Estate Planning Questions to Ask Clients
Twenty intake questions for estate planning attorneys and advisers. They cover existing documents, what the client owns and how it is titled, who they are providing for, business interests, guardianship of minor children, healthcare directives and end-of-life wishes, lifetime gifts, charitable giving, and the family disputes they are trying to head off.
The questions
Open any question for the note
Do you have a will, a trust, or powers of attorney already, and when were they last reviewed?
Why ask it
Old documents are more common than none, and they often name a guardian, executor or spouse who is no longer the right choice. Ask where the originals are kept, since a document nobody can find has limited effect.
Has anything changed recently: a marriage, a divorce, a death, a birth, a move to another state?
Why ask it
Each of these can alter how an existing plan operates, and a move matters more than clients expect because rules on marital property, witnessing and probate differ by state. Divorce is the item most often left half-finished in the paperwork.
Who depends on you financially right now?
Why ask it
Ask about the people outside the obvious list: a parent whose bills they quietly cover, an adult child living at home, a former spouse under an agreement. Support that is informal today still needs a plan behind it.
What do you own, and how is each item titled?
Why ask it
Titling determines what a will can actually reach, so joint ownership and survivorship terms need checking item by item rather than assumed. Clients routinely describe an account as theirs when the paperwork says otherwise.
Which accounts and policies already name a beneficiary?
Why ask it
Retirement accounts and life insurance pass by designation and are not controlled by the will, which is the single most frequent source of an unintended outcome. Ask when each was last updated, not just who is named.
Do you own real estate in more than one state or country?
Why ask it
Property in another jurisdiction can require a separate administration and may be governed by rules the client has never encountered. Timeshares and inherited family land are the two that usually go unmentioned.
Do you own a business or part of one, and who would run it if you could not?
Why ask it
Ask whether an operating agreement or buy-sell agreement already dictates what happens, because if one exists it may override anything you draft. Where a business supports the family's income, continuity matters more than valuation.
Who would you want to serve as executor, and as trustee if that is a different person?
Why ask it
The two roles need different qualities: one is administrative and finite, the other can run for decades. Watch for a nominee who lives far away, is elderly, or stands to inherit in a way that puts them in conflict.
If your children are minors, who would raise them, and have you asked that person?
Why ask it
Clients often name a couple without considering what happens if that couple separates, or name someone who has never been asked. It is also worth naming a second choice, since first choices decline more often than people expect.
Is there anyone who would need help managing money they inherit?
Why ask it
A disability, a creditor problem, an addiction, or a beneficiary in an unstable marriage all change the structure rather than the share. Asking neutrally, without naming the concern first, usually gets a fuller answer.
Who would you want making medical decisions for you if you could not speak for yourself?
Why ask it
The right person is the one who can hold to the client's stated wishes under pressure from other relatives, which is not always the closest family member. Ask for an alternate, since the first choice may be travelling or unwell.
If you were seriously ill and not expected to recover, what care would you want and what would you decline?
Why ask it
General answers about not wanting to be kept alive on machines are too vague to guide a clinician. What helps is specificity about resuscitation, feeding tubes, ventilation and hospital transfer, in the client's own words.
Have you talked to the person you are naming about what you want?
Why ask it
A named agent who has never had the conversation is being asked to guess during a crisis. Where the client has not raised it, agreeing a time to do so is often the most useful outcome of the meeting.
How would your household absorb several years of long-term care costs?
Why ask it
This is where many plans quietly fail, since care costs can consume assets before any inheritance arises. Ask what they own that would have to be sold and in what order, and whether any insurance is already in place.
Have you made any large gifts in past years, or do you expect to?
Why ask it
Prior gifts affect the tax picture and can also explain a perceived imbalance between children. Clients frequently do not think of forgiven loans, help with a house deposit, or paying tuition as gifts.
Is there any charity you want to include, and would you rather give during your lifetime or at death?
Why ask it
The timing question separates a genuine intention from a vague wish, and lifetime giving may be more efficient depending on the asset. Ask which specific organisation and check the exact legal name.
Is there anyone outside the family you want to provide for?
Why ask it
A long-term partner without legal status, a stepchild never formally adopted, a caregiver, a godchild. These are the gifts most likely to be omitted by default rules and most likely to be contested.
Is there anyone you intend to leave out, and how should they learn about it?
Why ask it
An omission the family did not expect is a common trigger for a challenge. Whether the client explains it in the document, in a letter, or in person during their lifetime changes the odds of a dispute considerably.
Which family disagreement are you most concerned about after you are gone?
Why ask it
Most clients have one in mind, and it is usually about a specific object, a house, or a perception that one child has already had more. Naming it lets you address it directly rather than discovering it later.
Is there anything you have not mentioned because you assumed it did not matter?
Why ask it
This closing question surfaces a surprising amount: an estranged child, a second household, a debt, a prior marriage, an account overseas. Leave silence after it rather than moving on.
Running the Intake Meeting
Practical guidance for the conversation itself
Conducting the conversation
Take the facts first and the wishes second
Documents, titling and beneficiary designations are straightforward to work through and give the client time to settle. Questions about incapacity and death are easier to answer once the meeting has a rhythm.
Meet spouses together and separately where appropriate
Prior marriages, children from an earlier relationship and support of a relative are sometimes disclosed only in a private part of the meeting. Explain any conflict of interest position clearly before you split the conversation.
Use plain words for the hard parts
Say dying and unable to make decisions rather than passing and incapacity. Clients answer more precisely when the question is unambiguous, and softened language produces vague instructions.
Let silence do some of the work
The questions about family conflict and about what has been left unsaid often produce their real answer after a pause. Filling that pause with the next question loses the disclosure.
What to collect before drafting
- Existing wills, trusts, powers of attorney and any advance directive, including superseded versions.
- Deeds and titling for real property, with the exact form of co-ownership.
- Current beneficiary designations for retirement accounts, life insurance and annuities.
- Business documents: operating or partnership agreements, buy-sell agreements, shareholder agreements.
- Prior marital agreements, divorce decrees and support orders.
- Records of significant lifetime gifts and any prior gift tax filings.
- Full legal names, dates of birth and locations for every person and charity to be named.
- Digital assets: where credentials are held and who is authorised to access them.
Where plans go wrong later
Beneficiary designations nobody updated
A designation naming a former spouse or a deceased parent overrides the newly drafted will for that asset. Confirming the forms have actually been changed is a separate step from advising that they should be.
Trusts that were never funded
A trust that no assets were transferred into does little. The transfer work is administrative, easy to postpone, and the most common gap found after a death.
Fiduciaries who cannot act when needed
Executors who have died, moved abroad, or fallen out with the family are found at the worst moment. Naming alternates and reviewing the choices every few years prevents most of it.
Documents nobody can locate
Originals in a safe deposit box that the agent cannot open, or a healthcare directive filed at home while the client is in hospital. Agree where copies go and who holds them.
Wishes never spoken aloud
Even a careful directive leaves judgment calls. The families who cope best are the ones where the named agent heard the reasoning from the client directly.