September 4, 2018

A person running a business cannot have an estate plan without a business succession plan and vice versa. These items must work together to protect your individual interests, your future beneficiaries and the future of the company. All too often, however, critical details are overlooked in your individual or your business succession plan. 

A rock-solid plan for the future can give you greater peace of mind and help to protect your beneficiaries if and when you become incapacitated. The first of these issues has to do with incapacity.

Far too many people approaching estate planning look at it just for handling what happens when you pass away. However, it is becoming more likely that the average person entering retirement will at least one or more periods of incapacity during their lifetime in which they are unable to make decisions for themselves. Make sure that you appoint someone else for seamless asset management during these periods of incapacity.

Continued management of your assets and the business should also be included after you pass away. Place these assets inside a trust if necessary because the beneficiaries are not of sufficient maturity or age. Another thing to consider on behalf of your beneficiaries is divorce protection. Although your loved ones might appear to be married happily right now, nearly half of marriages end in divorce. Divorce protection can be one way to give you peace of mind about your loved one’s future. Finally, also consider whether or not beneficiaries could have creditor issues. Asset protection involves developing trust and other strategies that can help to shield these assets from being attacked by creditors. One of the easiest tools to do this, with the help of an experienced estate planning attorney, is to put the assets inside a fully discretionary trust managed by a third-party trustee. If you have questions about approaching the estate planning and business succession planning process, the support of a lawyer is instrumental in helping you to accomplish your goals. Schedule a consultation with an attorney today.