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Episode 37: New Year Strategies for Your Estate: From Assets to Heirs
8 Plays6 days ago
Start the New Year right with the Burch Law team as we dive into why estate planning is a top New Year's resolution. After holiday gatherings, many are motivated to update their Wills, especially with changes like divorce that kick off at the start of the year. We'll explain why it's crucial to update your estate plan after big life changes, like removing an ex-spouse from important roles in your Will.
We'll also cover how and why you might disinherit someone, and the right way to do it to avoid legal headaches.
Plus, don't miss our rapid-fire list of typical (and not-so-serious) New Year's resolutions, from unused gym memberships to the commitment to pet every dog you meet. Join us for a mix of useful tips to get your estate in order and your 2025 off to a great start!
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Visit burch-law.com/podcast to reach out!
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Transcript
Introduction to Wills & Estate Planning Podcast
00:00:03
Speaker
Welcome to another episode of One of Us Knows What They're Talking About. Another one is you. I'm Lori Burch, your host. Join us as we discuss and unpack wills, trust, estate planning, and probate law in a way that's actually informative, interesting, and well, hopefully entertaining. Because if you don't have a will, the state of Texas has one for you. Let's dive in.
Podcast Release Timing & Elvis Story
00:00:40
Speaker
OK, so this is exciting because it's the beginning of the year. I mean, it's actually not when we're recording this, and it's potentially not when you are listening to this. But when this is released or escapes. Remember when I told you that story, the Elvis story, that instead of calling it a release, it was an escape because the record company never knew what they were going to get because of how controversial he was. So he joked that it wasn't a release, it was an escape, it escaped. Anyway, um when this will first be released, when this will first be dropped in the vernacular of the times, it will be New Year's. In New Year's, a 2025 or 2035, whenever you're listening to this.
Podcast Format Clarification & TikTok Jokes
00:01:36
Speaker
I'm sure that if there's anything that's going to endure,
00:01:40
Speaker
it will be this podcast. yeah Even though people think this is a Zoom call. Hey, right we listen, we went viral. I think, yes, so I think Sarah, maybe you need to put across the screen like this is a podcast. The whole time. yeah This is a podcast. This is a podcast. Here's the link so that you can join us. Listen,
00:02:07
Speaker
watch. It's not an office zoom meeting. Thank you. We just hang out here yeah and record it all day. I mean it's it could be a reality show because these conversations we have are basically the same conversations that we have when we're not recording them but we did we did go viral on the TikTok So now that this is 2025, at least when you're listening to this, pain does it exist? Does it not exist? We just don't know. I suspect it'll be fine. Just don't know. Yeah. Yeah. Because I'm assuming it's just like you can still post on it. You probably just can't make money from it and you can't download it in the store. We just don't know, Sam. Like Flappy Bird. Like Flappy Bird. These are uncertain times. There's so many ripoffs of Flappy Bird.
New Year's Resolutions Discussion
00:03:02
Speaker
and I have no idea what you're talking about, but it's okay cause i don't know this right now so What are y'all's opinion on New Year's resolutions? Like do you think they're good? Do you and or do you do them or is it like, you know? It's actually just another month. You should be trying to do better for yourself all all the time Sarah um i I don't really do them. I used to, but they fade after like a month. So um now I just go to therapy and work on things year round, you know? Okay. So Sarah, so proud anti New Year's resolution pro therapy. Exactly. Yeah. Okay. Sam, what about you? Where, where do you stand on that? I think if you're good at them,
00:03:58
Speaker
yay for you but i am not you're not like if you know you're gonna stick to them i think they're good to have like both also but if you're gonna say that you're gonna go to the gym but then you stop after a week like what was the point of hyping yourself so what what is an example for you where you used to think they were good but you haven't you didn't stick well what's an example well i mean one every year i do is say i'm gonna read 50 books and i never get there
00:04:27
Speaker
i cant with Maybe maybe it's the books you're choosing because I feel like I've read 50 machine books 50 times. Yeah, I mean they are usually longer books which don't help but but then I like I'll read like 10 in a month's period. I'm not even kidding. And then I'll just not read for like six months. So it's just me not spacing them out very well. Maybe I need to do like a book a month and then everything else is a bonus. Maybe we should do a book club. That that is something I floated. with I sent you. We've talked about it. It'd be cool.
