Blog | Ball Morse Lowe

Wills and trusts can help provide for your children

Written by Ball Morse Lowe | April 12, 2019

It is no secret that every adult needs to have a will so their estate can be handled easily when they pass away. For adults who have minor children, avoiding estate planning might be the easy way out since they will have to choose a guardian for their child. Even for parents of adult children, estate planning might seem complex if those adult children have disabilities.

In either case, having an estate plan is vital so that you can ensure your children will be cared for if something happens to you. For people who live in Oklahoma, creating an estate plan that includes a will and a trust might be the answer to the issues.

One of the reasons why people might procrastinate is that they will have to choose a guardian for their minor children and disabled adult children. As difficult as a decision that this is, it would be much harder knowing that your children might be in limbo as the court decides who should care for them if there isn't an estate plan in place that makes your wishes known.

The positive thing about naming a guardian is that you will be able to change the guardian if it becomes necessary, so unless something happens to you, the guardian isn't a permanent choice.
For those who have disabled children, a special needs trust can help to create a stable life for them when you are gone. These trusts help you to allocate assets to help care for your disabled child without having to worry about how any assistance received by the child will be affected since your child won't actually have control over the assets. With a special needs trust, the trustee is over the assets, but they are used as allocated for the child.

The complexities of setting up estate plans when children are involved are very real. Knowing about various types of trusts and how to word wills is vital to ensure that your children are cared for if the unthinkable happens and you are no longer hear to care for them.