HOW WE ARE DIFFERENT
During the traditional experience, you’ll meet with a lawyer who may make things seem complicated and confusing.
You might think your lawyer is smart and knows what they’re doing, so you nod and answer questions, whether or not you understand everything. Wanting to do right by your family, you let the lawyer prepare documents, and you sign them, relieved to have taken care of that.
You take your fancy estate planning binder home, place it on a shelf or in a drawer, check off estate planning as done, feel good, and forget about it.
But then what?
You might remember your lawyer said something about moving your bank accounts into your trust, so you’ll go to the bank, forget what you were supposed to do, call your lawyer’s office, get a voicemail, have to leave the bank and wait for a call back (which takes several hours at least and sometimes days). By then, you’re caught up in other tasks and forget to move that bank account.
A few weeks later, a bill arrives: $125 for 15 minutes of your lawyer’s time for a few questions. You make a mental note: ‘Don’t call the lawyer ever again.’
THANK YOU
Thanks for your interest. I know you have a lot of options when it comes to legal planning. Jill Gregory has been a trusted advisor for over 25 years.
We look forward to meeting with you and learning how we can serve you and your family.
Most People Don’t Want to Talk to Their Traditional Lawyer Again
Several years later, you’ll refinance your house or sell it, and you’ll buy a new home and forget that you were supposed to let your lawyer know or make sure you kept the title in the name of your trust.
Your children will get older, making your guardianship choices outdated, but you don’t want to call your lawyer because you know you’ll get a bill in the mail two weeks later.
You’ll hear something about a change in the tax law, but you’re not sure if it was something that affected you, so you don’t worry about it. And, you’d have to dig through boxes to find your trust documents so you could remember your lawyer’s name and find their contact information. Who has time for that?
It’s not until you become incapacitated or die that family finds the binder you stuck up on a shelf several years before and never looked at again.
It is that moment when your family realizes your plan is so outdated that it has nothing to do with your life, your assets, or the law.
Your family is at a loss.
They don’t know where to turn or what to do, so they contact the same lawyer you used to prepare the documents, who is as happy as can be to probate your assets, which never made it into the trust.
How Do I Know All This?
Because I have seen countless clients come in to see me who have had this exact experience.
Unfortunately, what I discovered is the estate planning industry was not designed to serve growing families who experience lots of changes on their way to success. Sadly, it was designed for clients in later stages of life who were preparing for their eventual passing.
Our Firm Helps You Prepare for Life
What makes our firm different is that we were built with the needs of growing families in mind. We understand you are BUSY, you are growing, you are planning for a life of prosperity, and you value ease, convenience, and efficiency.
You may be raising children and caring for elderly parents while also working hard to build your own nest egg for a lifetime of support.
You want to know you have made the best decisions for your family and that your plan will work when your loved ones need it most. You want to make sure your minor children would be raised by the people you choose, and never by anyone you wouldn’t want, and that your teens and adult children are properly prepared to care for you and what you leave behind.
You want to feel confident that you’ve made the right choices and handled everything so that you aren’t leaving behind a mess when something happens.
This is our focus as well.
We have developed unique systems to give you the same access to a Personal Family Lawyer® as was previously only available to the super-wealthy, so you can have the guidance you need to build and maintain a life of prosperity and wealth. And we can guide you to keep your family out of court and out of conflict, which is the greatest risk to the people you love and all you have created.
We can do all of this even if you have already worked with a traditional lawyer or created DIY documents online.
We Are Here for You
We encourage communication with our clients. In fact, we have thrown out the time clocks, so you never have to be afraid to call with a quick question. Everything we do is billed on a flat-fee basis, agreed to in advance, so there are never any surprises.
If you need to schedule an in-depth legal or strategic call with your Personal Family Lawyer®, we have an online calendar so you can schedule a call when both you and your attorney are available and ready for the call so we can make the very best use of your time and not waste your time by leaving voicemail after voicemail back and forth.
And, we ensure the most important details of your planning are followed through on and your plan continues to work throughout your lifetime.
You have the option to have us ensure your assets are owned the right way throughout your lifetime and that none of your assets will end up going through a long, expensive court process or lost to the state department of unclaimed property because they were missed after your death.
We have created unique maintenance programs to keep your plan up-to-date year after year as well as to give you access to our trusted team of legal experts for guidance on any legal or financial matter.
One day you will need a lawyer.
I don’t know why and I don’t know when, but when you do, you will be grateful you can call on us and we’ll be here to advise you.
We Help You Transfer More Than Your Assets
Lastly, we believe your financial wealth is only a small part of your overall “Family Wealth” which is made up of your far more valuable – and most often lost upon incapacity or death – intellectual, spiritual and human assets. These assets are what make you who you are, and sum up what’s most important to you. And, a survey of inheritors has revealed that what they care about even more than inheriting your money, is inheriting these intangible assets.
Most estate plans only focus on the transfer of your financial wealth to the next generation. Most people have such great intentions of passing on the intangible, but very few ever get around to it. It’s just not a priority, until it’s too late. How much do you know about your grandparents’ values? Their most prized personal possessions? How did they feel about you? What did they learn during their lifetime?
If you are like most people, you know very little. That’s why we build the capture and passage of these most valuable assets into every estate plan we create. Not only will we help you pass on your money, but also your values, your insights, your stories and your experience – the truly valuable assets your loved one’s care about the most.
We’ve developed a tool that allows us to capture and pass on your whole family wealth, including your intellectual, spiritual and human assets. I can’t go into all of the details here, but we’ll definitely talk about it when you come in for your Life and Legacy Planning Session.
We look forward to seeing you and caring for your family soon!
– Jill Gregory
P.S. If you think this all sounds expensive, well you’re right and you’re wrong. I can guarantee you that if you qualify to meet with a Personal Family Lawyer®, this planning is substantially less costly than it would be for your family if you become incapacitated or die with a plan that doesn’t work or if you don’t have a plan in place at all. I’ve never had a single family who believed in this kind of planning and wanted to put it in place for their loved ones leave my office because they couldn’t afford it. We’ve made creative financing available to our clients because we know that this planning is the foundation for a life of success!
Get Started Today
If you are ready to get started and you know that your family deserves the kind of protection, guidance, and love we provide for a lifetime, click the button below or call us at 949-514-8842 (Southern California) or 530-581-5455 (Northern California) to schedule your Planning Session.
Alternatively, if you have questions, schedule a free 15-minute phone consultation with Jill—this is a great way to ask your questions, learn more about us, and determine whether Jill Gregory Law is the right fit for you and your family.
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