Book Club Experiences
00:05:04
Speaker
Whenever I lived back in East Texas, my roommate, one of my roommates, JC, me and Luke, we had book club, but
00:05:14
Speaker
There were several aspects to it. It was one, the person who gets the most books in a year gets a gift card and we all like would put in like into a pool and whoever read the most books would get the pool. But that would be also a, this is the book we're reading for these two weeks and then we'll talk about it. So it was both like a joint effort, but also your own thing to see. JC pretty much always won. It's fine.
00:05:42
Speaker
She can read like no other. So something that our listeners can't see and even our viewers can't view, but I do, is on our on our screens, it has our names however we decided to enter them. And for some reason, Sentia put her name in as Sentia, but then her middle and last initials. So it's Sentia SF.
00:06:05
Speaker
And of all the many episodes that we've done, I've always like it's always in the back of my mind. And I'm now I'm now just going to bring it to the forefront, because if you can't tell by now, I have a little bit of a head cold and I'm not thinking clearly. So ah here you go. So Cynthia S.F. So S.F. is a common abbreviation for ah San Francisco. And I was thinking that would actually really be a cool name. Cintia, San Francisco.
Detective Name Joke & Banter
00:06:34
Speaker
and would be but Yeah. Like that could be like a book series. And you're a detective. Cintia San Francisco is on the case in Dallas. Nice. And Cintia San Francisco always goes to the Sam Anderson for the famous flapjacks.
00:06:56
Speaker
Every time she solves the case. Every time I solve every time she solves the case, I go there. She goes to the Sam Anderson. World flame won't flame us world famous flapjack say that three times Actually, so I'm really gonna go off the rails here, but it made me um Me flubbing my words made me think of one of my favorite birch law flubbing of words so for those of you are clients or are to become clients, which is all of you and
00:07:29
Speaker
We have an actual you'll move to Texas. It's actually a really cool proprietary exclusive tool that we developed. Now we call everybody knows where this is going now.
00:07:45
Speaker
that we called the WillLap for short. for sure and It's a really cool customized tool where clients can go in, answer questions that we've customized, and every one of their answers is then mapped to specific language and templates
Birch Law's Estate Planning Tool Features
00:08:03
Speaker
that we've crafted. so Not only is it a great and efficient tool for clients, it's also amazing for law firms. and so For all the law firms that are listening,
00:08:14
Speaker
If you're interested in licensing this, you can reach out to Birch Law and we'll be happy to explain how you can do that. Anyway, we've gone round and round on how we want to describe this to to clients, to um public facing, right? So we don't want to call it will laugh or anything like that because it's not just wills and people think apps are only things on your phone, which that is an accurate app is short for what?
00:08:44
Speaker
Application. I feel like Sarah was only pretending to start to answer when she all said it. She started and didn't know where it was going. She just opened her mouth and then went up. She went up and then she like watched us and was like, oh. A-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a I don't know if I'm ruining this for anybody, but an app is not just an app that goes on a phone. but Anyway, that's that's too much to explain to the general public. so we actually One of our esteemed team members, i i sometimes I screen calls to see how people are doing. and these These calls are only reviewed for quality assurance.
00:09:31
Speaker
and She mentioned something about how it's kind of like a blueprint and I'm like, oh, I love that. So we started going back and forth and we we narrowed it down to two choices. There was a state blueprint builder.
00:09:48
Speaker
an estate blueprint designer. And when we were talking about this in a small group, we realized we were talking aloud that one of them will not work. So we put in our chat with our team so that they would read it and not say it. And I said, do you all prefer blueprint builder or blueprint designer?
Naming the Estate Planning Tool
00:10:11
Speaker
And most everybody chose blueprint builder and then I said okay now say it three times aloud and then throughout the office what started to go on is what we had experienced in our office and knew that the only answer was blueprint a state blueprint designer because we're going to do this a state blue blueprint boober
00:10:38
Speaker
a st Blueprint bill but builder. Sarah say it three times. State blue estate blueprint builder. and i ah State blueprint builder. ah state blueprint oh no it's okay say i try it on twitter State blueprint builder. State blueprint builder. State blueprint builder. Okay it's not fair because you're in theater and I know that those are warming up exercises so you don't count.
