When creating a will, it’s important to think about what will happen upon your death. More specifically, there are steps you can take now to prevent someone from contesting your will in the future.
Here are several things you can do:
- Create your estate plan as soon as possible: You should create your estate plan when you are in good physical and mental health. You don’t want to give someone reason to believe you were mentally incapacitated at the time of creating your will.
- Write a no contest clause into your will: This provision states that anyone who challenges your estate plan will not receive anything upon your death.
- Use a trust: Although a trust can be contested, it makes it much more difficult for someone to have success. It’s more time-consuming and costly to create and manage a trust compared to a will, but you get greater peace of mind.
- Don’t hide your estate plan: Not only should your executor or trustee have a clear idea of where to find your estate plan and related information, but it’s imperative to review it and make changes as necessary.
While there is no guaranteed way to prevent someone from contesting your will, there are steps you can take to put your mind at ease.
It doesn’t matter if you’re creating your first estate plan or editing one that you have in place, focus some attention on the distant future. Doing so will allow you to make decisions that protect your beneficiaries upon your death.
