FAMILY
A Heart-to-Heart About Your Parent's Estate
Decision Center
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f the subject of sex was taboo between you and your parents when you were growing up, just wait until you ask about their estate plans.
Death isn't a pleasant subject anyway and it's only human nature to be suspicious of anyone who asks about your money, even if "anyone" happens to be your child or children. It's natural for parents to worry whether their offspring's concern is purely or partly financial in nature (especially if you have not called them in the last month or two). Don't let that stop you. Otherwise, any of these scenarios could be in your future:
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Your father said he had a will, but no one knows where it is. Perhaps there is a will and three codicils, each in a different place, raising questions about a possible missing fourth codicil and setting up the estate for a challenge from a disgruntled brother.
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Your mother's will refers to a trust she has set up, but the trust document is missing. The trust's assets allegedly include some closely held stock in some out-of-state company you've never heard of. You've been told that the stock was very valuable. But since you can't find the document, you also don't have the stock.
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You discover at the reading of the will that you have been named executor and trustee, although your sister is a lawyer and you're an artist who hates dealing with money.
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Despite your father's assurances to the contrary, it appears that everything has been left to your stepmother and that her corporate real estate attorney cousin was the lawyer who drafted his will.
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Your parent's joint estate is worth well over $2 million, but they're relatively unsophisticated and you don't know what (if any) steps they have taken to reduce estate taxes.
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You're an only child, so if your mother runs out of money, you will have to support her. You are happy to do so to the best of your ability, but you need to know her financial situation so you can plan accordingly.
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Your 80-year-old widowed father is in intensive care, and critical decisions must be made about whether to operate to try and prolong his life. You just had to go to court to get the right to make decisions on his behalf and now you have to make the decision yourself, not knowing what he would have wanted.
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Ever since your parents died, your brothers are not speaking to each other and you are trying to be the peacemaker. Now the in-laws, cousins and grandchildren are taking sides. The people to blame are your parents because they never did any estate planning so everything was distributed according to the laws of the state in which they died.
Now is the time to have that difficult discussion with either or both of your parents. Here is how to handle it:
1.
Show them this article and explain you're only bringing up the subject to avoid any of the situations detailed above. Explain that it is going to be hard enough to deal with their deaths without having the added stress of dealing with any extra problems in settling their estates.
2.
Tell them that you don't need to know the specific names of any assets or the dollar amounts of anything they own. However, you, an attorney or other trusted friend needs to know everything that's in their estate. This includes account numbers and locations of all insurance policies, retirement plan funds, investment accounts and other financial assets as well as where any personal effects such as jewelry, silver, antiques, and so on, have been hidden if they are not visible in the house.
Many people also hide cash in small safes; make sure they include the location of those items as well. Safe deposit boxes should be listed by bank and box number. Again, reiterate that you don't have to know what is in them; you just need to know that they exist. The existence and location of legal documents including real estate deeds and all of the estate documents listed above are critical. You also need the addresses for any real estate they own, as well as the names of any co-owners other than themselves.
3.
Get the name and address of their attorney, primary care doctor and any specialists they rely upon. Unfortunately, in an emergency sometimes the hospital specialist is called in because none of the family members knows who the specialist is who has been treating the patient for the past five years.
4.
If your parents' estate is large enough to warrant annual and/or lifetime gifting, and they have told you they're not doing so because they don't trust you to hold on to the money, offer to show them your annual bank account statements to prove that you've been squirreling away their past annual gifts to you.
However, the IRS requires that your parents give up total control of any money gifted to you either directly or in a trust, so technically you can use the money for anything you want. Your "promise" can come in the form of a general discussion about what you plan to do with the money. Your parents will ultimately save on estate taxes because any appreciation on the gift money will occur outside of their estates and will therefore be free of tax.
5.
As painful as it is, they should tell you or write down their wishes about funeral and burial arrangements (including songs and Scripture passages), as well as the location of any burial plots and the existence of any pre-paid funeral plans. If your parents have paid in advance for their funerals, and you happen to use another funeral home out of ignorance of their plans, you usually can't get your money back.
6.
Ask them to let you know now if they believe there is a chance they will be financially dependent upon you in the future. Explain to them that you want to plan in advance so you can assist them as best you can, and this will show you that you are taking your own financial planning seriously.
Before you raise the topic of your parents' estate plan with them, make sure that your own estate is in order and that your attorney or trusted friend or relative has all the information you're asking your parents to provide. You want to make sure that when this most sensitive of family subjects comes up, you can prove that you truly are practicing what you are preaching. 
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