00:11:06
Speaker
Come on, Cynthia. A state blueprint builder, a state blueprint builder, a state blueprint builder. Yeah, I just want to say that was not the experience we had when we were trying to just casually do this. I just remember during this meeting at one point, you told me I wasn't allowed to talk anymore. And you're like, you sit over there. And I'm like, well,
00:11:27
Speaker
Okay. Has that only happened one time? It's hard. I think there's like only one time when you actually said no, you don't have to speak anymore. I'm like, ah so there is there is no exclusive online birch law, estate plan, blueprint boober. We just have the estate plan, the estate blueprint builder, no blueprint designer, ah designer, designer, right designer so Anyway, speaking of flubbing words, which we weren't, but it happened. So New Year's resolutions, Cynthia, what it we were talking about book clubs that was came off of Sam's conversation. what Where do you stand on New Year's resolutions? I don't put much stock in New Year's resolutions as far as like, that's when you're going to start it. It's either you're going to start or you're not in waiting for some matchable time. I don't think it's going to affect it.
00:12:25
Speaker
so The only thing I see about like the new year is if you're just trying to mark like a time period that's easy for everybody to remember that you're doing something in, then yeah, okay, the new year, you start at day one. yeah But other than that, like if you're gonna wanna eat better, if you're gonna wanna go to the gym, if you're gonna want to start reading, ah it's not just gonna be one magical day, it's a process. So you have to kind of build up to it in order to make it a habit and keep going.
00:12:56
Speaker
i I think January is a terrible time to try to start something new. It's, you know, you're so worn out from the holidays. You're trying to get back into the grind. You're tired. You're cold. You probably are sick. Others around you are probably sick. You're trying to get kids back in school. Traffic's like picked up again. Why would you want to? They are from the holiday.
00:13:20
Speaker
Yeah, so um I do think the idea of renewal in time, and I think when people try to bite off too much, it yes it's not good. i my My sister, Julie Burch, who is not a sponsor, who is a professional speaker,
00:13:41
Speaker
she has She has a quote and now I wish I had looked it up, but it was so it's something to the effect of just try to make one but change one thing. Just change one thing in and make the step on the one thing. And I actually now, I should probably go to her website, julieberch.com, because I bet it's on there. Let me see, Julie Burke. But hold on. In the meantime, what is the likelihood of Julie deciding to be a sponsor via providing craft services for the podcast.
00:14:14
Speaker
I thought you were going to ask her to be a guest because I thought about that before. I mean that too, cause I would love that. Anytime I get to spend it on a news grade. She should be a guest. But craft services, I'm just saying, putting it out there. Maybe we should do an on location podcast and we'll go to her and we won't even have to ask her to do a spread. She'll just have something.
00:14:38
Speaker
She'll want to know you know names and spellings and favorite colors and we'll have um place settings and yes, it's it's an experience.
Birch Law's Anniversary & Estate Planning Resolutions
00:14:50
Speaker
That's why she always hosts the holidays.
00:14:53
Speaker
So one thing that I've noticed, so we're going into 20 years of, I mean, not any of you, ah me, but us collectively, the collective we, this is our big 20th anniversary year for birch law. And a trend that I've noticed is that people will often make getting their estate plan, on their wills, trust, powers of attorney, a New Year's resolution. So why do we think that's a common New Year's resolution?
00:15:21
Speaker
an adult thing to do. A lot of clients will say that they're adulting and signing appointments. Oh yeah. Yeah. Well, I think it's because they just spend a lot of time around their family and they see that some are going to drop off soon. Yeah. And they realized yeah they don't have a plan. Maybe I should. Hmm. All working theories, all working theories here. Right. Sarah, did you want to offer anything?
