Ok. I know the economy stinks. Not only does it stink in the United States, but it stinks throughout the world. An article out of the U.K. demonstrates the point as author Sion Barry writes in Wales Online that people are not thinking about their retirements plans. Instead, they are worried about debt.
Mr. Barry makes a good point that people are naturally less concerned about things like estate planning when they have more important things to think about: like how they are going to pay their mortgage.
I don’t always like these doom-and-gloom articles. You and I both know that the economy stinks. That is nothing new. I also believe that the news has nothing else to cover, so they write about how the economy is bad. It is a self-perpetuating problem – and here I am exacerbating it.
But, there a valid point made by Mr. Barry in his article: it is tough to think about estate planning or retirement planning when the economy is bad. If you don’t have enough income to save, you aren’t going to conduct retirement planning.
I’m here to tell you that I think you should. I know that as somebody who drafts Minnesota wills on a regular basis, I’m a little biased. Let me warn you of something – we are all going to die at some point. Most of us have family we care about. Most of us have children, parents, siblings, friends, and causes we worry about. What happens if we die and we haven’t conducted any estate planning? What happens if there is no Will to tell people what you wanted done? I’ll tell you what happens, a lot of hurt and financial trouble.
I don’t like to think about doing estate planning any more than you do. But, when I read articles like that of Mr. Barry, it upsets me. I know that estate planning in Minnesota is often ignored and the economy isn’t helping anything.
