Minnesota Estate Planning: Who To Tell About Your Estate Plan

If you’ve taken the important step of meeting with a Minnesota estate planning attorney you should be congratulated. It’s an important step that far too many people put off. But now that the plan is drafted and formally prepared, you may be wondering who you should tell, if anyone.

There are two basic strategies that those who craft an estate plan tend to employ, we’ll simplify these as: “Mum’s the Word” and “Shouting from the Rooftops.” Each has its benefits and its drawbacks and we’ll discuss them in turn.

Your Minnesota Estate Plan: Mum’s the Word

Many people instinctively feel the need to keep their estate plan private, sometimes deciding to tell no one other than their Minnesota estate-planning attorney. This is often done because people feel uncomfortable with the idea of discussing their money with others and are afraid that personal details will change their relationship with family and friends.

This approach does have its benefits in some cases. For one thing, if you are afraid of beneficiaries challenging your will, especially any updates that might reduce their share of your estate, keeping quiet can help avoid some of these squabbles. After all, people can’t miss what they didn’t know they had.

However, remaining silent about your wishes can lead to trouble. The silence might leave loved ones confused about your choices and possibly even hurt if they expected a different result. By talking things through while you’re still around, family and friends can come to grips with the plan well in advance and avoid some shocked reactions while they are dealing with grief surrounding your passing.

Shouting from the Rooftops

Rather than keeping quiet about your estate plan, some decide to share the news with the world, telling everyone about their plans for the future. These people usually want to preserve open relationships and level with their loved ones while they are still around to answer questions.

Telling people about your plan can be a good thing in some cases because it can lead to peace of mind for the person whose plan it is. You can rest easy knowing that your loved ones understand what will happen in the event of your death and not have to worry about infighting or damaging disagreements between your heirs.

One downside to this open approach is that if changes are made to the plan it can create confusion and even anger among those who may not have been kept up to speed or disagree with the new approach. Estate plans are living documents and routinely undergo revision, but if a loved one feels shorted by a new draft it can leave a bitter taste in everyone’s mouth, a problem that would have been avoided if they’d never been told in the first place.

Your approach to your Minnesota Will or Trust

You can choose to stay quiet or spread the word far and wide, or better yet, take a path entirely of your own down the middle.

Many estate-planning experts recommend that those with estate plans inform their fiduciaries (the people who will be left to manage their affairs), at the very least. This gives them notice about what will be expected of them when the time comes and allows them to beg off if they don’t feel they’re up to the task.

It might also be a good idea to inform your loved ones that a plan exists without going into potentially embarrassing or uncomfortable details. You are entitled to inform them that a plan is in place, where the documents will be stored and the contact information for your Minnesota estate-planning attorney, without delving into the specifics of the plan. The reality is that it’s your estate plan and, at the end of the day, only you can decide who finds out about it.

An experienced Minnesota estate-planning lawyer can help walk you through the process of establishing or altering a comprehensive estate plan. For more information on estate planning in Minnesota, along with a variety of other topics, contact Joseph M. Flanders of Flanders Law Firm at (612) 424-0398.