00:15:50
Speaker
No, I think it's like it's one of those like it's I agree with Sam. It's like one of those like I should do that. Yeah. I so if you remember our last episode, we talked about the top reasons people don't have an estate plan that'll work. And what's the number one reason like we can go through all these other things. But what did I lead up to is the number one reason people don't have an estate plan.
00:16:17
Speaker
um quickcrastination exactly so it's It's something that people have on a to-do list. It's something that people know they should adult on, that they should get around to. And so just like we were talking about with New Year's resolutions,
00:16:34
Speaker
Maybe there's something that you've been putting off and it's like, okay, this this is the year This is the year i'm going to get this done. Well, i'm going to mark this off my list. So Be that as it may I think it's it's good to get an estate plan whenever uh when we get asked should I Wait until and I don't even let people finish the sentence i'm going to say no because you never know when you're gonna have an accident and you're gonna be hospitalized and need a medical power of
Importance of Having an Estate Plan
00:17:03
Speaker
attorney. You never know when you're gonna pass away potentially and need to have all your affairs in order. So i it does not matter if you might get transferred next year. It does not matter if you might have future kids. It does not matter um any of those things. It is it is a responsible adulting thing to do and
00:17:25
Speaker
I think people often feel this stress of things that they should do right should I mean nobody wants to do that as lovely of human beings as we all are Some more than others. Nobody really wants to call birch law Nobody really wants to use our services. Do they I mean no they don't know. It's okay. Like, there are things there are there are goods and services that are necessities. And there's goods and services that are extras, fun, superfluous. You know, it's superfluous is Sarah.
00:18:05
Speaker
It's just so fun when a word escapes my mouth and I'm like, I wonder if Sarah's ever heard that word. I don't know why we treat you that like Sarah is ah is a highly educat educated, intelligent person. You have a master's degree. You have other. You're like, you're very intelligent. I should use it in context, but I couldn't explain it. Sarah's like a genius, actually. I figured you could, I bet you could. and bet you could
00:18:35
Speaker
Okay. Now you're, she's going to the Google. I can see the position you want me to do this now. No, I don't. Okay. Thank God. Yeah. okay Okay. It's okay. Actually. So just so people know the villain origin story of us going after Sarah, because it's not an intellect thing. She's it's not she she's smarter than half of the other people that work at first. is very capable and very, very, very capable. it It had to do with a strategic planning session. Do you know this, Sarah? Like, can you go back to how this started the hazing of you? I remember. I wouldn't use that word. And and well, we can't use horseplay either. That's in the handbook.
00:19:18
Speaker
No, you can't do horseplay. And we were asking you to define like were asking people to define things and we discovered that you had this very special skill of defining the terms by just reordering the actual terms themselves. So if you're the marketing coordinator, you coordinate marketing. Right.
00:19:42
Speaker
yeah My favorite term that you've defined is what a trust is. that was That's my favorite. I think about that every now and then to this day. What did she say? so She said, it's a document you put a lot of trust into. Right. so yeah so So, dear listeners, I need you to understand, and we probably should explain this to some of the newer members of Birch Law,
00:20:05
Speaker
We're not insulting Sarah's intelligence. but No, very. It's just we love asking like if she knows definitions of words or how she would define things. Yeah. It's really more than one thing sometimes also because she like there's people that have been here for a while or like some of us that have had, you know, experience in the legal field, like most of my career has been in legal field. Lori, the attorneys have gone to law school.
00:20:35
Speaker
and just having somebody who is not from this background and we're like, define this. And she's like, and she gives something that is completely reasonable most of the time. There's a caveat there most of the time. But it's also like, well, I guess you could see it that way. Yeah. And these typically aren't common everyday words. They're kind of SAT level words that Sometimes escape my mouth. Okay, well, we're trying to build you a barrier. For you, Sam, it's the language barrier, right? Oh, yeah, totally. Right, your ethnicity.
00:21:23
Speaker
ah ah we I guess we won't share that story for the podcast. No, I don't know that that would be a bit of a share. Wasn't culture barrier, technically. Do you want to go that route? I mean, yeah, sure. I'll give you that. Because nobody told me about the MCTs and that I could take it more than once. I'm sure. Here's something I know in my core, that when you first saw it, you called it SATs. I didn't. Because you pronounce acronyms. Yeah, I do. Yeah. What's the acronym for the podcast?
