September 18

Estate planning unmarried couples

Cortes Law Firm Oklahoma City Estate Planning Attorney

Estate planning unmarried couples must have to protect each other

Are you an unmarried couple, but still wanna provide for your significant other? Well, by the end of today's video, you'll have a better idea of what to do.

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One of the things we're seeing more and more of is unmarried couples coming into our office who have been living together for a significant amount of time and really are life partners, but see no reason whatsoever to ever get married and it could be for a variety of reasons. But whatever those reasons are, they still want it provide for their significant other if one of them were to pass away first. So what do they do?

I bet you can guess that the first thing that I recommend is that we get a revocable living trust in place and because they are unmarried, usually what we see in unmarried couples that come into our office is that they have done a really good job of keeping their assets separate from one another and it could be because they were previously married and they had kids from a previous marriage and they wanna make sure that their kids eventually get their assets, right. Or it may be just that they came into this relationship and it was just easier to keep everything separate from the get-go and so that's what they did.

If they have done a really good job of keeping everything separate, then we create a revocable living trust-centered estate plan for each one of them. That way they can still provide for their significant other once they pass away but they can also make sure that their kids or their family are the ultimate beneficiaries of their estate once their life partner has passed away. We do this simply by creating a trust for each one of them and we give the other partner a life estate in the one who's passed away in their assets.

So for example, if they had a financial account or retirement account or a house or whatever it is, we might say that the other partner can continue to live in the house as long as they are alive. And then once they pass away, it goes to the original person's decedents, their kids, and their grandkids, etc. Same thing with financial accounts, we could say that the person who passes away that their money, the interest from that, and possibly some of the income can go to the benefit of the surviving partner during their lifetime. And then once that surviving partner passes away, whatever assets are left over here, go to that person's decedents, their kids, their grandkids, whoever it is that they want it to go to.

By doing that, you're still providing for your significant other because they get to enjoy the benefits of all of your assets but you know that once they pass away, whatever's left over will go to your children or your grandchildren or whoever it is you want it to go to. So if you have been living with somebody for a significant amount of time, or even if you're just starting out and you guys still want to provide for each other, don't be afraid of the estate planning process just because you're not married. We can customize estate plans for both of you so that you're both protected and you both provide for each other in case something were to happen.

I know I've thrown a lot at you today, so that's why we've prepared our free guide on estate planning. I'll put a link to it in the description below and in the comment section below that so that you can download it and get started in the right direction and to help you out even more, watch this video up here and this video up here. If you enjoy this video, then guys, please smash that Subscribe button and click on the Like button and also click on that little bell so you'll get notified every time we post a new video. Have a great day and an awesome week and as always, thanks for watching.



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