John -

I concur with David - find a good attorney to draw up your documents.
However, your own understanding and your own planning are something
only you can work on. Before you go see the attorney, get a reliable
book on trusts and estate planning, and read it. Your attorney will
formalize / document your plans for you. You might phone an estate
attorney and ask him for a reading recommendation, explaining that
you'd like to be an informed client. (I have heard to avoid big law
firms because you get billed for the attorney, then for his assistant,
and it stacks up rapidly. There are good attorneys who can draw up your
Will competently for $500 bucks or less. The better your plan, the less
it wil cost to write up. You can then review your document. Keep it
updated if things change.)

Generally, as you have alluded to with reference to your mother's
estate, the practical complications of many accounts and many vehicles,
and many possessions, can make life hard for the family - at a time
when they are least able to handle it. A good goal for estate planning
is to simplify things, and organize your affairs as you would organize
your household for valued dinner guests.

A letter from you and your wife to your daughter, for example:
suggestions and recommendations to her as to what course she should
take in life and what she should do with your estate, followed by a
detailed list of where everything is, clear labels on every key, and so
forth. Keep it updated. Tell her who to go to for what, whom you trust,
what to expect, and so on. And make sure your daughter knows it exists
and exactly where to find it. If you are gone, you cannot answer even
the simplest questions.

A decent book on estate planning will tell you to keep your Will at
home, within your household. It will not, however, take you into
details of legal documents. That's why there are State Bar exams. If
you know nothing about cars, would you plan to get a piece of software
and change your transmission yourself within three days? Are you sure
that left-over bolt is not important? Find a good attorney - who will
not die before you do - and one your daughter can rely on.

Again: the legal documents are important, simplicity is a big plus, but
your estate planning is something only you and your wife can do, as
above, and it is a lot of work. Do you have funeral expense insurance
covering all costs, for example? Do you have a "payable on death"
checking account so your daughter will not have to ask your Brother &
Bi__ch for money during the months it may take to settle your estate?
Should you live another 30 years, and leave a taxable estate, will your
daughter or her children have to sell your house to pay taxes?

You have more than enough work to do in planning and organizing. MOST
of an attorney's work is not drawing up your Will - it is assisting the
executor of your estate to implement that Will.

John Marks asks:
- quote -

Look at it this way. If you write it up yourself and make a mistake, it
won't be discovered until after your death, at which point it will be
impossible to change, because even a revocable trust becomes
irrevocable at the death of the trustor. Get legal help and have your
trust written correctly.

Dave

I am a father of one daughter of 12 years of age and a wife. I am 43 and
my wife is 40. We have assets spread out over several areas. I am not
sure if I should consider writing up a trust or should I have someone
else do it. I have seen those software packages but I read what some of
you have said about them. Let me explain about our position

We have a daughter age 12. I have no real good selections of where she
should go if both of us were to die together. That is still up in the
air.

We have a home. Purchased 3 yrs ago at $106,000 now it's worth about
$125,000 or so
My wife has a 401k plan and I don't.
We both have accounts owned jointly and some not.
We both have IRA's. My wife also has a Roth.
We jointly own an investment account at one of the major firms.
I have an IRA that I received from my mother at the same firm. (Ben IRA)
The remainder of my mom's money and belongings are held in her trust.
About $40,000 or so plus all her items that my brother the executor of
her will (and his bitch wife) has total control. I have seen very little
of her items because my brother and His wife love the power trip. Of
course they would have been the best choice for my daughter if we both
die at the same time but I don't trust them. The only irreplaceable
family items I have received are two paintings, both of which had garage
sale stickers on them. One of them was painted by my dad's cousin 45
years ago.

Now the reason I brought that last one up is that even with a very well
written trust, my brother has still failed to send us anything wrapped up
in family memories (2 years now), so my confidence in trusts and family
in general is strained. (At this point in my life, I really don't care
anymore. I would rather not speak to them ever)

Should I get an attorney for our trust instead of going it alone?