00:22:00
Speaker
Oh God. Ookwa Tata and Tui or something like that? That's it. Yeah. Ookwa Tata and Tui. See why? It sounds like Beetlejuice is going to appear or something. Yeah. They always said it twice. Don't say it a third time. I don't know what will appear if you say it two more times. I really was going to call you.
00:22:22
Speaker
Well, that can happen at any point. Yeah, that's that's always on the table. There is nothing unusual about that. But anyway, yes. So anyway, I just felt like it was important to explain that. and Sarah is held in very high regard. It's just she's she's an easy target for some things. She's an amazing sport.
00:22:42
Speaker
Well, that's the other thing, like, and you know, you all gave out awards in the year awards yesterday. And I don't know why you didn't give Sarah the like best sport award because she's she has signed that to her. So what was your what was your award, Sarah? I think it was the most likely to track office drama on a spreadsheet or something like that. Yeah. Yeah.
00:23:07
Speaker
Yeah. Since Sarah is also like a secret little bolt of secrets, a secret to her also, cause she'll forget things, but she knows right like things that are going on. She knows more than she should know. In one eye out the other.
00:23:24
Speaker
ah Okay. So we get to the topic. we all write about New Year's resolutions. Okay. So yeah, so state plans in New Year's resolution, I think it just boils down to the procrastination aspect and so get to it. So another thing that occurred to me that is more reasons people get a state plans done at the beginning of the year, besides a New Year's resolution is, did you know, did you know that divorces increase exponentially in the beginning of the year?
Divorces and Estate Planning
00:23:59
Speaker
No, I did not know that. OK, so because Sarah and Sam did not know that, I want you to speculate as to why you think that is. My guess is like stress of the holidays and like all of that is now kind of ended. Yeah, yeah. Where they're kind of like, oh, maybe this person didn't I don't know how as much as they should or. They fought a lot over things or I don't Yeah, sure. That's part of it. There's a related one that's probably a bigger reason, but it's really kind of related to that. Can you think of another reason why people would have a higher rate of divorce at the beginning of the year? I think it's probably harder since neither of you have been married and or had children. Right. But
00:24:51
Speaker
Disrupting the holidays for your family and your kids yeah oh is a lot. So a lot of people feel like, I just, I can't do this anymore. But if they're feeling that way in like September, October, like all of that, they're like, I can't do this to the kids. I can't like, I just get through, let's just get through the holidays. Like just write that down, crochet that on a pillow. Let's just get through the holidays. yeah Right? yeah So with divorce comes a change in
00:25:27
Speaker
assets and who has what and perhaps ideas that you have about who you want to take care of your kids. And so divorce is a great time to either redo your estate plan or get one in the first place. But there's a good chance that especially if you have kids that you may not necessarily want your ex to be the one in charge of your money or the kids, you know, all of that.
00:25:54
Speaker
And so ah you've made up with them to be the ones who make medical decisions for you or to be your executor, to really have anything whatsoever to do with you. And so you can go ahead pre-divorce being final and get your estate plan started.
00:26:12
Speaker
There's not a reason, um, other than perhaps your finances and budgeting, but there's not a reason to wait. Um, there's not a legal reason we can, there may be some things we need to wait on. For example, if you do a living trust and we need to connect your assets to the trust, we can go ahead and get all that set up. So it's in full force and effect. But once the divorce is final, when we know, okay, who has the house, who has the bank accounts, all of this,
00:26:42
Speaker
We can't necessarily connect those to the trust also in many divorced situations There are requirements that are agreed upon where you have to keep a spouse or kids named as beneficiaries of life insurance or um, just other arrangements and that's important to incorporate into whatever your estate plan is but just because your divorce isn't final and in texas there's no um ah separation. There's no legal separation, meaning you are married until the day you're divorced. So the law will look at your spouse as your spouse until the day you are divorced. There's no, oh, but they were separated or there was a divorce on file or anything.
