The Mom's Guide to Wills and Estate Planning 1st Edition

This book is useful for following:1. Parents for planning their estate. Who to appoint guardian? How to plan finances and who will take care of finances? Whether to have a will or a living trust?2. If you are wondering whether just having a will enough for you or do you need a living trust? The purpose of living trust is to avoid probate.Every body needs a will but some people should have a living trust to avoid probate. This book has some estate planning worksheets at the end but no tools to help you make a will or a living trust. After reading the book, you can write a simple will yourself but you may be better off using a software like  Quicken Willmaker 2010 Edition: Book & Software Kit  so that your will has the right format and legal jargon. If you already know that you do not need a living trust, and do not have children, then you do not need this book and are better off spending the money on  Quicken Willmaker 2010 Edition: Book & Software Kit . For about fifty bucks you can also write a will at Nolo's web site using online forms.Who needs a living trust? Property with joint ownership and right on survivorship goes to the co-owner. IRA's, payable on death accounts, life insurance, bank and brokerage accounts should already have beneficiaries assigned and do not go through probate. If you are in one of the states where probate is not streamlined and your property does not have a co-owner with right of survivorship then you are probably going to need a living trust to save your beneficiaries going through the probate proceedings. Other situations requiring living trusts include business owners, assets are more than three million, special needs child, children from multiple marriages, complicated partnerships etc.If you are one of the brave souls who wants to try their hand at making your own living trust then  Living Trust Maker  will be better option because it comes with software to do that. For ninety dollars, you can also make a living trust online on Nolo's web site. However, transferring assets to a living trust requires so much complicated paperwork that you are probably better off spending a thousand or couple of thousand dollars on a trust lawyer to make sure it is done correctly because consequences of wrong documents can be severe.Like all Nolo books,  The Mom's Guide to Wills & Estate Planning  book is written nicely and is easy to read and understand. Ms. Hanks has a done a nice job of covering estate planning for parents. A variety of topics like retirement accounts, payable on death accounts, life insurance and power of attorney are also covered. Scattered throughout the book are USA Today snapshots with a variety of statistics which are rather distracting because most of them are irrelevant to the topic of estate planning and their purpose in this book is not really clear. May be advertising for USA Today. A search on Amazon for will or living trust or estate planning will bring up plenty of other books but I have always liked Nolo books for their nice format and easy read.Estate planning is one of those things, like exercise, which we should all do, but most of us never do. I knew a doctor couple who died, without estate planning, in a helicopter crash in Belize and there was a big legal fight for several years between mother's parents and the father's sister for custody and guardianship of children, who were the real sufferers, of course. Wrong court assigned guardians, during crucial years of childhood can result in permanent, severe and irreversible damage to the children. So, if you have children, then this book is very helpful in planning your estate.

Lisa Hanks writes "...basic estate planning isn't legally complicated, it's emotionally difficult" and this is why most people put it off until it is too late.I hoped I was not the only person who misread the book's title and assumed it is only for single mothers. I soon learned I wasn't as Hanks addresses the book's title in her introduction:"It's not that dads aren't interested or involved--far from it. They are active and essential participants. It's just that mom usually gets the ball rolling. And trust me, you've got the skills required to make sure this project gets finished, too. Anyone who can juggle a family for one week--logistics, finances, health care, emotional havoc--can put an estate plan together." The Mom's Guide to Wills & Estate Planning  is a well-written guide that covers estate planning for parents. It covers wills, living trusts, retirement accounts and life insurance. The book also provides a series of estate planning worksheets that include a will worksheet, an inheritance planner and a family inventory. Credit the easy-to-understand format to Nolo's practical writing.I'm familiar with Nolo reference books (I think this is the sixth Nolo book I've reviewed for Amazon) and find most to be a great starting point for learning the basics of a new topic.This book is smaller than in size and length than most Nolo books. The advantage is the book is easier to carry but the font size is a bit to small in the worksheets. The USA Today snapshots spread throughout the book are little more than window dressing though and do nothing more than break up the text. That is a minor complaint, considering the amount of helpful information included in this guide.One last caveat: you should not substitute the book for face-to-face legal advice. This guide covers the estate planning basics you need to protect your family. Read it and use it as intended but don't forget the author is an attorney herself, so don't hesitate to contact your own for help.Rating: four stars.