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Discussing Finances And Wills With Young Adult Children

Discussion in 'Miscellaneous in Parenting' started by Laks09, Jan 20, 2021.

  1. Rihana

    Rihana Moderator Staff Member IL Hall of Fame

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    Many large companies offer the "Legal Help Plan" as part of employee benefits. Employees can enroll in the plan at open enrollment in Nov/Dec. It usually costs around $200-$300 per year for the employee to enroll in this Legal Plan. The cost is deducted from the monthly paycheck. So, the monthly payment is quite small.

    MetLife Legal Plan (used to be Hyatt Legal) and LegalEase are two well-known Legal Plan providers. If your employer does not offer a Legal Plan then you have no choice but to pay the entire will/trust cost yourself. If they provide but you have to wait till Nov/Dec to join and it will be effective Jan 2022, you can decide whether to wait. Or whether to do make a basic will using online resources for now and do the formal thing in Jan 2022.

    Here are two very informative links about the Legal Plan thing:
    • Will and Trust Through Employer Legal Plan (nice quick read that lists what all the Legal Plan creates for you, and couple of 'watch out' alerts).
    • Trusts | Google LegalAccess (has samples of the Will, Pour Over Will, Revocable Living Trust docs! Wish I knew this about this link when we started on this process. Though it is specific to Google employees, most of the info is common to all.)

    The Legal Plan helps with things beyond will and trust creation. It depends on the plan itself, but most provide a basic 30 min lawyer consultation if an issue crops up in life, basic financial planning questions answered by email and phone, debt management, fighting a traffic ticket, escrow for house buying/refi, simple dispute resolution.
     
    Last edited: Feb 2, 2021
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  2. Hopikrishnan

    Hopikrishnan Platinum IL'ite

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    :blush: Answer followed by question.
    I feel that people should KNOW what are the possibilities.
    And then do what is feasible, what they feel comfortable with, etc.. for their own situation.
    If at all we know/learn anything from this forum, it is MIL-->bad .
    You are already winning on that score. Good luck.
     
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  3. nuss

    nuss Platinum IL'ite

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    Thank you @Laks09. Yes, that’s what I figured as well- there are better earning vehicles.
     
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  4. nuss

    nuss Platinum IL'ite

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    Thank you! Yes, I lucked out. I have the best parents in law in the world!
     
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  5. Rihana

    Rihana Moderator Staff Member IL Hall of Fame

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    @Laks09 thanks to this thread, my February must-do list got changed a little. Hoping to wrap up a few more loose ends.

    ====
    One thing I wanted to add here is if anyone is trying to decide whom to name as Executor and Guardians in the will - think deep whether you want to appoint one person as both.

    The Executor is the one who takes care of the legal stuff. In the case of minor children, the Executor retains control of the money to be used for the children until the age specified in the will.

    The Guardian is the person who takes care of the children and raises them till they reach adulthood.

    Often, one person from our family or friends is not suitable for taking on both roles. But, assigning the roles to two people means the Guardian has to get the money (and approval to spend it) from the Executor. Parenting is in itself a thankless and soul killing job. Parenting a child who has lost his/her parents and having to get the money from another person can test the patience of a saint.

    The person we chose as Guardian can nod and say yes he is fine with not being the Executor. But when he has to actually ask the Executor for money over the years, resentment can set in.

    So, think deeply about these assignments. I erred on the side of assigning the same person for the two tasks. There was a second choice also specified if the first one could not or did not want to take on either task.
     
    Last edited: Feb 4, 2021
  6. Thoughtful

    Thoughtful Gold IL'ite

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    Wow, that's valuable information. Thanks @Rihana
     
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  7. nuss

    nuss Platinum IL'ite

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    This thread is a gem! Thank you @Rihana for taking the time to explain things so well.

    I would just add a bit of advice. When choosing guardians- think multiple times. This decision should be practical not entirely emotional. You might want your sibling to be the guardian but know deep down that they won't be able to handle the responsibility. I know that my sisters will happily raise my kids but they are in India. We decided to nominate my parents-in-law and if they have passed then one of my husband's cousins instead of his brother. We also erred on the side of assigning the responsibility of both executor and guardian to the same couple.

    You might want to think about what happens if the couple separates. In the event of a divorce, would both still be guardians or you would have one of them as guardian/executor and not the other.
     
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  8. Hopikrishnan

    Hopikrishnan Platinum IL'ite

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  9. msm

    msm Gold IL'ite

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    What a wealth of information in this thread... Thank you so much.

    Could someone make this a sticky/easily accessible/more appropriate forum, than in the Misc forum... am not much familiar with the way, else I would have done it.

    Tagging @Laks09 and @Rihana
     
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  10. Laks09

    Laks09 Moderator Staff Member IL Hall of Fame

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    @Cheeniya sir - Can you please make this thread a sticky.
     
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