how important it is for our kids and for ourselves to be mindful of what our legacy will be and how we will pass it on.  We do have the power to live on and guide our kids, but we have to first face the possibility of death and then plan ahead to make sure we've left pieces of ourselves behind.

What will your legacy look like?

To your family's health & prosperity,

 
P.S.  If you're ready to get started, call my office at (503) 235-5150.  We love to help parents who want to make things as easy as possible for their kids if the unthinkable happens.