Break Out the Balloons - It is National Estate Planning Awareness Week!
Every year I count the days down to this week. Well, not really. But it does serve as a regular reminder about the need to address the basics of estate planning. Despite my best intentions, there continues to be a large portion of Americans that don't have estate plans. Based on a 2014 survey , for those individuals age 51-64, 51% don't have wills. For all ages above 18, it is 64% without wills. Wow. Many younger people feel invincible and don't believe it is necessary to have a will in place . I suppose you can wait until the day before you die to sign your will and all is fine. But for most people, except for Marty McFly , we don't know when our number gets called. It is one of the reasons we buy insurance - protection against the unknown. For the cynical people out there you are probably saying "whatever lawyer boy, you are just trying to get some business." Yep. Lawyers need to eat, too. But it is frustrating to see situations where lac