Millennials Estate Planning is for you too!

As Estate Planning Attorneys in the Washington DC metropolitan area I will share our experience. The clients that we have that are under the age of 50 are not typically members of the Black community. It could be that Black people under 50 are going to other attorneys to discuss legacy building. Yet, I will never forget the 90 year old woman who told me that she wanted to wait before completing her estate plan. (Her daughter successfully encouraged her to do otherwise.)



           Millennials have an extra advantage in planning. As in retirement planning, the longer the planning time, the greater the possibilities in building and developing. Strategic Estate Planning is the creation, protection and transfer of wealth.  The approach we are taking is wholistic financial planning.

           Too often I hear millennials say that they don’t have enough assets to create an estate plan. The truth is as soon as we become the age of adulthood there is a need for protection and when we are first enter adulthood there is a need for support. The privacy laws attach at the age of majority(18). These laws create a challenge for parents to help in more than a distant advisory role. In many cases, as young adults we run to the opportunity to become an adult. Yet, each of us should anticipate what supports we would like to have if we were to need it.

           As we embrace the global economy and many people move away from the initial support system for work or love or wanderlust we should be thoughtful. We must be thoughtful about who we would want to support us if there was a need and create the mechanisms that allow for limit that support. 

           The benefit of appointing someone to act on our behalf for business/financial or health decisions is empowering. The proactive action is positioning for managing any occurrence. It enables the actor to choose in a way that dictates his or her support. It is empowering to determine who can support you in any vulnerable state that may develop.  It is empowering to determine the support that you would like to receive or what you would reject. Not making any statement allows those who are appointed to help you the opportunity to determine that involvement.

           Stephen Covey, author of the book 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, proclaimed that we should begin with the end in mind. Although I am talking about estate planning, I am not speaking about the ultimate end but the lifestyle end. To what end are you willing to build? What did you go to school for?

           Youth creates an amazing planning opportunity for the life we want to live. The Griffin Firm has adopted the PBoD© approach to estate planning. We work with other financial professionals to create a synergistic team that provides comprehensive long-term counsel for the client to build diverse income sources that can grow over time while simultaneously building structures that protect your values and your assets. Time gives the great opportunity to start to build the legacy that will be yours. The legacy that we build is greatest when we have the greatest time frame to build and implement the plan.  Collaborating with subject matter experts gives you the opportunity to build a great plan. The Bible says (Proverbs 15:22) Without counsel, plans go awry, but in the multitude of counselors they are established.

Take the opportunity to build the plan that will create the legacy of your life.