Picking the Picker – How You Can Select Someone Else to Pick Your Trustee and Power of Attorney Agent

While everyone would love to be in charge of their finances for the rest of their lives, sometimes life happens and we can no longer handle our own financial affairs. For some of us, a traumatic or medical event can force us out of the driver’s seat to manage our financial affairs. Usually, none of us know when this change in our life may occur or what our life circumstances may be when that time comes. Estate plans can create a sense of peace because you have the documents in place to take care of you when the need arises.

But naming someone else to manage your money in your estate plan can be stressful. You may not know a particular person that you trust enough to name as your trustee or your agent under a power of attorney.

Maybe your children and your new spouse do not see eye to eye. Maybe one child is great with numbers but tends to take over, while another is more even-tempered but already has a full plate. Maybe you worry that, once you are no longer the person keeping everyone calm and connected, old disagreements could bubble up at the worst possible time. In situations like these, naming two people to act together as co-trustees or co-agents might sound fair on paper, but you may understandably wonder whether it would actually bring people together – or just give them one more thing to fight about. Your family members may have busy lives and do not want the additional stress and headache of managing someone else’s financial affairs.

In this kind of circumstance, you may want to pick the picker. In trusts, and in a power of attorney, you can name a particular individual who will then, when the time comes, interview and select the appropriate financial fiduciary to handle your financial affairs. This person would be someone you trust to select the appropriate financial manager, given your life circumstances and the nature of your financial situation. Put another way, instead of trying to predict today who the right person will be years from now, you can choose someone you trust to make that call when the picture is clearer.

Picking the picker is just one of many solutions that may allow you to unburden yourself from selecting the fiduciary and unburden your family members from having to act, or declining to act, in the role of financial fiduciary.

This communication is not intended to create or constitute, nor does it create or constitute, an attorney-client or any other legal relationship. No statement in this communication constitutes legal advice nor should any communication herein be construed, relied upon, or interpreted as legal advice. This communication is for general information purposes only regarding recent legal developments of interest, and is not a substitute for legal counsel on any subject matter. No reader should act or refrain from acting on the basis of any information included herein without seeking appropriate legal advice on the particular facts and circumstances affecting that reader. For more information, visit www.buchalter.com.