My Personal/Traditional Model
First a word about your investment in your estate plan. All of my estate planning fees are a flat fee and you will know right from the beginning what the total fee will be before we commence working on your plan.
Through a series of stories, we learn about each other to determine if we are a good fit to work together. During the sharing of those stories, the information necessary to design and draft the estate plan is gathered.
Our initial meeting generally follows the following pattern:
- Introductions and setting the agenda and expectations for the meeting.
- I will share with you my story, background and why I do estate planning.
- I will ask you to share your concerns and the reasons for your visit to my office.
- After we have identified your concerns and worries. We will discuss what might happen if those issues are not addressed and resolved.
- At this point I will generally share with you other possible concerns that you might have but have not thought of. We discuss ramifications of not addressing these issues and determine if it is important to you to address them.
- We now shift the discussion to all of the possible solutions and lasting benefits that can be designed into your estate plan to resolve each of your concerns.
- At this point we determine if my experience is such that I can assist you and we decide were going to go forward together.
- We will now create the specific design for your estate plan. At this time, based on your design, you will determine the investment you will make to complete your estate plan. All fees are a flat fee with 75% paid at the conclusion of this initial meeting and the balance at the time the plan is signed.
- Generally I will ask you to share with me your understanding of the important points of your estate plan. This is important to verify that we both understand the personal design of your plan.
- At this point we discuss what is next. My process is to create a draft and request that you verify that I have all of the pertinent names and fiduciaries properly identified. I will then complete the plan we will meet and sign it.