Part 2

 

Jordan Vaka
It’s kind of been an evolutionary advice for us as well, is not taking things at face value so much anymore, but getting those primary and source documents. And it can, it adds a lot of friction to the process because we’re collecting a lot more data and information that has privacy and security issues and all that. But we need that to make sure the advice reflects your actual circumstances, not correct your understanding. And I think I just realized as we’re talking, this may be triggering quite a few of the people that are listening because they may have had some of the negative outcomes of maybe bad strategic planning or bad documentation or outdated documentation. So we might move on to kind of the best end of the spectrum of documenting your estate plan.

But I think there’s two sub areas there, really getting advice from a lawyer, but then there’s kind of getting advice from a general lawyer and getting advice from an expert lawyer. Can you walk us through maybe the distinctions there?

 

Lucy Percy
Yeah, I mean, people often ask me, you know, why your prices? My mum got their will done for $500. Like, can you talk to me about your pricing? And I do not mind that question at all. So, historically, wills have been what we call a loss leader production in the legal service industry. So a loss leader is when we sell something at a loss, because we know it’s going to bring in other work. So family law, I want to grab a wills client, because when they divorce, I’m going to make 50 grand from them. I’m going to grab a wills client for $300, because when there’s a death, I’m going to charge 20 grand in the probate, and maybe if there’s a litigation aspect to the file, 100 grand. So that’s how people have been funding wills, chapters of their firm.

I suppose the issue with a generalist law firm, I suppose, on choosing not to use an expert, is that I think that wills and estates is a great area. I love it because it touches on every other area of law. It intersects with property law, corporations act, family law, like you name it. If you die and you’ve got other legal things going on, we’re going to have to work and, you know, put it all together for you. So it’s so interesting. But what that means is that the complexity these days is astronomical. So I honestly don’t believe that to do the best job by your clients, you can do this area of law and much else.

Maybe you could do one or two, but the volume of, I don’t know, professional development and things that you just need to know, I mean, you would find that as a planner, it can’t be a side gig. Wills and estates is not a side hustle to your main law firm business.

 

Jordan Vaka
I think it surprises me to hear that is kind of a topic in law, because I always think law has those very specialist silos. But you’re right, you do have those general firms that are, you know, typically out in the suburbs, they are a bit of a one stop shop, and I think there’s a valuable service there. But, yeah, you’re right in planning, the complexity is too great. Now, I feel it adds too much of a risk to the practitioner and also to the client to say, well, I reckon I can do this. But realistically, maybe you’re at 80% of the complexity or 70%. There’s a huge gap there. And I think with Wills, you won’t realize that something’s gone wrong until a very awful time far down the track.

 

Lucy Percy
Correct. Yeah. There’s no one capturing your mistakes. That’s right. It’ll be when the death occurs. And then you realize, oh, my precedent was out of date, or, oh, I didn’t realize that happened, you know, so.

 

Jordan Vaka
So if we’re working along that spectrum, intestacy’s the worst. Post office wills are a bit better. Online wills are in that same bracket. A general. A will from a general lawyer is. Could be good. It’s better than the other options. But then we’re dealing with an expert. And why is that worth doing?

 

Lucy Percy
Yeah, well, it’s a great investment, that the saying that comes to mind is the poor man pays twice. So you can pay me my fee and I’m going to give you genuinely the best document that you could have. Whether you have a $400,000 estate or a $20 million estate, the bones of what I’m going to use for you are going to be the same. My approach, my service is going to be the same. We’re going to do the best job we can for everyone. We’re going to give you a plan that gives your people, certainty. It’s not just going to work on paper. We’re going to talk deeply about your relationships and the relationships of the people you’re appointing. So we say, this is a great plan. Is it going to work in reality? Tell me about those people.

Are they, you know, generous or stingy? Are they going to listen to an accountant when they tell us how to do something? Are they going to be proactive? Have they done their own tax returns on time? So we stress tested in terms of legal strategy, the relationships, it’s going to be the most tax effective that you can achieve. So there are some things that we put in people’s wills, and even, you know, the planners or the accountants, when we send a copy off, they say, wow, I didn’t know you could do that. And I’m like, if the will or the estate planning pays for itself in even just one clause, which it might.

Or for me, I actually always say to people, my power of attorney is probably going to pay for itself in terms of the bespoke powers and conditions that we’re going to include. So when you think about the cost difference between a general law firm and a specialist or an expert, it’s actually not huge. Like, it’s not like we’re talking about buying a Holden Molina versus a, you know, I don’t know, an expensive Mercedes. I’m not a car person, but do you know what I mean? Like, the difference is just not that big, but the difference in outcome is going to be exponential.

 

Jordan Vaka
So it’s that idea of certainty for you and for the people you’re leaving behind. You can feel a bit more confident in that documentation. And I think, as you’re speaking, I mean, analogy that keeps popping up in our world is the difference between kind of buying a mass market home and an architect home.

 

Lucy Percy
Correct.

Jordan Vaka
The architecturally designed one, it’s a lot dearer. So it’s not a perfect analogy, but it’s going to be far more tailored to your situation, to the site, to what you’re looking for. Exactly. And it’s far more valuable, I think, for the people that value that. So I think I would encourage that. And the description of your process that you’ve gone through there. We. I get to hear the stories of other people’s experiences, and that is not the experience people have with a generalist firm or a post office will. Post office will. It’s very lonely. It’s all on their shoulders. A generalist firm, people often feel rushed. They can feel like they’re getting squeezed through a sausage maker. But yours is very deliberate, very methodical, very. It’s not. You’re not rushing people.

