Video: Who is the executor of your estate?

David Chilton:

Creating these estate-planning videos over the last few years has been a lot of fun. Well, for me, not necessarily for the viewers. So many of you shared personal stories, often deeply personal stories with me about estate-planning challenges your family has run into. Frankly, many have been quite sad. But they’ve also contained valuable lessons—lessons we can all learn from. The big take away is that a good percentage of the most troubling issues could have been easily avoided.

In one of my earlier videos, I talked about the big reason in my mind for using a corporate executor. That is, having a trust company act as your executor, instead of a close friend or family member. I felt, and still feel, that’s a lot to ask of an individual. Especially one dealing with grief. Being an executor is a huge responsibility. With larger estates, huge squared. It’s a burden and, bluntly, one I feel is often unfair to put on the shoulders of busy individuals.

I also argued, rightly, that many executors aren’t up to the task as estates are often so much more complicated nowadays. Holding companies, foreign real estate, shares in private enterprises, blended families, illiquid assets, etc., etc. There is some true expertise needed here. A financial background instead of just helping, may, in some cases be imperative. I would rather have a corporate executor. And I do! An entity who deals with these complex situations routinely. People who know what they are doing.

Then the third reason to use a corporate executor, one I almost threw in here as an afterthought, was to avoid family friction. Have an unbiased party handle all of this. There are a lot of hot spots here, a lot of potential areas of conflict.

Well, after taking in all this real-life, front-line feedback I can tell you that I had the reasons right… but the order wrong.

The number of extreme family fallouts that has been shared with me is heartbreaking. “I no longer speak to my brother.” “The cousins won’t be at the same wedding.” “Oh my gosh, we ended up taking my stepsister to court.” And so on and so on and so on.

Look, I am a big fan of the corporate executor for larger and more complicated estates. Your family will be grateful.