Estate Planning

The Law Office of John D. Harrington, PLLC is happy to announce that we are now offering Estate Planning where our focus will be establishing Trusts. A properly executed Trust will avoid probate. There are 3 reasons to avoid probate:

• Time: Probate can be a time-consuming and frustrating process for the personal representative and the beneficiaries. The personal representative must expend a great deal of time and effort to administer the estate through probate, whereas the beneficiaries want their distributions as soon as possible. Probate takes, at the very least, six months. However, the process typically takes one year, and sometimes it can go on for several years if the estate is complicated, there is an asset that the estate cannot sell or distribute, if there is a challenge to the Will, or if there was no estate planning.
• Cost: The probate process can be expensive. Legal fees will be incurred if an attorney is hired to manage the estate's administration, and the personal representative might want to be compensated. The estate must pay the probate court's inventory fee, which is based on the total value of the estate. If the decedent received Medicaid assistance prior to passing away, there might be estate recovery.
• Lack of Privacy: All documents and information filed in connection with the probate are a matter of public record. Estate assets and debts, as well as the identity and distribution pattern of beneficiaries, will become public knowledge. As you would imagine, many clients want sensitive information like this to remain private.

Trusts can be used by anyone, not just the wealthy, to protect assets and loved ones.