Wills · Estate Planning · Living Trusts · Probate Services

We have a competitive pricing plan and offer comprehensive estate planning to cover your needs whether your estate is small and your needs are simple, or whether your estate is large and your needs are complex.

When you retain Joseph Malley, you are creating a relationship that should last a lifetime, and you are choosing the attorney who will craft the plan that your family will live with after you are gone. You are also choosing the advisor upon whom your loved ones will likely depend at one of their most difficult times. This choice should be entered into wisely.

What is estate planning?

Is a living trust expensive?

Living trust or will?

Why have an estate plan?

What is Estate Planning?

Estate Planning is the very important process everyone should go through in order to be prepared for one’s inevitable, and sometimes unexpected, death. Most of us are fortunate enough to have families that we would like to take care of and friends that we would like to remember with a gift upon our passing. What you own and what your familial obligations are will help determine what kind of estate plan you should have. An estate plan is a gift to your family. Between probate and taxes, your family may spend lots of time and enormous sums of money that could have been saved by an effective estate plan. Your survivors will have a much easier time both emotionally and financially if there is an estate plan in place before your demise.

Living Trust or Will?

While a will based plan can accomplish many of the same goals that a trust based plan can accomplish, a will based plan is hindered by the fact that the provisions of a will do not take effect until you die. Thus, a will based plan cannot avoid conservatorship should you become incapacitated, nor can it avoid probate. Each of these can only be accomplished by a trust based plan.

In addition, and for many this is a very important issue, a will is a public document filed with the court and accessible by anyone. Thus, upon your death, anybody who wants to can learn who your heirs are and how much money they will be receiving. This creates an opportunity for predators to take advantage of your loved ones. A trust based plan avoids this publicity since your trust is not a public document.

Accordingly, we recommend Revocable Living Trusts as the foundation for most estate plans. A Living Trust offers complete control to you during your lifetime, provides for you and your loved ones in the event of your incapacity, and on your death allows you to pass your assets to your loved ones without the costs, delays, and publicity associated with probate. A Living Trust can give you the peace of mind to know that you have a comprehensive, personalized, and thoughtful plan in place after you are gone.

Is a Living Trust Expensive?

While a Revocable Living Trust is typically more expensive than a Will, an effective Living Trust provides value far in excess of the cost to set up and maintain it. Consider the costs of:

  1. Forcing your family to go to probate court should you become incapacitated. This alone could run into the tens of thousands of dollars.
  2. Paying for probate executor fees and attorney fees, possibly in multiple states. Again this can easily run into the tens of thousands of dollars. Remember the above example where a $500,000 estate would pay in excess of $25,000 in fees. If the estate is worth $2,000,000, then the fees would be in excess of $66,000.
  3. Paying estate taxes. For those estates where estate taxes are an issue, a proper estate plan can easily produce savings in the hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of dollars.

Why have an Estate Plan?

  1. Maintain control over who receives your assets when you die.
    If you have not done any formal planning prior to your death, the State of Pennsylvania will tell your heirs who gets what, and how much of your estate they will get. This can result in gifts you would rather not have given, or the avoidance of gifts that you would like to have made.
  2. Estate Tax Reduction or Elimination.
    If you have significant assets, your estate may be subject to Estate Taxes. At this time the Estate Tax is truly horrendous and can result in a tremendous burden on your estate. For example, if you were to die with a one million dollar taxable estate, the taxes that your estate would owe to the government would be approximately $500,000. Proper estate planning can minimize, and sometimes even eliminate your estate’s liability for these taxes.