Obviously, these documents should be custom-tailored to the particular concerns and circumstances of each relationship, and require a lawyer to do them right. Unmarried couples with sufficient assets and a cohabitation agreement might find living trusts useful, if they can stand the inconvenience of keeping track of which property goes into which trust. Each might set up a separate living trust for his or her separate property, and possibly a third one for shared property. Each individual trust can be used to make gifts for friends or relatives of each partner. The shared trust can leave property to the couple's mutual friends, as well as to the surviving partner.
Law books are full of wills that tried to provide for pets people left behind.
Especially in recent years, these provisions are almost always thrown out. You generally can't leave money or a property directly to an animal, nor can you make an animal the direct beneficiary of a trust. The one way to provide in a will for a pet's care is to make an agreement with someone to take care of it after you die and bequeath an amount of money needed to pay for the care to that person. You also need to provide for what happens to that money after the pet dies. A final word .