The Riverside Press-Enterprise Jan and Robert Hazelwood are in the prime of life. They have a spacious house in Lee's Summit, Mo., two good jobs and a couple of cute children. They have much to plan for, such as vacations and their children's educations. But being practical people, the Hazelwoods also have planned for what will happen after they die or become incapacitated. Last year, they set up a living trust, a key tool in estate planning.
Estate planning is a way of setting down answers to some of life's critical questions.
Whether you get a living trust, a simple will or both, financial experts agree that you must plan for the inevitable. Estate planning gives you the opportunity to minimize the amount of your estate that will flow into the tax bucket. Estate planning also involves health-care issues, said Louis Austin, a Kansas City lawyer specializing in living trusts. Millions of Americans are reading books, attending seminars and scooping up computer software connected with estate planning. Many are turning to living trusts.