Build Your Legacy with Comprehensive Estate Planning from Weatherby & Associates, PC

Do you know what will happen to your estate and your loved ones once you’re gone?

Will your assets benefit the people you care about for years to come? Will they support future generations of your family or benefit your community? Or will your assets diminish through probate fees, taxes, health care costs and other losses?

Few people know the answer to these questions. At Weatherby & Associates, PC our trusted estate planning lawyers can help you use the assets you’ve worked hard for to take care of the ones you love and to have a lasting benefit for the people and causes you care about.

Sophisticated Custom Planning for Your Unique Needs

Every individual and every family has unique needs and goals. Your estate plan should address those needs and goals using an approach that makes sense to you and a strategy that you can be confident in. At Weatherby & Associates, PC we begin the estate planning process for each client by taking the time to understand the client, their situation in life, the scope of their estate, the dynamics of their family, and what the client hopes to achieve. Then our design team drafts a customized plan that expresses each of the client’s goals and ambitions as efficiently and effectively as possible.

Through the sophisticated use of trusts, living trusts, business entities, planned giving strategies, and other estate planning tools, the estate planning attorneys at Weatherby & Associates, PC can often help people do more with their estate than they thought possible, including:

• Ensure you receive the kind of care you want and deserve should you become incapacitated
• Minimize estate taxes, gift taxes and income taxes on your estate
• Prepare for late-life health care needs, such as nursing home care or home health care, that have the potential to drain estate assets
• Protect your estate and assets against unnecessary loss
• Give you control over distribution of your estate
• Minimize conflict between family members over estate distribution
• Create a legacy supporting causes you care about

Through the sophisticated use of trusts, living trusts, business entities, planned giving strategies, and other estate planning tools, the estate planning attorneys at Weatherby & Associates, PC can often help people do more with their estate than they thought possible, including:

Our seven-step Family Estate & Legacy Program^® is tailored just for you to assist you build the plan best suited to you.  Click each of the steps in the process below to learn more:

Goals & Responsibility
Conversation Organizer Design Document Builder Advisor Coordinator Asset
Alignment LifeBridge
Program Goals & Responsibility
Conversation Organizer Design Document Builder Advisor Coordinator Asset
Alignment LifeBridge
Program BACK It all starts with your Client Organizer that you complete and which gives us a starting point to analyze your current situation. It also provides us the facts that we need to ask you the right questions pertinent to you. The Client Organizer should be completed as thoroughly as possible. The information that you provide is confidential, and is important for us to provide the best legal advice during our initial conference.

Goals & Responsibility
Conversation Organizer Design Document Builder Advisor Coordinator Asset
Alignment LifeBridge
Care Program BACK As we begin our initial conference, we will ask you what goals are most important to you and what concerns or obstacles may currently stand in the way of achieving those goals. This will form the basis of your estate planning strategies, and provide us valuable insight into your mindset. We will also review who should make decisions for you if you could no longer do so for yourself, which is an often neglected but vital element to your estate plan. Finally, we’ll discuss who might be the best party to handle all of the responsibilities necessary to carry out your final wishes and directions.

Goals & Responsibility
Conversation Organizer Design Document Builder Advisor Coordinator Asset
Alignment LifeBridge
Care Program BACK We will work together to design a will or trust package that meets your needs, given your family and financial situation, and your goals and concerns. There is no such thing as a “one-size-fits-all” estate plan. The Design element will consider the types of assets that you own, how you own them, and the relative tax consequences of your holdings, among other things, in fashioning your individualized plan. We will provide you a fixed fee quote so that you know the price for us to complete your planning.

Goals & Responsibility
Conversation Organizer Design Document Builder Advisor Coordinator Asset
Alignment LifeBridge
Care Program BACK We will build your documents based upon the Design phase specifications, providing you easy to read and understand flowcharts and summaries. You will have as much time as you need to ask questions and consider revisions to the first draft. It is important to know that we want to answer any and all questions that you may have about this process.

Goals & Responsibility
Conversation Organizer Design Document Builder Advisor Coordinator Asset
Alignment LifeBridge
Care Program BACK You may have a trusted attorney, CPA, or financial advisor that you would like involved in this process. We’re happy to do so. Just let us know and we will either invite them to your meetings, or conference call them in if they are not local.

Goals & Responsibility
Conversation Organizer Design Document Builder Advisor Coordinator Asset
Alignment LifeBridge
Care Program BACK Unlike other firms who hand you a sheet of instructions how to align (transfer or “fund”) your assets into your revocable trust, we do it for you. This is another way that our unique process provides you confidence, comfort and clarity. You’ll rest assured knowing that your legal team includes well-trained professionals who work with your financial firms, banks and advisors to ensure that everything is titled correctly.

Goals & Responsibility
Conversation Organizer Design Document Builder Advisor Coordinator Asset
Alignment LifeBridge
Care Program BACK Your estate plan includes one free year in our LifeBridge Program, which is a cost effective way to ensure that your documents do not fall out of date with the ever changing legal, tax and financial world. The LifeBridge Program also works to keep your plan up to date with your family and financial situation. When you open a new account or acquire a new asset, our team will work with you to make sure that it’s titled correctly.

For more information on the LifeBridge program, click here!

LIFEBRIDGE^TM ENSURES A SUCCESSFUL ESTATE PLAN

To ensure your loved one continues to get the best care and to ensure the plan achieves your intended goals and doesn’t become outdated or ineffective, clients’ families have the option of participating in our LifeBridge^TM program, which includes regular check-ins with the client and regular updating of planning components. Click here to find out more about LifeBridge^TM.

Estate Planning is for Everyone, Not Just the Wealthy

You don’t need to have millions of dollars in assets to benefit from estate planning. Good estate planning can benefit anyone by giving them more control over distribution of their assets, minimizing loss to probate costs and taxes, and preparing in advance for health care needs. Wills, living wills, advance health care directives, powers of attorney, insurance policies, and accounts with beneficiary designations are estate planning tools that anyone can benefit from and use to leave more for family and loved ones. Many people are also surprised to find they can benefit from sophisticated planning techniques using trusts and business entities even though they don’t consider themselves wealthy.

Discover how you can do more for yourself and the people you care about with custom estate planning from Weatherby & Associates, PC. Call our estate planning attorneys today to schedule a free consultation: 888-822-8778 (Toll Free)

Estate Planning Attorneys - West Hartford CT, Bloomfield CT, Simsbury CT and all of CT