How We're Different
To explain how we're different first requires us to discuss what the “traditional” experience with an attorney is like. If you've worked with an attorney in the past to prepare estate planning documents, this will probably sound familiar:
You would start by calling their office, telling the receptionist that you need a will or a trust (maybe you're not really sure, but you need something to protect your family), and you ask “How much is this going to cost?” You're told that each of the firm's attorneys charge on an hourly basis, and the rates vary depending on the attorney's experience level. They'll tell you about it in more detail at your meeting.
At the meeting, you sit down with the attorney and he asks you, “Well, what would you like to do?” You might say, “I just need a will.” Or, “I know I need to do something for my family, but I don't know what. That's why I'm here: I need your advice on what to do.” This typically results in the lawyer trying to explain what you can do—but in terms of complete legal jargon, making things seem complicated and confusing. But, you figure the lawyer knows what he's doing, so you nod your head as if you understand everything, because after all, the billing clock is running!
Because you want to protect your family, you have the lawyer prepare the recommended documents. You go in to sign them and then feel relieved that everything has been taken care of. You take your documents home, stick them in a drawer or filing cabinet, and then you never think about them again.
You vaguely remember your attorney saying something about a change to your bank account, so you head to the bank, but when you get there, you realize you're not sure what you're supposed to do. You call your lawyer's office, only to get his voicemail, so you leave a message and then head back home. Hours or days go by before you get a call back from your lawyer, but by then you're busy with something else, and you never get back to the bank to change the account.
A couple weeks later, you receive something in the mail from your attorney's office. A letter explaining how to change the bank account? A thank you note, perhaps? No, it's a $75 bill for the 15 minute phone call!
A few months or years later, you read something in the newspaper about some tax law changes and wonder if they affect your plan, but you figure that if it were something important, your lawyer would send you a letter to let you know your plan needs to be updated.
Your life changes—maybe you have a child, or you get divorced or remarried. Maybe you start a new retirement account at your new job or buy some additional life insurance. Your plan—which was not cheap—continues to collect dust, and you start to wonder whether your assets and family are protected. You consider giving your attorney a call, but then you remember that $75 bill you received last time you called to ask a question.
So now what? You forget about it. Your plan continues to sit in the drawer without any of the necessary changes or updates being made to it, and there it will stay until you either become disabled or die, and your family goes looking for it. Only, by then, the plan is so outdated that it doesn't do what you wanted it to do.
Your family will probably have to deal with the court system for either a guardianship hearing (if you're disabled) or a probate hearing (if you've died). They'll discover that the process is expensive, time-consuming, stressful, and public. A large amount of the inheritance you had hoped to leave your family is spent on taxes, legal fees, court costs, and family disputes.
Our Team Helps Prepare You and Your Family For Life
Our firm is different in many ways! We understand that you're busy, your life is evolving, and you want to know that you've made the best decisions for your family and that your plan will work when your loved ones need it the most.
To start, our practice is based on relationships. We recognize that every client is different and has unique goals and objectives. So our first focus is to learn about you, your family, your goals, concerns, and fears.
That's why we've thrown out the hourly billing clock! We work on a flat-fee basis because we want our clients to be able to talk with us, without feeling rushed or worrying about the size of their bill.
We place a high value on education. Not degrees and class rankings, but real, applied learning about how we can continue to best serve our clients. That means when we're not seeing clients, we're attending classes, reading about changes to the law, what other practices are doing, and new planning techniques. We're listening to estate planning podcasts, teleconferencing with other attorneys, and thinking about new ways we can help your family get the most out of life. It also means we're constantly investigating and employing new technology to do more for our clients.
This educational and proactive approach extends to how we work with our clients. We use a lot of stories and plain English, so you will know and understand the planning options that are available to you. We discuss, using real world examples, how we can design a plan that will protect and care for you throughout your lifetime and how it will continue to protect and care for your family after you're gone.
Together we'll create a plan that best fulfills your dreams and goals. We'll help you arrange your affairs in a way that is both personally satisfying and that meets your unique objectives—all while accomplishing substantial savings for your family in the long run.
We also ensure that the most important details of your plan are fully carried out, so that your plan continues to work throughout your lifetime. This begins with ensuring that all of your assets and accounts are titled properly. Did you know that a lot of estate plans will not work as intended, because the assets are not titled correctly? That's why we have a “funding coordinator” to ensure your assets are titled correctly, so a simple, common oversight doesn't result in a long, expensive probate process.
We also have affordable maintenance and education programs, which will help keep your plan updated year in and year out, as well as give you access to our office for additional guidance. We encourage clients to call us or email us with their questions or concerns!
We believe in a team approach, working collaboratively with your other professional advisors. We will work closely with your financial advisor, accountant, insurance agent, or other advisors to ensure that your entire financial plan works together and is suitable for your situation.
Finally, we believe that your wealth is far more than what's in your bank account. You are also the sum of your values, experiences, dreams, and interests—who you are and what's important to you. More than ever before, people are expressing that the intangible assets in their life such as character, faith, morals, and life lessons are dramatically more important to them than their financial assets. Yet many admit that they haven't done a good job of incorporating these intangible assets into their plan, even though they'd like to. How much do you know about your grandparents' values? How they felt about you? What they learned during their lifetime? If you're like most people, the answer is, unfortunately, very little.
That's why we offer unique tools such as our Priceless Conversations to capture these intangible assets. We use legacy building tools and concepts with you and your family to capture your values and emotions—the very core of your identity and what matters to you.
We look forward to meeting you and crafting your life and estate plan, so you we can help care for your family's future!
Jackie W. Bedard
Founder of Carolina Family Estate Planning
Member of National Network of Estate Planning Attorneys