Sometimes when we are doing a will for a client, we make their adult children leave the room

Attorney Tom Olsen: Chrissy, I had an estate planning appointment yesterday, with a-- she's a long, long, long, long-time client. She's 92 years old. She showed up with her son, and it's time to redo her will. Last time I did it, it was many, many years ago. She's had a child who's passed away since then. Sit down in the room-- Of course, she and her son both come into the appointment, and we start to talk about what happens to her wealth when she passes away.

I said, "Well, your daughter's passed away. Do you want her share, that would have gone to her, do you want to go to her three children?" "Yes, I think I'd like that." Then the son chips in, "No, mom, that's not what we talked about at home. No, that's not what we talked about." You can tell he's getting a little bit angry and upset about the whole thing. Well, you know what we have to do, "Son, you got to get up. There's the door. You're out of here. You go wait in the lobby while I talk to your mom."

It's exactly the conversation that you might think. She's sharp as a tack, "Oh, he really wants me to give it all to him and his brother, to not leave anything to my daughter's children. I guess I need to do what he wants me to do." No. We're going to do what you want to do. This is what you want to do.

Attorney Chris Merrill: Exactly.

Tom: It's just funny that people would come in here and think that they're going to bully their parent in front of us and we're going to stand by, and allow that to happen?

Chris: Never.

Tom: No, not ever. No. People out there, listening to us, saying, "Well, God, Tom, that must only happen once every few years." No, really, it's once every few months, I'd say.

Chris: Oh, yes.

Tom: As soon as I have a child walk in with their parent, my radar is up, listening for the little intricacies. It starts by-- We're asking basic questions. "What do you own? How many children do you have?" First of all, we want our clients to be answering those questions, but sometimes, the kid will chirp in.

Chris: Exactly.

Tom: "She's 86. She's got three kids, and here's their names." No, I need your mom to answer those questions for me. Sometimes, it's perfectly legitimate, and I get it, and understand why mom is doing this. Sometimes, we know that she is being pressured into it.

Chris: Correct.

Tom: We're not going to stand by and let that happen.

Chris: Absolutely. It is really a good thing, though, to me, when that does happen. We don't want it to have to happen, but when it does, it really is better, for mom, that that adult child did come in because we then are able to observe for ourselves, and we know how to help mom. The harder part is when they don't come in, because there can be things happening behind the scenes. If we don't see that, and we don't know that, we're not able to give the proper advice.

Tom: There are certainly times when people often ask us, "Tom, do we have to leave something to one or more of our children?" Here, in the state of Florida, you have no legal obligation to leave anything to your adult children. Sometimes, when we have clients that come in and say, "Tom, we are not going to leave anything to our daughter, Susie," make up a name. We, at Olson Law Group, we're going to ask why.

Then, in our database, we're going to make notes about why mom's not leaving anything to Susie, because then, when mom passes away, Susie goes out and hires a lawyer, and writes us, Olson Law Group, a letter, and says, "Well, guy, you wrote the will for mom. Why didn't she leave anything to Susie? You must've drafted it wrong. You must've got it all wrong, Tom. It's all your fault." We go right into our notes. Well, here's why. She loaned Susie money, and Susie never paid her back.

She bought Susie a house, while mom was still alive. She put Susie through medical school, she didn't do that for any of her kids. There's a whole myriad of reasons. Some of them are completely legitimate. We just want to know what the reasons are, and we make it in our notes, so that when that happens, and this happens on a regular basis, when I get that letter from the--

I got one the other day, and the lawyer says, "You did a will for Mary. You're now on notice, do not destroy or delete any of your records, because Mary's daughter is going to be suing, to set aside the will that you did for her." Of course, we don't destroy anything, we don't have to change it. There's no reason for us to do that. It just goes to show that that is the mindset of kids, when they have been omitted and disinherited from the will.

Chris: Correct. Correct.

Tom: When you omit or disinherit a will from the child, there's nothing within the law that says you have to put that language in your will. We do, at the Olson Law Group, we put language in there, that says, "I have specifically omitted my daughter Susie, for my own reasons." We're not opening the door for Susie to say, "Oh, mom just forgot she had a daughter named Susie. That's why I'm not in there." We're not obligated to do it, legally, but we do, it's good practice.

Chris: Yes, correct. Again, when it is done with us, or any other estate planning lawyer, and you do it right, and you put it in writing, in a proper, legally executed will, it means that it will stand up.

Tom: Yes. It will. People, on a regular basis, call us and say, "Tom, my mom has passed away. She left everything to my sibling. She didn't leave anything to me. I want to challenge that will." First thing I say is, "Send me a copy of that will." If it looks professional, if it was prepared by a lawyer, witnessed by the lawyer, witnessed by the lawyer's staff, it's rock solid.

If it's a handwritten will and it leaves everything to the neighbor, and the neighbor's friends and family witnessed that will, it's automatically suspect, and we'll challenge the will when the time comes, but that's really where it starts.

Chris: Absolutely. It's important, again, for people to understand that, so that they know how to do things best for themselves, meaning mom, dad, and their family.

Tom: [unintelligible 00:06:38] on a similar topic, over the years, and you wouldn't think this would happen, but on a regular basis, I have people that come in and say something like this, "Tom, I've got three children. I don't want to leave everything to my oldest child and let him split it up with his siblings."

Chris: We hear that a lot.

Tom: I won't abide by it. I won't let it go. I say, "Do you want your wealth to go equal to your three children?" "Yes." "Well, then we need to write your will, that way, everything's going equally to your three kids."

Chris: Good for you. Of course, I do the same as you. I won't let it go. To the point where, in some, that were that insistent, is that we want them-- I want them to do, ultimately, what the parents want to do. However, if I don't feel comfortable doing it, I want them to do it with somebody else.

Tom: I know that you've literally turned down some clients because they just won't follow your advice.

Chris: Again, not follow it, but in other words, if we don't feel comfortable on why and what they're doing, we want them to be able to do it. What's best, how they feel best to do it. We just feel that it's important to try to, again, think about the words of the client. It's one thing for the client to say, "I only want to leave to this child." That's-- Absolutely, but when they're speaking the words-- Here's the part where we feel uncomfortable, when they're saying, "I want it to go to all three, but I'm only going to leave it to one to divide up."

Tom: Yes.

Chris: That's the problem.

Tom: Sometimes, they'll speak the words, "I'm going to leave it to my oldest child to split it up equally between the three kids." Sometimes, they'll speak the words, "I'm going to let him decide how to split it up between all of them."

Chris: Exactly. Correct.

Tom: Oh, my goodness.

Chris: Correct. That's the uncomfortable part for us.

Tom: Looking for trouble.

Chris: Correct. To say, "I'm only going to leave it to one, and let them do it the way that I want to do." Well, the way you want to do should be in writing.

Tom: Yes. We've done thousands and thousands of wills and trusts for people over the years, and everybody's a little bit different, but we give our clients the best advice possible.

Chris: Absolutely.

Tom: Our goal is for the children of our clients to make things simple, easy, inexpensive, and help them to avoid arguments. When it's all said and done, the children are still speaking and friendly with each other.

Chris: Exactly.

Tom: That's asking a lot, these days.

Chris: Give parents peace of mind, and make it simple for their adult children.

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