As a parent, protecting your children is your first and main priority. This includes ensuring their well-being after your passing, which is why assigning a legal guardian to care for them and securing their future in case anything happens to you is of the utmost importance. You should also try your best to leave them a stable inheritance that they can rely on after your death. To protect your kids and secure their financial future, you need to understand what steps to take and that involves planning their future without you. This article will give you 4 ways to protect your children’s future and wellbeing should something happen to you.
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Assign a Legal Guardian
While this might not be an easy step, it’s crucial for your children’s future in the event of you and your spouse passing away. If you and your spouse die without appointing a legal guardian for kids who are under the age of 18, they will fall under the care of the state’s Public Guardian until they are appointed legally to be raised and looked after by someone else. This is why you should decide early on a trusted person to take care of your children if something happens to you and to any other guardians. You should also make sure this person is willing to carry this responsibility; this might be the hardest part; talking to the desired guardian and ensuring their willingness. This step, however, is important if your kids are minors in order to secure their future and make sure someone is there to proceed with the next steps needed to grant them their deserved support.
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Appoint Power of Attorney
Minor and adult children are entitled to sue for the wrongful loss of a parent if their death was a result of someone else’s negligence. This is why it’s important to appoint someone to legally speak for your children in the event of your untimely death. A wrongful death claim or a lawsuit is filed by the surviving parent on behalf of minor children. If both parents have passed away, the lawsuit is filed by the executor or the holder of power of attorney. In New York, over one thousand victims meet their death every year as a result of auto accidents and road negligence. Many of these deaths, as any New York City wrongful death lawyer will tell you, could have been avoided had the state’s safety rules been followed accurately. If you or another parent dies as a result of the wrongdoing of someone else, your children or family members are entitled to receive compensation for their tragic loss. A wrongful death claim can be filed by their appointed guardian or personal injury lawyer, and they can receive financial and emotional compensation as per state law.
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Set up a Trust
Securing your children’s financial future is not as easy as leaving them some money to spend after you die. Young children don’t develop financial maturity on their own and as part of your will, you should be addressing how the money will be utilized in a trust that lists specific terms on when and how the money can be received. Kids or minors at the age of 18 can be at risk of spending all the money they receive on unnecessary assets. This is why it’s important to provision their financial decisions and limit them even if you are not around. Setting up trusts will control how and when you want them to receive the money after your death. This will give them the opportunity to develop financial maturity and learn how to spend their money in the right place and at the right time, even if there’s no one there to teach them. Make sure you address this in your will and explain how the inheritance is going to be used in a trust.
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Make Living Arrangements
If you pass away before your children grow up and live on their own or with a partner (or anyone else), they will need a place to live with their legal guardian. The guardian you assign may live in a small property where they can’t welcome more than one person to live with or look after. In that case, you need to consider whether your kids are going to move to the guardian’s place or continue living at home and have their guardian move in with them. In both cases, you’ll need to sit down with both your kids and their guardians separately and decide what would be most convenient for both sides.
Ensuring your children’s well-being without you there to look after them may not be easy, but it’s definitely an essential task you need to get out of the way. As a responsible parent, it’s your job to ensure your children are looked after at all times, even if you’re not there to do that. This is why it’s your duty to have a plan for the future in case something ever happens to you.
