Every day, you care and provide for your family but how will they be provided for when you are no longer there? Talking with an attorney today to plan for your family tomorrow is a wise investment of your time.
Learn more about how you can protect the future of your children, elder parents, disabled family members, and other loved ones with wills, trusts, and other estate planning tools. Contact Shatleh Law to schedule an initial consultation today.
Too many people think estate planning is only for wealthy people with large estates. Nothing could be further from the truth. Estate planning allows you and your family to achieve a number of important goals:
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Distributing your property to family and friends after you’re gone with wills and trusts, or a combination of the two.
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Ensuring your children are cared for by naming a guardian.
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Ensuring a disabled or mentally ill family member is cared for with a guardianship or power of attorney for decision making.
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Sharing your wishes regarding medical care with a living will / advance medical directive.
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Ensuring someone can make medical and financial decisions, should you be unable to make decisions with medical or financial powers of attorney.
Estate planning attorney, Nour Shatleh can help you with every one of these goals.
Elder Law
Aging is inevitable and yet many families don’t talk about how to care for an elder parent or relative until the elder has been taken advantage of by strangers or suffered serious medical problems.
Don’t wait to have these important conversations. While your parents or grandparents are still alert and active, sit down with them to discuss their wishes regarding medical care. Find out who they want to handle their finances, should that become a problem. We can help facilitate those discussions and can draft the paperwork you need to see that their concerns are addressed and their wishes are communicated.
Transition Planning for Mentally Ill or Developmentally Disabled Children
Once children turn 18, parents are no longer their natural guardians. The law assumes that they are now able to make legal, financial, or medical decisions on their own. However, people with serious disabilities will still need a guardian who can make some or all of these decisions on their behalf, even after they become adults. If your child has a serious disability that will prevent him or her from becoming fully independent, email Shatleh Law at least 6 months before your child turns 18 to apply for a guardianship. Even though you can obtain a guardianship later, it may be a good idea to handle it right away to make sure there is no period of time when there is a gap in your decision-making authority. If you apply within 6 months before your child turns 18, you can obtain a guardianship that will become effective on their 18th birthday.
Texas Probate
Probate is the process of proving that a document meets the legal requirements to be found by a court to be the valid last will and testament of the testator. This process requires certain acts to prove the validity of the will. The process of the court finding the document to be a last will and testament of a testator is referred to as “admitting the will to probate.” Once this is accomplished, the probate estate can be administered as provided for in the will, and in compliance with the law. Different requirements exist for a court to authorize administration of an estate when a person died without a valid will (intestate). In either event, the administration of an estate involves three main responsibilities:
1. Identifying, gathering and evaluating the decedent’s assets.
2. Identifying decedent’s debts and paying allowable debts.
3. Distributing the remaining assets to those entitled under the terms of the decedent’s last will and testament, or in the case of an intestate estate, in compliance with law.
When performing such responsibilities, the law requires the executor/administrator to perform specific acts within specific time frames. Shatleh Law helps executors and personal representatives work with the Texas probate courts to distribute an estate after the death of a loved one.
P.S. Some people try to draft their own wills or simply “pencil in” changes to a will they had drafted by an attorney ages ago. This is a mistake which can have grave consequences for your loved ones, and is never worth the small amount of money you think you are “saving.” Call Shatleh Law now to schedule an initial consultation, and get the peace of mind you and your family deserve!
