An Overland Park estate planning attorney provides you with some of the most important legal advice that you will ever receive. Your comprehensive estate plan protects you in case of incapacity so you don’t get unwanted medical care and so your assets are not mismanaged. Your estate planning attorney also helps you to ensure you don’t end up losing your life savings if you have to go into a nursing home. Finally, your attorney helps to make sure your heirs can inherit the maximum value of your property without losses due to taxes or other problems.
You cannot afford to make any mistakes when it comes to creating an estate plan, because it will often be too late to correct errors by the time problems are found. Your living will, your last will and testament, the trusts you create, and all other estate planning tools need to be created in accordance with the law to provide the protection you expect.
You need to ensure you have an Overland Park estate planning attorney who is up to the task of helping you to make effective use of all available legal tools. Parman & Easterday is that firm, so give us a call today.
Things to Look for in an Overland Park Estate Planning Attorney
When you are hiring an estate planning attorney, it is often difficult to know who to trust. You can ask for referrals from friends and family, use the Internet to research legal professionals, and look into professional organizations to find a list of lawyers who may be able to help you. However, you need to know what credentials and characteristics are important so you can choose a good lawyer.
Some of the key things you should be on the lookout for as you consider who should help you with the creation of your comprehensive estate plan include:
- Membership in the American Academy of Estate Planning Attorneys: The American Academy of Estate Planning Attorneys was founded in 1993 and is comprised of law firms dedicated to providing excellence in the estate planning process. Academy Members are required to undergo 36 hours of continuing legal education annually to maintain their status and to ensure they remain up-to-date on all legal developments within the estate planning field.
- Designation as an Academy Fellow: Certain members of the American Academy of Estate Planning Attorneys are designated as Fellows because they meet additional rigorous standards established by the Education Advisory Board and the Academy Board of Governors. Fellows not only complete continuing legal education each year, but also demonstrate substantial practical experience in the estate planning field. Fellows must be re-certified every five years and demonstrate they continue to meet the requirements.
- A focus on estate planning: Estate planning is a highly technical and highly specific area of law. Attorneys who specialize in other fields of law do not have the knowledge or the experience necessary to provide comprehensive advice that clients need to plan for incapacity or death. You need an attorney who handles all aspects of estate planning and who knows the state and federal laws inside and out so you can make full use of legal protections which are available to you. Look for a lawyer who can help you with an advanced directive, a last will and testament, irrevocable and revocable trusts, legacy planning, estate tax avoidance, and all other aspects of estate planning.
- Compassionate advocacy: Making decisions about end-of-life issues and incapacity issues can be emotionally difficult. You need a lawyer who is both knowledgeable and compassionate.
Parman & Easterday has all of these credentials and many more. Clients trust us to provide them with estate planning services because of our decades of collective experience and because we have proved time and again how our dedicated legal service can benefit clients in planning for their future.
Contact an Overland Park Estate Planning Attorney Today
Clients throughout Overland Park and surrounding areas place their trust in Parman & Easterday and we take our responsibility seriously. Our goal is to help clients of all ages, and at all phases of life and all income levels, to make an estate plan that helps them to achieve security for themselves and their families.
The future is uncertain and there may be many bumps in the road as well as many joyous occasions throughout your life. We want to help you be prepared for anything life throws at you. To learn more about how an Overland Park estate planning attorney can help you, give Parman & Easterday a call today at (405) 843-6100 or contact us online.
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