What To Share with Executors/Successor Trustees (Well) In Advance?

[ncbill]

Health care POAs are crucial IMHO...be sure to discuss at length with your heath care agent how far you want treatment to go in some specific instances.

E.g. the progress of dementia has left you bedridden & unable to communicate...do you want a full-court press the next time you develop an acute complication (e.g. pneumonia) or is that the time to call Hospice, or something in-between?

I had a parent in the "bedridden & unable to communicate" state for the better part of a decade before they died...still not sure I carried out their wishes because we never talked about such difficult situations beforehand.

[Charlotte]

When we completed our trust, wills, POAs, health POAs, etc, I wrote a group email to everyone listed with any role in it.

I started with the location of the stored documents and the name of the attorney and her contact info. Next, so that there wasn’t later confusion, for each document, I listed out who was first in a role, who was backup, etc.

This was because some of the people in the documents don’t really know each other that well. For example, although my sister and my husband's sister have met several times in the last 30 years, they don’t really know each other and don’t live in the same city/state. Yet each has a named role in our plans. So I wanted each to know what they were on point for, and what they were NOT on point for and who was. As well, it made sure everyone had names and contact info for each other, in the event of a disaster happening to my husband and me at the same time.

Note: I did not actually distribute any of the documents. I also didn’t tell anyone the size of our assets. I did tell them that there is an informal letter at the front of the trust docs that outlines account numbers, approx balances, general investment strategy and how to best help our kids (currently college-aged... still a bit too young to manage the kind of money they will eventually inherit.)