In the age of social media and readily available information about people’s lives, many are placing a new value on privacy. Keeping your personal information away from the eyes of the public is priceless. Many estate planners have this as one of their top priorities when they start to think about their estate planning strategies.
If you want to make sure that the details contained within your estate plan will remain private, it is important that you look into the different estate planning options and how they could help you with your other goals.
The problem with using a will as an estate plan
Creating a will is a popular choice when creating an estate plan, because it is very easy to create, and generally flexible in being able to communicate your exact wishes. However, if you are creating a will, it is important to note that will-based estate plans become public court records. This means that at the end of your lifetime, it would be possible for members of the public to learn about the wishes that you have set out within your will regarding your personal assets. This is because the document will be filed with the probate court.
Consider the use of a trust for privacy
If privacy is a high priority for your estate plan, you may want to consider creating a revocable living trust. By creating a trust for your estate, the assets held within the estate will be able to completely bypass the probate court. This has several advantages, including the possibility to keep all of your wishes and details about assets confidential. Additionally, by creating a trust-based estate plan instead of a will, you will be able to avoid the lengthy process of probate. This will also be expensive and will take significant funds from your estate before your beneficiaries have access to it.
If you want to learn more about creating a private estate plan while also optimizing the functioning of the plan, you should make sure that you look into the various options in California. Estate plans can be molded according to your individual needs.
