Author Archives: Leanna Hamill

Action Items: Review Your Wills During Tax Time

If you are in the process of getting your financial paperwork in order to meet with your accountant, pull out your wills and other legal documents and take a look at those, too. Make sure the people you’ve named to help you are still available and the ones you still want to help you. Check the distribution scheme in your will or trust to see if any changes need to be made – have more children or grandchildren been added? Are there charities you want to change or add?
Getting all of your uncomfortable paperwork out of the way at once will make it possible to go into spring and summer knowing that you have a plan in place if something were to happen. So, review, make changes if needed and then go play!

How To Research Family History

Stuck inside during a blizzard and need a fun project? Searching your family tree can provide hours of interesting discoveries (assuming you have electrical power, of course.) There are a few sites you can use: Family Search https://familysearch.org/ is free to use. You can also volunteer to help index old records to make them accessible.… Continue Reading

Is indecision bugging you?

Having to make too many decisions can hold people up from taking any action. (This is why I sometimes leave the peanut butter aisle in Whole Foods empty handed: there are too many choices.) This can hold true for people thinking about doing their wills. I always try to start out with just a few… Continue Reading

Doctors Without Wills

The herniated disk that plagued me most of the fall finally resolved itself.  However, dealing with it meant visiting with lots of doctors. In the course of the visits, my profession would come up and every single one of the doctors – without fail – said “oh, I really need to do a will” and… Continue Reading

Contingency plans

I’m a big fan of contingency plans.  Most of the work that I do with my clients is to help them set up contingency plans as well. When someone signs a durable power of attorney allowing a family member to sign checks on their behalf that’s a contingency plan. If my client is hospitalized and… Continue Reading