Boston Legacy Planning

How We Are Different

I am different from most other estate planning attorneys because I have a different Perspective, a different Process and I offer a different Relationship.

Traditional estate planning is about buying the right documents. People have the impression that if you have a trust, you will avoid probate, avoid taxes, and the right people will be there to take over when you need them to.

My Perspective is that documents don’t solve problems, and you can leave a huge mess behind even if your documents are perfect. The people who will take over have to clearly understand what you want to happen, they have to be able to find documents and passwords, they have to know something about the job they are taking on, they have to be able to avoid disputes, and they have to work effectively with your team of advisors. I have distilled my list of things that can go wrong – and will go wrong if you don’t plan to avoid them – into what I call the Root Causes of DIS-functional Planning™.

Because my Perspective is that estate planning involves a lot more than preparing documents, my Process involves meetings to get to know a client’s goals and values, to work on financial issues together with the financial team, and to make sure the trust is funded.

My Process begins with education. I offer regular online classes on Estate Planning and Business Transition Planning, open to all by registering from the Home page. Education continues as the trust is designed, so that clients have a deeper understanding their plans. Education continues for family members, including training on the job of a trustee. Many of these classes are recorded and available on the Client Area of the website.

This Process is a key part of the different Relationship I offer my clients. Once the documents are signed, we continue to work together to avoid messes. That means that assets have to be properly titled, helpers have to be trained, and information has to be organized so that it can be easily found. And all of this has to be done on an ongoing basis through changes in the family, the assets, and the law.

My approach to dealing with the Root Causes of DIS-functional Planning is called the Legacy Planners Network™ (LPN). I have been offering it to my clients for years. Recently I started making LPN services available to other estate planning attorneys and financial advisors. You can learn more about the Legacy Planners Network here.

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