00:27:25
Speaker
So just because you haven't gotten the final divorce yet, there's a very good chance that's still not the person that you want to be making decisions for you if something should happen. So I think it is a good idea to go ahead, if you know you're going to get divorced, to go ahead and get your estate plan updated and started.
00:27:46
Speaker
The reverse is true. What do I mean by the reverse? The reverse is that this has not been my personal experience, but kudos to you who are getting divorced, but you're still buds with your ex and you still want them to do things. You still want them to make medical decisions or be your executor, oversee money for your kids. Like that's great. You know, just didn't work out. Um, but I still trust them to do these things for me.
00:28:17
Speaker
So you still need to update it. So if you have a will that says My husband is my executor is my trustee is my medical power of attorney in the medical power of attorney document Even if you still want them to be you need to update it after divorce because Texas automatically disqualifies them if you have a spouse and And the date that everything was signed is pre-divorce. And that kind of messes with people sometimes, but it is important. So if you want your spouse to make medical decisions for you, even once you're divorced, you need to have it updated after your divorce, even if it says right now, that's who you think. Does that make sense? I mean, only does it make sense what I'm saying you need to do? What? Yes. Is that the only thing they do automatically?
00:29:12
Speaker
Who's they? The state. We've mentioned how many times like things don't happen automatically. But is that one thing that is like? well yeah it's known happens it's It's not automatic.
00:29:25
Speaker
yeah It's not automatic. it's So here's here's a very important nuance. It's by operation of law. So none what I just said is not automatic. It has to be proven. Just like when we say a home doesn't automatically go to a spouse when one spouse dies. That doesn't mean it won't go to the spouse. It's just not automatic. It's by operation of law. So you have to go to a court or you have to do this or you have to do that. You have to go through probate.
00:29:49
Speaker
So it's the same thing. It's not like you've got the medical power of attorney and once you're divorced, it's like invisible ink that just comes off the paper and nobody will ever know that you have that person named.
Legal Nuances Post-Divorce
00:30:02
Speaker
But it it has to be shown or demonstrated or proved. So, you know, a lot of a lot of gray area there just to be clear on the automatic work. And that's like that's a really big point that I feel a lot of people who don't know that's why you go to an attorney. They don't think of how many things it's not necessarily proving that something happened. It's also proving that something was undone.
00:30:28
Speaker
and proving that, no, even though this happened, XYZ still wants to be done. Okay, so you need to do something to prove that you do want this. And I think that's a big piece of how, like, no, things aren't just going to happen. You need to go through all the steps and make sure find it it's That's right, Cintia San Francisco.
00:30:50
Speaker
ah Another thing that you need to be sure of is it when it comes, it doesn't work that way with other things. So like life insurance beneficiaries and retirement beneficiaries, we see this happen a lot. This is a very common mistake.
00:31:06
Speaker
where you don't think about how you named an ex or a previous person even on those. And if you don't update those, not every company works the same way that the state of Texas does. So it may very well keep your ex-spouse. This actually happened in my family. I won't say who it was, but someone that I know in my family passed away. They had an old life insurance policy that they had not looked at in like 30 years.
00:31:34
Speaker
And it had someone else in my family who was an ex-wife listed as a beneficiary. And they had been divorced for 30 years. But just never thought to update it, never never did anything. It's not like your insurance company necessarily reaches out to you and say, hey, do you want to change your beneficiaries?
00:31:54
Speaker
So if it's something you're not keeping track of, then it's something that could at some point um go go to an ex or someone who's passed away. So it's a good idea to always make sure that you're looking at however beneficiaries are designated and getting those set up, especially in divorce. So the last thing before we get to the Sam and Sarah show,
00:32:18
Speaker
is beginning of the year, another thing that prompts people to either get an estate plan or update their estate plan is the idea of cutting family members out now. yeah Why do you think that is? They saw them at the family function and realized yeah no more. No more. Especially with the ah upcoming election.
00:32:47
Speaker
Upcoming. Oh, I'm sorry a recent variation. Okay. Oh Yes, we actually have had some people reach out that wanted to make changes based on election results. That's a thing. And so yes, you may have decided that after the holidays, there are some unsavory characters in your family that you would really rather not have them involved, make decisions, inherit property, all of the above. And well, my friends, I have good news for you.
