How To Make Sure Your Will Cannot Be Successfully Contested

Your will serves as your last chance to tell the world exactly what you want to happen. Even better, this powerful legal document gives you the opportunity to make sure your family and friends have no choice but to honor your final wishes. That is of course, unless a family member is able to successfully contest your will after your death. Thankfully, there are steps that you can take to ensure this does not happen:

Even In Death You Must Follow The Law

Unfortunately, you do not have the right to simply do whatever you want with your estate after your death. This is because just as in life, you will need to follow all laws even after your death. This means that you cannot legally instruct your lawyer to build a criminal empire using your assets to fund the operation, and you cannot legally disinherit some members of your family. For instance, in most states, it is illegal to completely disinherit your spouse.

However, this does not mean that you have no say over how your estate is divided. While you may not be able to disinherit your spouse or child, you can certainly limit the funds that are given and may even have some control over how the funds are dispersed. For example, rather than giving your child a large inheritance all at once, you can set up a trust fund that will only allow them access to a certain percentage of the total inheritance each year.

In order to ensure the terms of your will are legal, it is always best to have your will drafted by a licensed probate attorney. If you choose to draft your own will, you should still hire an attorney to review the contents of the will to ensure that a family member will not be able to contest the will based on the grounds that they were inadequately provided for.

Remember, You Won't Be Around To Defend Your Will

If a family member chooses to contest your will based on the grounds that you were under duress or that you lacked the mental capacity to enter into a legal contract, you will not be around to defend against these accusations. Therefore, it is important to leave behind evidence that will stop these accusations in their tracks.

In order to help protect against a claim of duress, some individuals will choose to read their own will on video. This allows their loved ones to see them one last time after death, allows a personal message to be shared with each person named in the will, and helps to eliminate any claims that you were under duress when the will was signed.

You can also help to protect against claims of diminished capacity by asking your probate lawyer to complete a competency exam at the time your will is signed. As an officer of the court, your attorney will be able to swear to your mental state at the time the will is signed and eliminate any questions regarding your legal ability to enter into a binding contract.

To learn more, contact a company like Gruber & Associates, PC with any questions or concerns you have.