Providing for Minor Children
Parents of minor children probably want to choose who will finish raising their children in the event that both parents die before their children are grown. Grandparents, aunts and uncles are usually the most promising candidates to fill this role. By properly nominating one or more legal guardians for your children, you will make this process much smoother for everyone involved, and will help avoid what might become a court battle between different family members, some of whom might want to assume the role of legal guardian of your children for selfish reasons.
Parents of minor children may also want to designate how the assets they leave will be used to care for their minor children, and whether, when and how any assets remaining after their children are raised will be handed over to the children when they become adults. In that regard, it is sometimes better to select someone other than the children’s legal guardian to hold the purse strings in order to create checks and balances to try to ensure that the assets are used appropriately.
The proper combination of a Will, a trust and, frequently, life insurance can be used to ensure that minor children are raised by someone who their parents, rather than a court, have picked; provide assets to be used in raising and educating the minor children; and give the children an inheritance at a point in time where they are more likely to use it responsibly rather than just handing over a significant amount of money on their eighteenth birthday.
Call us today at 801-505-5600 to learn more about how our Salt Lake City, Utah-based trust, estate and probate attorneys at J.D. Milliner & Associates, P.C. can help you create an estate plan that will take care of your minor children when you and their other parent can’t!
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