An estate plan shouldn’t last forever. It’s a good idea to make it well in advance, perhaps doing your own estate planning in your 30s, rather than waiting until you are in your 60s or 70s. This helps ensure that your plan will actually be in place when your family needs it, and you won’t die intestate if you pass away unexpectedly.
But if you make your plan early, life is going to change, perhaps in significant ways. This is why the plan shouldn’t last forever; it needs to be reviewed and updated. When should you review that plan?
Periodic reviews
One tactic is just to make periodic reviews on a predetermined schedule. Maybe you want to draft your estate plan when you are 30 and then review it every two years so you can see if changes are necessary. Once you have a set schedule, you know that the estate plan won’t fall significantly out of date.
Life events
Another tactic is to review the estate plan after significant life events that necessitate estate planning changes. These events could include:
- Marriage
- Divorce
- Childbirth
- The death of an heir
- A serious medical diagnosis
- Major changes to your assets
In some ways, looking for these key events is even more effective because you can just make the revisions when they are necessary. If you sell a family business and have a sudden influx of cash, you may want that to be reflected in your estate plan. If a grandchild is born, you may want to update the plan to include them. You don’t need to wait for two years to make these updates on a set schedule.
You can see that there are many different ways to look at estate planning, but the key is always to know what legal options you have and what steps you can take to make a comprehensive plan.
