What is the Cost Of Michigan Estate Planning?

Many people who contact us or who are shopping for a Michigan estate planning lawyer ask us “what is the cost to do an estate plan?”  Like a good attorney, my response usually is “it depends”.  Unlike the “chop shop” trust mill types, we don’t have a set fee for a trust or will and try to shoe horn every situation into that document.  We sit down with our clients in an initial consultation and work together to learn their goals and apply our knowledge of the law to come up with a unique estate plan tailored to their individual needs.

So, when people call me and ask “what is the cost to do an estate plan?”, my response when not using the good lawyer “it depends” and when they have quoted a price from either their friend who is the criminal lawyer but does wills, the financial salesmen who pitch a trust at a seminar, the general practice attorney that is part of their Ford/GM/Chrysler legal plan or documents they bought out of a box, my response is “probably more expensive then them.”

The reason for this is we do not want price shoppers as clients.  What we do as a law firm that practices entirely estate planning is very different than all those other sources of “estate planning” I already mentioned.  What they do is document preparation.  That is not estate planning.

There is so much more too estate planning then just filling in the blanks on a word document.

How will you title your assets?  Is your trust funded properly?  Have you protected your spouse from creditors?  Have you provided a plan for your pets?  What is your business sucession plan?  Have you protected your children from the income tax hit of your house?  Have you avoided making mistakes with your IRA/401k where they are double taxed?  Is your life insurance proceeds going directly to your children?  Is your life insurance removed from your estate so you are not giving 45% of the life insurance to the U.S. Government? Do I have a QTIP trust for my spouse?  Are my children protected from creditors, divorce, IRS, and bankruptcy?  Have I avoided risking my children going into foster care or have I just named guardians in my will?  Ask your general practioner attorney, your trust in a box, or downloaded form those questions.

I’ve reviewed too many crummy wills, trusts, and estate plans.  We’ve had to probate too many screwed up estate plans.  Why would you short change your heirs by not doing your estate planning correctly with lawyers who focus only on Michigan estate planning.  You can either do it right the first time, or you’ll create a mess for your loved ones.

If you’ve found someone to put together a revocable living trust, pet trust, will, power of attorney, patient advocate, HIPAA documentation, funded your trust, etc for $500, more power to you.  Good luck, but I hope your heirs contact us when it comes time for administration time, my bet is there will be unplanned consequences.

You get what you pay for…

-Christopher J. Berry, Esq.
Michigan Wills and Trusts Lawyer