Probate is an expensive proposition – monetarily and emotionally. With foresight and attention it can be avoided.

This sometimes-personal conversation occurred a few weeks after Hurricane Milton devastated Tampa in October 2024, and now is a good time to remember the lessons: get your documents in order and make sure you have backups and copies.

The 2025 Hurricane Season is upon us, and it's time to prepare. Organize your legal documents, save remote copies/backups with family, backup services, and perhaps key people mentioned in your documents.

Two main ones in my experience – lack of proper beneficiary designations on bank accounts, IRAs, life insurance…AND residences being incorrectly titled – especially when purchased by people in committed relationships. They often think, "For sure, if one passes, the other automatically owns the whole." Not so!

It's easily avoided.

This happens. Sometimes a person appointed Power of Attorney dies. It’s readily remedied. I recommend successors already be in place to prevent having to do anything.

This is not true. Any amount of money requires some estate planning. Much that’s needed doesn’t need an attorney

What’s the most important thing someone can do to get started with their estate plan?

A good place to start is to do an inventory of what you have. Not just tangible property – pictures, books, etc., but more intangible property like bank accounts and life insurance. Next figure out who you want to represent you with documents that are relevant while you're alive and those that come into play after you pass. Work with a good attorney.

This role only comes into play after someone passes. This person is the one you’ve chosen to dispose of your estate – whatever you own when you pass that hasn’t been legally designated to go to someone specific. A good plan covers tangible personal property from vehicles to knickknacks. Sadly, probate is the result if anything hasn’t been beneficiary designated.

The first is a Last Will and Testament, which describes how an individual wants their property (the legal term is "bounty") distributed after passing.

The other three are essential while an individual is living.

If you love your family, you plan. When you pass, your loved ones are best served if you give them a plan. Then the only thing for them to do is grieve. You plan to provide that luxury.

Part of my commitment is to minimize and mitigate indecisiveness in the estate planning process and to minimize suffering of all parties involved in a probate situation.