Marin Estate Planning Attorney | Estate Planning Lawyer | Living Trust Attorney

Good estate planning is good life planning

The estate planning process doesn’t have to be complicated or uncomfortable. Together we'll create an easy-to-understand estate plan that fits your needs. I will help you identify your estate planning "team" and organize your estate planning documents and financial records, making it easy for you and for your loved ones to know exactly what to do next.

We'll talk about your personal situation, your family, your assets, and your goals. I'll help you decide whether a revocable trust is appropriate for you, or not. Then, based on our discussions, I'll prepare an estate plan for you that includes:

Advance Health Care Directive
Additional Guidance for My Healthcare Agents
Financial Durable Power of Attorney with Special Instructions
Revocable Living Trust
Last Will

If you have young children, we'll also prepare nominations of guardians - both temporary (emergency) and permanent.

My Fees

While it is difficult to provide an exact estimate without understanding your specific situation, I think it's helpful to offer basic information about what my estate planning and administration services cost. Below I’ve described the usual kinds of estate planning projects I see and the “typical” fees associated with that work. My hourly fee is currently $500, my Legal Assistant $275, Associate $300, and Senior Counsel at $400 per hour. Direct expenses, such as title search fees, recording fees, filing fees, and Federal Express, are billed at cost. There is no additional charge to notarize your signature.

Basic Trust Plan

If you are single or newly married, just starting out, with no children and no real estate, you probably need a Basic Trust Plan.

A Basic Trust Plan provides immediate protection and a solid foundation for future planning. A Basic Trust Plan includes the Advance Health Care Directive, a durable power of attorney for the management of your finances, a single revocable trust, details of all assets – whether they’re included in the trust or not, and a pourover Will. The trust leaves everything to one or more individuals or charitable organizations, but does not include provisions for minor children. You’ll learn how to transfer bank accounts and taxable brokerage accounts into your trust, and we’ll help you to update beneficiary forms for your retirement accounts and life insurance. We’ll meet with you at least twice to review drafts and execute the final plan. After you’ve signed your plan, you’ll receive your original documents, a customized estate-planning binder with additional copies and instructions, and a flash drive with digital copies of everything. The Basic Trust Plan includes an annual check-in to see if there have been any changes in your life or in the lives of your agents, trustees, executors, or beneficiaries that might require a second look. The flat fee for a Basic Trust Plan for a Single Person is $3,500 and $4,500 for a Married Couple or Registered Domestic Partners.

Trust Plus Plan

If you are single or married and own your own home or other real estate, or if you have children (especially young children), you probably need a Trust Plus Plan.

The Trust Plus Plan includes the Advance Health Care Directive, a durable power of attorney for the management of your finances, a single or joint revocable trust, details of all assets – whether they’re included in the trust or not, and a pourover Will. If you have young children, the trust includes provisions to protect them now and in the future, and the Will nominates guardians for your children while they are minor. You can leave personal effects and specific gifts of cash or real estate to family and friends or charitable organizations. If you are married, the trust leaves everything else to your spouse. We’ll prepare and record the deed to transfer your home into your trust. We’ll also help you to transfer bank accounts and taxable brokerage accounts into your trust, and to update beneficiary forms for your retirement accounts and life insurance. We’ll meet with you at least twice to review drafts and execute the final plan. After you’ve signed your plan, you’ll receive your original documents, a customized estate-planning binder with additional copies and instructions, and a flash drive with digital copies of everything. The Trust Plus Plan includes an annual check-in to see if there have been any changes in your life or in the lives of your agents, trustees, executors, or beneficiaries that might require a second look. The flat fee for a Trust Plus Plan is $4,500 for a Single Person and $6,000 for a Married Couple or Registered Domestic Partners.

Complex Trust Planning

If you have a blended family or family members with special needs,

if you or your spouse is a non-U.S. citizen,

if you have a pre- or post-marital agreement or substantial separate property,

if you hold a substantial portion of your assets in retirement accounts, or

if you own your own business, hold an interest in a closely-held business, or own investment real estate, you probably need Complex Planning Services.

Any of these circumstances requires careful planning. This type of planning allows time to really understand how to best protect the assets you have built for the benefit of your family and future generations. The plan includes the Advance Health Care Directive, a durable power of attorney for the management of your finances, a single or joint revocable trust, details of all assets – whether they’re included in the trust or not, and a pourover Will. It might include an Irrevocable Life Insurance Trust (ILIT), if that's appropriate. If you have young children or vulnerable family members with special needs, the plan would include special needs provisions. Your trust might include the appointment of a special trustee or trust protector to manage your business assets or generation-skipping transfer tax provision. If you have an interest in charitable giving during your lifetime or after your death, we can help you with planned giving. We’ll prepare and record the deed to transfer your home into your trust. We’ll also help you to transfer bank accounts, taxable brokerage accounts, and business interests into your trust, and to update beneficiary forms for your retirement accounts and life insurance, as needed. We’ll meet with you as often as needed to review and revise drafts and to execute the final plan. After you’ve signed your plan, you’ll receive your original documents, a customized estate-planning binder with additional copies and instructions, and a flash drive with digital copies of everything. We will check in with you annually to see if there have been any changes in your life or in the lives of your agents, trustees, executors, or beneficiaries that might require a second look. We provide complex planning services on an hourly basis.

