An estate planning attorney is an integral part of your estate plan. The attorney will not only help you draft estate documents, but more importantly, they will serve as a guide through the estate planning process.

Here are four important services that estate planning attorneys can provide during estate planning:

Provide Guidance

An estate planning attorney can help you get started with estate planning by recommending steps to take and which documents to get in order. The attorney may also be able to recommend helpful resources for gathering information about what estate documents to prepare and how much they should cost. Because estate taxes, exemptions, and valuations change over time, it's important that you meet with your estate planner on a regular basis in order to ensure that your plan stays current with current tax laws.

Draft Estate Documents

After you have a general idea of what estate plan you want, your estate planning lawyer will draft estate documents for you. These documents may include a last will and testament, a living trust, powers of attorney, and medical directives. Your estate planner can also help you protect valuable property from nursing home costs through the use of protective legal instruments such as powers of attorney and special needs trusts. In addition to these important estate planning tools, your estate attorney should also prepare estate tax returns that are required by the IRS following your death. In some cases, the lawyer can even do this work on an ongoing basis so that new returns are always prepared. This ensures that your estate pays no more than necessary in taxes after your death.

Advise You on Estate Taxes

In addition to estate planning, estate taxation is another important area that estate planners can help with. Your estate attorney will calculate estate taxes due upon your death based on the total value of your estate and exemptions available to you at that time. If you have a complex estate plan or if property ownership isn't symmetrical among plan members, this process can become very complicated and result in unnecessary taxation. Your estate planning attorney will be able to advise you about which strategies to use in order to avoid or minimize estate tax liability so that more of your assets are passed along to your heirs rather than the government after your death.

Make Sure All Ends Meet

While preparing documents for you, estate planning lawyers are also involved in estate administration. This means that they will be helping you keep your estate documents updated, resolve estate disputes, and ensure that estate property is distributed properly.

For all your estate legal issues, hire an experienced estate planning attorney near you.

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