Estate planning can be an emotional issue which almost every family will have to deal with at some point or another. For parents this can be particularly difficult when their children have interpersonal conflicts among each other. This can cause arguments and disagreements over how assets should be distributed during the estate administration process in Maryland and in any other state.
This can prevent parents from being able to make final decisions regarding how to distribute assets among their children when they finally end up dying. Many estate planning professionals say that parents in this situation commonly make the mistake of trying to please everybody. However, the longer one waits to make estate planning decisions the more exposed one’s assets are to tax liabilities and other potential issues.
One common problem is when parents are trying to decide what to do with their family business when their children, who would have normally inherited ownership of the business, are not getting along for one reason or another. If their children do not iron out their differences, it may be best for the parents to liquidate the business and split their assets evenly among their children. Although this will not make everybody happy, in the long run it will better protect assets meant to be given to heirs.
Therefore, it is essential for one to begin the estate planning process as soon as possible in Maryland. This will ensure that there will be assets left to distribute during the estate administration process which will need to happen after one’s death. However, it is still important to carefully design an estate planning strategy to serve one’s goals, and this process will be different for each person.
Source: Tri-State Neighbor, Estate planning: The green beans of life, Michael Baron, Dec. 26, 2013
