With Wills Month here, I wanted to share a quick reminder about something that is easy to put off, but incredibly important.

A will is about making sure your wishes are clear and that the decisions that matter most stay in your hands — who receives your assets, who looks after your children, and who you trust to carry out your wishes.

Without a current will, those decisions may not be made in the way you would have wanted.

Even if you already have a will in place, it is worth reviewing it from time to time, particularly if life has changed.

Some common reasons to review your will include:

• Getting married or separating

• Having children or grandchildren

• Buying or selling a property

• Starting or selling a business

• A significant change in your financial position or assets

• Changes to the people you want to benefit from your estate

• Changes to your executor

• The death of someone named in your will

A will is one of those things we often intend to get around to “one day”. Wills Month is a useful reminder to make sure what you have in place still reflects where life is today.

However – it is not a set and forget magic bullet.

A recent situation has been an eye opener for me and one of my clients.

They had a current will in place but because the Dad had assets in his personal name of $40,000 the will has to go through probate.

I had understood that having a will enable the family to be well prepared in the event of the loss of a loved one but it’s only part of the story.

His wife needed to find a way to pay the upcoming mortgage payment, and waiting 8 months for the Courts to work through probate process, was not going to work.

Talk about stress at the wrong time.

Fortunately, there were life cover policies in place with ownership correctly structured and the payout will mean the mortgage can be massively reduced to a level that is affordable for the surviving spouse..

This is why life cover and some form of mortgage protection is our recommended bare minimum, and we refer clients to our preferred trusted advisers to put this in place.

We always encourage clients to set up a valid will end enduring power of attorney, and not having this sorted can lead to unexpected consequences.

So what now?

1.      We strongly recommend having a minimum amount of life cover to repay the mortgage.

2.      Review the Wills regularly

3.      Connect with us so we can put you in touch with one of our recommended advisers for a review of insurances to ensure the right cover and ownership structure is in place – before it is needed.

The content of this post is the opinion of the hosts. It should not be treated as financial advice. Always consider your own personal situation and goals before making any financial decisions