Disinheriting Family Members
00:33:23
Speaker
Can you disinherit a family member in Texas? yeah Yes, you can. And when I say family member, I mean child, I mean spouse. It's a little trickier with spouse because we are a community property state. So you can cut them out of whatever your share or interest is, but that's super complicated. Maybe we'll talk more about that. Actually make a note for that when we have Jamie Dugan back, Sarah, to ask her about that mess, cutting out a spouse Yeah premier a statement because I don't know that we dug into that as much as we could have I know we talked a lot about community property issues, but
00:34:00
Speaker
That's a complicated one. So I have to try to remember if we did discuss that, if not, let's go let's go there. But yes, you you can do that. And there's there's really no problem in doing that. And we typically recommend going all in, just completely cut completely cutting them out. We usually put precautions in there where it's called a no contest clause where we say,
00:34:24
Speaker
um no one can contest this. We also, in many of our wills, have a limitation of Devicee, which says not only that, the beneficiaries that I did name, if they think that they're entitled to more, then the most they can recover is a dollar. So if they do bring suit and prove that they should get something, um the most they can get is a dollar. But I want to get to the dollar thing, because a lot of people think well, I need to at least give them a dollar or $10 or something nominal. And I don't, we'd have to look up the history of this. It's, it's almost one of those misnomers like will readings, which I told Sarah, I think would be a fun thing for us to discuss, uh, as a future episode of reading of code of just, yeah it's auto motiveive and yeah, like, but a lot of like random stuff, like the dollar thing or this or yeah.
00:35:22
Speaker
Yes, so um I don't know if others if it's required in other states or where where that the origin of that but let me tell you in Texas you don't and we typically don't recommend that you do and here's unless you just want to be petty and I'm all for that.
00:35:38
Speaker
Like, I love it. If you're just like, I give my porcelain duck to my niece, and she always hated that duck, okay. I'm okay with the pettiness aspect. But don't do it because you feel like you need to, because in Texas, with a will, you actually have to notify and send a copy of the will to all the beneficiaries. So you're making your executor have to reach out to that person, know where they live, know how to find them.
00:36:07
Speaker
and then be able to somehow get something to them. And that opens the door for, oh, I didn't know that my mom, who I'm estranged from, passed away. No, I i want to see the will. I get to see the will. I get to see what happens. And that's one of the most common issues that we see uh that we see come up where that causes conflict and fighting when someone has passed away is you know wanting to see copies of wills wanting to see an accounting like all this entitlement and there is a certain degree depending on who you are to the person who passed away or who you are is it a beneficiary that does give you rights to know some of that
00:36:49
Speaker
So that's often very contrary to the entire intent of disinheriting somebody is to be able to say, um no, I don't want any involvement. And by giving them a dollar or $10 or what have you, you're making them get involved.
00:37:08
Speaker
And that can be an issue. To go a step further, though, another piece is it's not just about disinheriting from ah receiving anything, but it's also who can be decision makers. So we often talk about how important it is to have a will or a trust or a power of attorney to be able to say, who can make these decisions? Who can handle this for me if I'm unable to do so?
00:37:31
Speaker
But it also may be important to say who cannot do that under any circumstances. So you might say, I want Sarah as my first choice, Sam as my second choice, but under no circumstances can Cynthia serve.
00:37:47
Speaker
So that if a situation where Cintia, San Francisco knocks off Sarah and Sam, so now I have a medical power of attorney that doesn't have a person named, so they're going to court, who's going to make decisions? And Cintia's like, I'll do it. They're like, no, no, not you. Not you. Nice try. So nice try.
00:38:12
Speaker
Also, under those circumstances, she probably she'd probably be in prison at that time, but regardless of the criminal action. I know some pretty good attorneys in that field, so maybe not.
00:38:27
Speaker
ah yeah Yes. So anyway, that's something that after the holidays and going into the new year may be a reason for you to want to get your will trust powers of attorney in place or to update them. You may have decided that there are family members that you do not want involved, do not want to get anything.
