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Is it time to review your plan?

On Behalf of | Jul 13, 2022 | Estate Planning

Making an estate plan serves as a time-consuming process, with a lot of difficult matters to cover. Most people feel relieved when they finally finish theirs.

But finishing the estate plan is far from the end of maintaining it. In fact, the maintenance of an estate plan takes more time and effort than most people expect.

Regular reviews

Forbes discusses the right time to review an estate plan. Generally speaking, a person should review their estate plan once every 3 to 5 years. This gives a person enough time between each review that they will genuinely refresh their memory when they look over it again. They may find small things that no longer apply that they want to change.

Other than that, it is also important to review a plan any time major life changes occur. This holds especially true for changes that involve a person’s finances or their beneficiaries.

Changes to beneficiaries and assets

Beneficiaries include anyone that will benefit from the estate plan, such as those mentioned in a will or on a life insurance plan. Changes will happen to this list all throughout a person’s life, as people come and go through death, marriage, divorce, birth and more.

Assets also constantly change, so a person may only want to alter their plan if they undergo a large and long-lasting financial change. This can include falling into debt and having to file for bankruptcy, coming into an inheritance, or making a transfer of one asset to another, like selling or buying a property.

By reviewing an estate plan often, it nearly guarantees that a person’s loved ones will not have to deal with too much legal hassle after the individual dies.

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