Tuesday, May 6, 2008

Estate Planning Symposium (not so) live blogging

Last Friday and Saturday I attended an Estate Planning symposium put on by Continuing Education of the Bar. Speakers included practitioners from San Francisco, San Mateo, and Contra Costa counties. The conference was loaded with very useful and up-to-date information on bypass trusts, marital deduction, generation-skipping transfer tax, and other important topics, but the biggest takeaway was this:

"Estate planning is a process and not an event."

Preparing an estate plan is not something that happens all at once. It may start with a phone call to an attorney, followed by filling out a questionnaire, either by yourself or with the attorney, and then a conversation with the attorney. The conversation is where the planning really begins, because it is there where all of the imporatant information is conveyed: who you are, who your family is, what your goals are. The process of turning this into a coherent plan is not a simple one, and it doesn't end once the will or trust is drafted and signed by you. Your life may change. Your goals may change. The laws may change. The plan, if it is prepared properly, should be structured to accommodate changes, but it must be looked after and cared for.

With that in mind, many practitioners believe that it is therefore impossible to properly do your job with a flat fee arrangement. I have been a great supporter of the flat fee because I believe it fosters creativity and efficiency for attorneys. But I also acknowledge that it may limit an attorney's options, particularly where an estate plan may evolve and become more complicate than either the attorney or their client had originally anticipated.

I don't believe that hourly billing is inherently bad. Nor do I believe that a flat fee for an estate plan is always a bad idea. The most important thing in regard to fees is making sure your client knows that they are getting for their money, and is not surprised by how much it costs.

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