00:38:48
Speaker
I think the last way that we see that come up is we have people change things because they might have, ah let's say they named their sister as an executor and then their mom died and the ah the sister was the executor for the mom and she did a terrible job.
00:39:04
Speaker
And so it's like, I can't have my sister, she's terrible. So you you can change all of those things. So that's what the holidays bring upon us. It's a new year, ready ready to start fresh. And these are all good reasons to get it done. Why are you all smiling and laughing? I actually don't know. I'm here for the vibes.
00:39:28
Speaker
yeah So, um, I've been passively looking at butter molds in the background and I found, um, a video on how to make a Buddha butter
Butter Molds & Hosting Humor
00:39:39
Speaker
mold. And I just hear this music start. I stopped it, but it's just, you know, this is what we're talking about, Julie and her hosting and i see butter molds. So I've just been like possibly scrolling. Check out the link in the comments, everybody. of the building Buddha butter mold. Yes.
00:40:02
Speaker
yes So I think that Sam and Sarah have something special prepared for us when it comes to. Well, sure. OK, well, just just take it from here. Is it? Wait, is this going to be a rapid fire situation? Yes, because I need to know whether to interrupt for clarity or just to let you go. I think rapid fire and then we can go back and then clarity. OK, all right. And did you finally decide who's going to go first? Yeah.
00:40:31
Speaker
we did have been the last few weeks we we have not consistently not consistently right but we let just happy let's just let one of our new year's resolutions be that we're going to be more honest with ourselves oh wait okay all right ready in five four three two all right number one get a gym membership and use it once and then never again Wait a minute, wait a minute. Sorry, stop. You're going to have to start over. OK. You you did not give us your topic. Oh, yeah, it's a New Year's resolutions as people who do not make them. OK, now go. Yes. So starting with number one, get a gym membership, use it once and then never again. OK, sign up for a marathon that you will bravely not run.
00:41:28
Speaker
I think I actually did that. I signed up for another bike race and I might not do it. Sarah. Sarah. Anyway, do you like doing another one? Okay. I thought you did the last one. Keep going. I thought we were doing rapid fire. Sorry. I forgot already. Next goal. Pet every dog. Stay alive. Don't get fired. Ditto.
00:41:50
Speaker
Um, this is a real one. I want to become a local guide on Google maps and be that person that reviews everything for fun. This does include, uh, rating public bathrooms on Yelp. And finally, ah can' this any seriously anymore. Okay. And finally, get my family, the great long lasting, fantastic legacy, lasting gift of estate planning.
00:42:16
Speaker
That's right. Now wait just a minute. What happened? What happened with those recordings of getting everyone in the office to say? Oh, we need to get done. great long last I still have them. We have everybody. ben dukin And I even sent you Kimberly and Adley. Yeah.
00:42:39
Speaker
So what there is envisioning is, you know, like those um like Lincoln not sponsored commercials where it's like this black and white and actor just driving saying something like profound. I feel like that's what we need to do with these recordings. Just have some sort of commercial, some sort of dog like video talk. And it's just that it's different versions of that. And it's like I don't know somebody sending a will. know my I like that. I also like the that meme with the cat in the suit with the newspaper.
00:43:17
Speaker
And it should just say- One of my favorites. Should, I should, you know, cause it says I should get a boat and instead it should say, I should get my family the great, long, lasting, fantastic legacy, lasting gift of a estate planning. That's okay. I'll make that name immediately. So yeah, so great. So those are all great, wonderful New Year's resolutions, things that we're going to kick off the year and we're going to kick them off right with birch law.
Closing Remarks & Social Media Call to Action
00:43:44
Speaker
Thanks for listening. And just to cover all our bases about what you just heard, I'm sorry and you're welcome. Make sure you subscribe so you never miss an episode and tell your friends about us. We do webinars and live events.
00:43:59
Speaker
The best way to stay up to date is to follow us on Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, and YouTube. Links are in the show notes. If there's a topic you'd like us to cover, maybe you have a question you'd like us to answer, or maybe you just wanna say hi, hit the link in the show notes or go to birch-law.com forward slash podcast and fill out the contact form.
00:44:29
Speaker
much better. Yeah I thought that had a lot of energy.