Recently, I took a continuing legal education course sponsored by the King County Bar Association focused on drafting estate planning documents when a professional fiduciary is involved. The speaker explained that professional fiduciaries frequently encounter family disputes when documents fail to address how personal property should be distributed. In Washington, as described by this prior blog post, personal property can be distributed pursuant to a writing that meets the requirements of RCW 11.12.260.
Problems can arise when clients creating an estate plan are laser-focused on how their accounts and their house should be distributed upon their death, but give no thought to their tangible personal property. Examples of tangible personal property might include their grandmother’s silver set, a mother’s wedding ring, a well-preserved wedding dress, an old photo album, or a much-loved vintage car. These items may or may not be worth much monetarily, but they frequently carry deep emotional meaning. For example, if two daughters both have a strong attachment to their deceased mother’s wedding ring, and the mother forgot to mention it in her Will’s Personal Property Addendum, who gets the ring? Often, clients assume that their family will simply “work it out” when the time comes. But in reality, working it out may require a great deal of effort and negotiating on the part of the estate’s Personal Representative (who may be either a family member or a professional fiduciary), additional attorneys’ fees, and perhaps even the costs of a mediation or a court hearing. Depending on the level of emotional contention, played out amongst family members who are already grieving, when the issue of who receives what is finally settled, the end result may be a family permanently torn apart by the emotional ferocity of the dispute. This is the last thing any client working through their estate planning would want.
What’s a better approach? I would suggest that, as you work with an attorney to prepare your estate planning documents, you also engage in conversations with your family about your tangible personal property. What do they want? And what do they not want? If you, together with your family, can work out a fair distribution of these assets in advance, and then carefully document it in your Will’s Personal Property Addendum, then you may have prevented an emotional bomb from detonating after your death.
If you need help determining a fair and equitable distribution for your tangible personal property, please let us know. We’d be happy to help.
Phone: (206) 784-5305
