Our clients have often asked us “Do I really need a will?  This question often comes up because the client feels that “the law will take care of it when I die”, or the client doesn’t think they have a lot of property or money to worry about, or because the client thinks that they have already disposed of their property by other means such as a deed, a beneficiary designation for an account, a trust, or some other transfer besides a will that, unlike a will, allows the client to avoid a probate procedure in Superior Court.

The law will only take care of distributing your property if the law follows the way you want the property distributed. People who want their property distributed in a specific fashion should not depend on state law to do that job for them.

The other reasons stated above may be reasons for believing that a will is not needed for the purpose of distributing their property on death, when looked at very narrowly; however, a will has other purposes as well.

First, a will is used to identify a person’s heirs under the law. It is important to do so because will contests are often based on a failure of the testator to adequately state who his or her natural heirs are. This indicates that the testator may lack capacity to make a will. Stating who would legally receive your property if you had no will and died immediately is an important way to lessen the likelihood of any contest, even if some or all of these heirs will not be receiving anything from the will. Stating who your heirs are together with a statement in the will that specifically disinherits any or all of them can be very effective in disinheriting heirs if that is desirable.

Persons with minor children can nominate a guardian for them in their will. Such a nomination will be prioritized by the court over others who might be asked to be so appointed.

Even in the case of a small estate (in Arizona this would mean personal property of $75,000 or less and Real Estate of $100,000 or less) being named in a will entitles a person to utilize a much abbreviated probate procedure for small estates.

Finally, a will is a fail-safe document for property that is never placed in a trust or otherwise transferred outside of the jurisdiction of a probate court. A great example of using a will in this manner in conjunction with a trust is through a pour-over will. This type of will transfers any property subject to a probate proceeding into an existing trust to ensure that the trust provisions for distribution of the property will be applied.

            The older we get the more conscious we become of the need to put something in place to protect our heirs from the hardship of a death without estate planning. The present time is always the best time to take care of that.

            Sometimes we find ourselves in a situation where there is a need to change arrangements we have already made, for instance:

• We have an older trust that was made for reasons that are unnecessary now. For example the threshold for being liable for any estate taxes has increased from about $600,000 to about $12 million dollars in the last 20 years, yet people still have overly complex trust documents to deal with estate tax liability.
• Things have changed over time and you want to change your beneficiaries.
• You have a trustee that you no longer want to have serve, or who has died, and you want to make a change.
• You have a beneficiary who does not manage their money effectively and you want an alternative to leaving them a huge sum of money all at once.

Again, there is no time like the present to address these types of issues. Arizona Mobile Attorneys has extensive experience in this area and we stand ready to assist you in this endeavor.

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Often, a business, typically a limited liability company (“LLC”) is created as part of an estate plan. This is done because LLCs are somewhat informal business entities and are easy to administer compared to a Corporation. In addition, unlike a Trust, an LLC can continue in existence indefinitely. These types of arrangements are often used to deal with a specific asset, such as a home, vacation cottage, or other real estate. A new federal law called “The Corporate Transparency Act” is going into effect January 1, 2024 with new requirements for companies and very severe penalties for noncompliance, with civil penalties up to $500 per day, with a maximum cap of $10,000. Willfully providing false information in such reporting carries a prison sentence of up to two years.

These penalties are applied to beneficial owners and senior company officers.

This law requires the disclosure by companies of the beneficial ownership in the company (any individual who owns at least 25% of the company is considered a beneficial owner). A new system called BOSS will be made available for companies to report this online. Companies that already exist as of January 1, 2024 will have until the end of the year to comply. Newly formed companies will have 30 days to do so from formation or registration.

At Arizona Mobile Attorneys we assist clients in the formation of businesses and related estate and succession planning. Please call us to arrange an appointment.

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