Estate Planning
“Always plan ahead. It wasn’t raining when Noah built the ark.” — Cardinal Richard Cushing
Effective estate planning is necessary to avoid potential legal issues, ensure that your assets go to the intended beneficiaries, minimize tax burdens, and establish plans for medical decisions in case of your incapacity.
While it is not always pleasant to think about, as you age, the future becomes more uncertain. Estate planning provides a structured approach to safeguard your legacy, give you peace of mind about the well-being of your loved ones and ensure that your wishes will be fulfilled (while minimizing family disputes).
Estate planning is a responsible and proactive measure to secure your financial legacy and provide for your family’s future—and we can help.
Your Estate Planning Experts
Mango Law Group provides estate and trust planning services which include the preparation of wills, trusts, powers of attorneys, designations of guardians and advanced directives with thorough consideration of relevant family, financial and tax issues. We have extensive experience in Medicaid planning and litigating probate disputes that makes us particularly well suited to formulate effective estate planning strategies.
Establishing Trusts
Trusts are often utilized to minimize taxes and to avoid the expense and delay associated with the formal administration of an estate in a Probate Court. A “Trust” allows a person to transfer property to a trustee to hold for the benefit of family members and other designated beneficiaries. Types of trusts often utilized include revocable living trusts, irrevocable trusts, Medicaid Trusts and Special Needs Trusts
TRUST AND ESTATE ADMINISTRATION
Mango Law Group’s attorneys routinely manage trust and estate administration issues in all West Michigan and surrounding counties. We provide extensive advice and assistance regarding the management and disposition of trust and estate assets (including real estate & business enterprises) and related matters. To wind up a decedent’s affairs, there is a specific “process” dictated by law that includes notifying the decedent’s heirs, beneficiaries (and creditors) that the person died, dealing with qualifying claims of creditors, preparing detailed accountings and other necessary administration records and then selling or distributing the decedent’s property and assets (often including cash/bank accounts, vehicles/boats, real estate/home, jewelry, household furnishings, antiques, tools, and business interests) in accordance with the decedent’s will or trust.
PROBATE ESTATE
We assist the decedent’s family and friends in winding up the decedent’s personal affairs and fulfilling their last wishes in the most efficient manner. If effective estate planning was not done prior to death, a decedent’s estate can be subjected to a court-supervised process referred to as “Probate” that is governed by complicated rules and procedures that must be strictly followed and which necessitate the preparation, filing (and serving) of formal documents, the appointment of a personal representative, the payment of an estate inventory fee and other tasks that significantly delay the disposition of an estate and often require attendance at formal hearings held by the Probate Court of the county where the decedent died (such as Allegan, Kent, Muskegon, and Ottawa County)
PREPARING AND MODIFYING WILLS
“Wills” [Last Will and Testament] are a critical part of an estate plan and ensure that a decedent’s assets and estate are distributed in the manner that they have directed. Without a Will, an estate is distributed based on a specific set of Michigan laws (called “intestacy”) that dictate who gets a decedent’s assets, regardless of whether the decedent would have wanted the assets to pass to them or not. Accordingly, a Will is routinely coupled with a Trust to ensure that the decedent’s wishes are made known and followed.