Emergency Estate Planning is the practice of preparing a Last Will and Testament and possibly a Trust on extremely short notice due to some impending event. Perhaps you have a major surgery scheduled for next week and never made arrangements; perhaps your parent is getting ready to be admitted to hospice and your other parent lacks the mental capacity to manage the family affairs, or perhaps your ex-spouse is dying and your common child is at risk of inheriting more money then they can reasonably manage.

Imagine you receive a call from your ex-spouse with whom you have a strong working relation as a co-parent. The marriage may not have lasted but the two of you have worked together to raise your now 19-year-old daughter. Your co-parent tells you that they just had a massive heart attack and the doctors do not think they will make it through the weekend. Unfortunately, your daughter has developed a drug addiction in the last couple of years. Your stomach sinks, your co-parent has been very successful in business and has amassed about $500,000 or even $1,000,000 in savings and a house. They also have not remarried, nor do they have other children. You know they have not signed a Will or a Trust, and understand instantly that your troubled 19-year-old is about to inherit enough money to stay on a bender for the next few years.

Large inheritance can ruin the life of a young person even if they do not have a drug or gambling problem. If they do have such a problem, it is nearly guaranteed that they will spend all the money on their vice and come out the other side worse for wear (if they survive). To avoid this kind of outcome, it is important to leave large inheritances for a young person in a trust to be managed by an older relative or friend that has more maturity and better judgment than the young Beneficiary. This can be accomplished through Trust Planning, a type of Estate Planning. The money is held in the trust and managed by the Trustee for the benefit of the young Beneficiary until such time as they reach a certain age, educational milestone, or even until they can pass a drug test. This allows the inheritance to support them and aid in their growth, without allowing them unrestricted access to more money than they can safely manage.

This is where Emergency Estate Planning becomes necessary. Most Estate Planning Attorneys will not do Emergency Estate Planning. It can be very difficult to accomplish as the dying Testator/Grantor is often on pain killers in the hospital and often has a very short period of time to complete the planning before they become so incapacitated that they lose the ability to sign contracts or even die. You cannot sign a Last Will and Testament or a Revocable Trust Agreement without capacity and being intoxicated on pain killers means they lack capacity. As a result, the attorney will need the dying individual to stop their pain management treatment temporarily for a long enough period to discuss their goals and to sign the documents which can exacerbate the underlying medical condition. In addition, these kinds of signings usually must happen in a hospital at very short notice, often on a weekend or during the evening when most attorneys are not working.

In normal Estate Planning, it often takes the attorney several weeks to draft estate planning documents, review them carefully with the client, and have them executed. In Emergency Estate Planning, it is often necessary to prepare and review the documents overnight and have them executed in the hospital the next morning in case the patient takes a turn for the worse. It also requires the attorney to create a strong record of events in case the documents are later challenged on the basis of undue influence or lack of capacity, often by the beneficiary who the decedent was trying to protect.

Ultimately, it is always best to do any necessary Estate Planning far enough in advance of any potential issues that no emergency exists; however, life can happen unexpectedly quickly, and even if it does not, people do not always plan as well as they should. If you find yourself in a similar situation and need a Last Will and Testament or a Trust in an emergency situation, reach out to Florida Planning & Probate to inquire about Emergency Estate Planning.  We cannot guarantee we can help during any last-minute situation, but we will do our best.