Here are five questions to ensure you don’t end up paying for legal services you don’t need, expect, or want. Once you know exactly what you should be looking for when choosing an estate planning lawyer, you’ll be much better positioned to hire an attorney that will provide the kind of love, attention, care, and trust your family deserves.
01: How Do They Bill For Their Services?
When working with an estate planning lawyer, find a lawyer who bills for all their services on a flat-fee, no surprises basis —and never hourly—unless a court requires it for limited “court-related” services.
Your lawyer should determine the fees they charge you only after guiding you through a process of discovery in which they learn about your family dynamics and your assets and educate you about what would happen for your family and assets if and when something happens to you. Through that process, they will help you choose the right plan that meets your budget and desired outcomes.
All of our fees are a flat-fee, agreed to in advance, and you choose your fee through our Estate Planning Review and Design Session process, during which we educate you about the law, and you educate us about your family dynamics and assets. Then, you choose the right plan, at the right price, for the people you love.
02: How Will Your Lawyer Respond To Your Needs On An Ongoing Basis?
To ensure your lawyer can be responsive to your needs, ask them how quickly calls are typically returned in their office and if someone will be on-hand to answer quick questions when and as needed. Ideally, all calls to your lawyer should be pre-scheduled with a clear agenda, so you both can be ready to focus on your specific needs.
03: How Will Your Lawyer Proactively Communicate With You On An Ongoing Basis?
Work with a lawyer who has systems to keep your plan updated to ensure your assets are protected (throughout your life) and who will communicate with you regularly.
Additionally, ask them how they will proactively support you in keeping your plan updated on an ongoing basis and be there for your loved ones when you can’t be.
Think of it this way: Your estate plan includes a set of documents, but your plan is far more than those documents. Your plan is an inventory of your assets, which changes throughout your life. It’s a structure and container for who and what your family will turn to when something happens to you.
You want to work with a lawyer with systems to keep your documents up to date and ensure your assets are owned correctly throughout your lifetime.
Ideally, the lawyer should get to know you and your family over time so that when something happens, your lawyer can be there for the people you love. There will already be an underlying relationship and trust.
04: Can You Call About Any Legal Problem Or Just About Matters Within Their Specialty?
You want your personal lawyer to have broad enough expertise to consult with him or her about all sorts of legal and financial issues that may come up in your life—and trust he or she will be able to offer you sound guidance about whether you have a legal issue or not. While your lawyer won’t be able to advise you on all legal matters, he or she should be able to refer you to other trusted professionals who can help you.
Trust us, you wouldn’t want the lawyer who designed your estate plan also to handle your personal injury claim, settle a dispute with your landlord, and advise you on your divorce. But you do want him or her to be there to hear your story, refer you to a highly qualified lawyer who specializes in that area, and overall serve as your go-to legal consultant.
In this capacity, you can consult your personal lawyer before you sign any legal documents, any time you have a legal or financial issue arise, or whenever anything that might adversely affect your family or business comes up, and know that you’ll get excellent guidance.
05: What Happens When They Die Or Retire?
This is a critically important—and often overlooked—question to ask your lawyer and any service professional before beginning a relationship. A client-centered professional will have a succession plan to ensure their clients are cared for no matter what happens to the lawyer managing your plan.
Look for a lawyer with a detailed plan that will ensure that someone warm and caring will take over your planning without any interruption of service.
We work with a community of lawyers just like us who serve clients with Life & Legacy Planning. We have a network of successor attorneys who practice with the same morals and model as we do, so if anything happens to us you will be treated with the same level of care and relationship that we provide.
A Lasting Relationship
Should you choose the wrong person for the job, your family could face unnecessary conflicts, expenses, and legal entanglements when they’re most vulnerable. Ultimately, estate planning is far more than having a lawyer create a set of documents for you and then never seeing you again or only seeing you when something goes wrong.
We develop a relationship with you and your family that lasts a lifetime. Our unique, family-centered legal services are specifically tailored to provide our clients with the kind of love, attention, and trust we’d want for our loved ones. To learn more about our one-of-a-kind systems and services, schedule with us today.
AB Law, PLLC is a full-service business law and estate planning firm that serves clients throughout Texas. All consultations are free and no question is too silly, ridiculous, or complex. https://calendly.com/ablawpllc www.ab-firm.com