Florham Park Legal Blog

Dying without a will or trust in place has gotten a lot of attention in recent months and years as several prominent people have died without a will or a trust. Estate planning is vital to ensuring that one's final wishes regarding health care directives, burial plans and so forth are carried out according to one's instructions. It is also important that the people entrusted with carrying out those wishes are aware of the existence and location of the documents in New Jersey.

In the absence of severe illness, few people anticipate an early or sudden death. As unpleasant as it may be to consider, it is a possibility people face every day. As families gather for the holidays, it's a good time to take a few moments to ensure that loved ones are familiar with the existence of such information and its location.

Some of the biggest news stories about estate planning are about celebrities with a significant amount of assets that did not sit down with an attorney to discuss who inherits their property. It can become a financial and legal nightmare when the heirs are left to deal with the decedent’s mistakes.

However, it does also serve as a reminder that estate planning must begin at a younger age. You may not have a lot to give right now, but most are not able to predict when they will die. Before you begin planning out potential asset division, you may want to talk to your parents if they are still alive and can think clearly. It could potentially give you some ideas on the direction you want your plan to take while preparing you for your parents’ future in the process.

The decision to end a marriage is seldom entered into lightly in New Jersey. When a couple decides to divorce, there are different options that can be exercised as to how divorce negotiations will proceed and to what extent the courts will be involved. Arbitration is one such option that reduces the role of the court and has an added benefit of taking place privately rather than in a public courtroom.

When a couple makes the decision to enter into arbitration, it is often to aid in the resolution of issues that they cannot agree on. The arbitrator listens to each side and can then make a ruling. If both parties agree to the ruling, the issue is considered to be resolved. Divorce negotiations can be completed with the arbitrator.

Divorce and remarriage in New Jersey are very common in this day and age. Complex family structures are often one result of this phenomenon. One result of all of this is more complex estate planning. When both partners have offspring from prior marriages and possibly children together from the new marriage, they may want to ensure that children are provided for fairly after their deaths.

Estate plans occasionally need to be updated and a new marriage would be one of those occasions. If one spouse wants to ensure that part of one's estate goes to the children of a previous marriage and not everything to the surviving spouse there are options. The simplest is that one spouse designates part of an estate to the children and part to the surviving spouse. Another option involves creating a trust for the surviving spouse that would provide a distribution to the surviving spouse for the duration of his or her life and the balance would then pass to the children.