Guitar Shopping Anyone?

Merry Christmas! December and all of the holiday celebrations that this month brings has finally arrived. My kids are bouncing off the walls already. Last night, I took each of them to the store to help them pick out presents for their siblings and mother. After we got them all wrapped back at home, our little girl asked if she was going to get to open them tomorrow. I told her, “No. We still have about 20 days before you can open them.” I couldn’t help but feel her pain as a drawn-out whimper of despair escaped her lips while she tried to comprehend the eternity of the next 20 days. Ahhh, waiting for Christmas morning. What torture!

December is also a big birthday month in my family. Last Saturday I had the chance to go with my nephew Talmage to Guitar Center to help him look for a new electric guitar that his parents wanted to get him for his birthday. Of course, my doing so wasn’t entirely selfless as I will jump at any opportunity to go to Guitar Center and play with the big boy toys that fill my dreams on these long winter nights.

As we picked up guitar after guitar and plugged them in to let Talmage get a feel for each of them, I wondered which one would he would settle on. When he finally declared which guitar was his favorite, it was clear to me why. It was a beautiful guitar, of course. But more than anything else, it seemed to really “fit” my nephew and his personality. It wasn’t flashy, loud, or obnoxious. Rather, it was understated and very natural looking. The beautiful wood grains were visible through the finish of the guitar letting you see the guitar for what it really was underneath. It was also a very versatile guitar suited for playing a wide variety of styles. It was perfect for Talmage.

After speaking with his guitar teacher the next day about the guitar that he had settled on, I learned that that particular make of guitar was not his teacher’s favorite. Of course, his teacher’s favorite make of guitar is not my favorite either. And what felt right for Talmage likely wouldn’t feel right to me. But his teacher made a good point during the conversation. He told Talmage that, in the end, as long as he likes the way it feels and looks, that’s probably the most important thing for any guitar player. He explained that if you like your guitar enough that you always want to pick it up to practice it, then the chances that you’ll improve and become an accomplished musician are much greater.

When I work with my clients on their estate plans, I think the process can be very similar to choosing a guitar. I would be doing my clients a great disservice if I simply handed them a pre-fab estate plan that is pretty good with their names filled in the blanks. Rather, I find it very important to spend time with each client and really get to know them and their family before I make any recommendations. Once we’ve spent time getting to know each other, then it’s important to talk about the many different options that can be implemented into an estate plan. We talk about how each option would work in their specific family situation and whether it “feels right” to them. For some clients, certain estate planning tools would be very cumbersome and might even create more problems than they would solve. For others, those same tools will be absolutely critical to prevent problems from arising in their families at the death or disability of the parents.

It is my experience that when a family invests sufficient time and effort into this process, they ultimately get an estate plan that is the right fit for their family and will accomplish the goals that are important to them. And if they’ve taken that kind of care in creating the estate plan, then they are far more likely to give it an appropriate level of attention as time passes to ensure that the estate plan is maintained and adjusted to deal with ever changing laws and changing family circumstances.

If it has been a while since you took the time to understand your estate plan and how it actually works, may I suggest that you add that to your list of goals at the first of the year? By re-reading it (or reading it for the first time as the case may be) and seeking to understand what would happen if you or your spouse became disabled or passed away, you’ll be doing your family a great service. If you don’t understand how your estate plan is designed, or why it is designed that way, it would be well worth your time to schedule an appointment with your attorney so he or she can help you understand it better.

And if you don’t have a will or trust, that doesn’t mean that you don’t have an estate plan. You do! The state of Utah (or whichever state your property is located in or that you live in) has one for you. It’s called the law of “intestacy.” And it’s not very personal.