Review Existing Estate Plan

If you have an existing estate plan that you’d like us to review for you …

You’ll want to have an attorney review your existing trust and/or Will if you have married or divorced, if you have a new child or grandchild, if a family member or beneficiary has died, if your executor or trustee is no longer able or willing to serve, if you have received an inheritance, or if you have acquired new assets (especially real estate). I can review, analyze, and diagram your planning documents, and then meet with you to explain how your current plan works and whether you should consider updating any part of your plan. We provide review services on an hourly basis.

"“The past beats inside me like a second heart.”
― John Banville, The Sea (2005)

My younger brother and I spent summers with my dad's mother and our cousins in East Texas (“God’s Country”). My grandmother, Eula Brent Click, was the youngest of 13 children. She taught school in a one-room schoolhouse in Pennington. Rumor has it that she was quite an independent woman for her time, and she married late.

My grandmother was widowed during the Depression. She raised my father and his two older sisters alone, managed the family farm and business in Lovelady, and worked hard to put her kids through Huntsville State Teachers College.

Miss Eula embodied all of the "old-time" virtues - honesty, thrift, simplicity, plainspokenness. She could size you up over the rim of her coffee cup in an instant - and she could spot a lie a mile off. Steeped in the idiom of the King James Bible, she valued good writing, and she could tell a good story and laughed hardest at a good joke.

To be wasteful was a terrible thing. She made play clothes and sun bonnets for me out of calico chicken-feed sacks. She tended a large garden and raised cows and chickens to feed her extended family. She always washed and reused the tinfoil.

Family and church were the two touchstones of her life. There was always someone extra at the table - an aunt, cousins, a visitor - whether for coffee (boiled and tar-black) or dinner. Baptisms and graduations and weddings and funerals punctuated the years. No matter the occasion, there was always plenty of food and storytelling, both of which are competitive sports in my family.

My grandmother taught Sunday School until she was 90. Almost every week she'd pack a food basket for someone who was ill or having a hard time, and we'd drop it off after church. When she was older, nephews and neighbors and church members stopped in to check on her, carry the mail up from the highway, bring her a meal, or help with things around the house, all of which allowed her to live at home until the last year of her life.

I love hearing people's stories - the experiences of a lifetime that shape us all, one way or another. Estate planning, at least in part, is about sharing our legacies and our precious stories with our children and grandchildren.

A longtime friend asked me to help his friend, Harry, a man in his 60s, whose cancer had returned after many years in remission. Harry had worked in the healthcare industry for many years, and he had no illusions about his prognosis and inevitable death. Over the next few weeks, we talked about what he most feared and most hoped for, and how best to ensure that his wishes would be respected.

Together, we created a detailed Advance Health Care Directive, with specific instructions about his end-of-life care, including provisions for spiritual care. We discussed Harry's choices with his adult children, so everyone understood exactly what Harry wanted and why. We also planned for his eventual mental incapacity, so that his children could take care of his financial and personal affairs. Finally, we prepared a revocable trust and pourover will to simplify how his estate would be handled after his death. As he signed the final documents, Harry told me how relieved he felt to have settled everything so that he could focus on being with his children in what time remained.

A few months later Harry died peacefully at home with his youngest son - which was just what Harry wanted.

Seven years ago, Mr. D asked me to help him with his Will. He had never married, and he wanted to leave everything to his favorite nephew in Southern California. Mr. D had lived for decades in a rent-controlled apartment in San Francisco, where he knew everyone in the building by name. While talking with him about his Will, I learned that he recently had suffered a bad fall and was often dizzy. He was having difficulty carrying groceries up the hill to his building, and he wasn’t eating well. It was clear that he was becoming more and more isolated and forgetful.

When I asked Mr. D if he would like to visit some assisted living facilities, he reluctantly agreed. After seeing several facilities in the City, we headed across the Golden Gate Bridge to Mill Valley. It was love at first sight. He chose an apartment overlooking a garden with a beautiful view of Mt. Tam. Despite some initial complaints, within a few weeks, Mr. D was eating regularly and entertaining new friends with his wonderful stories. He even joined the chorus. He knew everybody (and their children and grandchildren) and everybody knew Mr. D. In this safe and supportive environment, Mr. D thrived.