Have a Will and a Living Will? You’re Not Done Yet.

August 24th, 2007 • Related • Filed Under • by admin

Planning for one’s own death can be a bit of a morbid experience, but it should be considered as an act of love to your friends and family. You’re facing your own mortality in order to ease the burden on your family if the unfortunate were to happen. Everyone should have a will to handle their financial matters, a living will to handle their medical matters, but there’s one more thing we all need to have. It’s called a letter of final wishes. This document is generally written to the executor of the estate, your spouse, and your children. It will usually contains things that your will and living will won’t cover. Setting up a letter of final wishes is extremely easy to do. All you really need to do is type it up, print it out, have it notarized and let people know where it’s at.

In your letter of final wishes, you should discuss what you want for a funeral and burial arrangements. Do you want to be cremated, or put in the ground? Is there a certain person you want to perform your funeral? How much money do you want spent on your funeral? Where do you want to be buried at?

You’ll also want to note where your loved ones can find your financial documents. This is where you have your accounts, where your safe deposit box is if you have one, what insurance policies you have and where they can be found at, the location of your will and any other estate planning documents, information about any social security or VA benefits that you have, where the title to your vehicle and home are, and things like that.

You’ll want to have a list of relatives, business associates, friends, civic organizations, or other institutions that you would like to have notified in the event if your death. If you want to pass any messages onto them, this is the place to do it. Be sure to list their current addresses and phone numbers.

If you have any debts that you’re making periodic payments on, you’ll want to list those in this document. That way if someone is coming after the estate for an alleged debt that you have, they can know whether or not it’s legitimate.

Be sure to identify your attorney and other professional advisers that you might have. If you have an accountant, a broker, an insurance agent, or a trust office, make sure they are identified as well as how to contact them.

Do you want to have any donations made in memorial of you? If so, identify which non-profit organization(s) you would like to have some money go to in your name.

These are some of the important items that you’ll want in your letter of final wishes, but the list is not all inclusive. You’ll want to include anything that your friends, family, or close business associates should know in the event if your death.