Lucy Percy
It’s high touch. It’s high touch. So. And the other thing that I think is different is when a generalist law firm, if you don’t have the skills to train, change the document. So, you know, I appoint Jordan and Lucy as my executors. And then the backup is I appoint Nathan. Does Nathan come and join Lucy? If Jordan can’t act, does he join Jordan? If Lucy can’t act? Like, if you have an expert, we can draft any combination and the words are going to be subtly different. If you have someone who doesn’t have that drafting skill, they’re going to be like layer one, Lucy and Jordan, Leia two, Nathan. And, you know, we can just offer so much more choice.

And it is so bespoke, and it might not sound important, but when you get to the administration phase, all of those little triggers that we’ve, you know, touched and pulled and worked with really carefully, all the strings we’ve pulled are hopefully going to make for a better outcome. All I want is for people experiencing loss to have a clear pathway forward that works on paper and works with the relationships.

Jordan Vaka
It sounds like that difference between constructive ambiguity, like giving them flexibility, and destructive ambiguity, where people are left wondering. The metaphor we always use internally is people are walking through this tunnel. There’s a light at the end of the tunnel, but they’re walking through the tunnel. So good documentation should shorten that tunnel for people and make that journey a little bit shorter for them. I want to talk a little bit about how we can bring more urgency to people getting their wills done. But before we do, I realize we’re using maybe some jargon and some bits and pieces here that people may not be comfortable with. So if we can. If I throw a few words at you, if you don’t mind throwing out some definitions. Firstly, power of attorney. In very broad, sweeping terms, what is a power of attorney?

Lucy Percy
Okay, so it’s a document that operates while you’re alive. It ceases to have effect when you die, and it appoints someone. Your attorney is the person’s name to stand in your shoes, and they manage your rights and responsibilities on this earth when you can’t do that yourself. So you’ve lost capacity. One distinction I’ll make with power of attorney is the trick is with a will, you know, the similar person in your will is called your executor. With a will, we’ve got stable ground. The worst thing has happened, the death has occurred. We’re dealing with stable ground. With a power of attorney. It needs to work.

If you’re hit by a bus and you’re in ICU for a week, and then you die, or you might have a stroke and you live for 20 years after that, within capacity, or you have dementia for 15 years. So that’s the trick there. That’s why I say, you know, your power of attorney might pay for. Pay for itself. It’s as important as the will. Yeah. Sometimes even trickier.

Jordan Vaka
And branches out into different areas. Financial, medical. It doesn’t have a health directive. That’s something you do with your gp, isn’t it?

Lucy Percy
Yes. Well, so that’s it chooses the people who are going to make healthcare decisions. If you want to give them a binding list of health decisions, you would have made that’s your gp with an advance care directive? Yeah.

Jordan Vaka
Can you describe fairly quickly what’s an executive?

Lucy Percy
Yeah, an executor is. Same thing I say. On your death, your executor’s rights and responsibilities are enlivened. So that’s even before they go and get probate at law, they are meant to be operating as your executor. You know, if there’s two wills or we don’t know who it is, that’s difficult. They stand in your shoes and they are responsible for your responsibilities. So keeping your property insured, maintaining your dependence, you know, all your legal compliance and aspects, and they are responsible for your liabilities and the things that you owe to other people? I suppose. So they have the legal power that you had when you die, but then there’s lots of limits in that, so they need to have good executor powers.

The executor is really given its power in the will, but then the court confirms it by giving a piece of paper called a grant of probate. So the executor takes the will to court and says, I think this is the last true will of the deceased. I think it’s legally valid. What do you think? The court inspects it, looks at the affidavit, and then if they agree, they give the executor a piece of paper called a grant of probate, and that is the executor’s proof to the rest of the world that they have the legal standing to make those decisions that the deceased could have made or to wind up their estate.

Jordan Vaka
Thank you. You’ve preempted my next question around probate. That’s perfect. And we will have another episode exploring the executive duties, but it’s a very important role. And now my understanding is that they’re standing in for the deceased. They’re not making the decisions based on the executor’s thoughts. They’re trying to execute the deceased wishes. That’s their responsibility, is that right?

Lucy Percy
Correct. So the executor shouldn’t have too much discretion. They are meant to follow what is in the will. So when there’s a piece, when there’s litigation, for example, it’s not about the executor thinking, well, the deceased should have given XYZ that. I did actually have a case where the sister in law, the sister of the deceased, was the executor. And again, it was a problem that happened with joint ownership versus tenants in common. If you have two minutes, I’ll tell the story. Yes. There was de facto partners. They were engaged. They had been together for 20 years. They both had a child from a previous relationship. They got together when each of the children were about one or two. They had separate houses and they’d paid off their mortgages.

And then when the kids were grown up, they said, we’re going to sell your house and we’re going to buy a family home together. So he kept his home as an investment property. She sold her house, let’s say it was worth two mil in Melbourne, and they used her two mil to buy a new family home for both of them. Instead of getting legal advice about how they should own the property, the conveyancer ticked joint proprietors, okay, no tenants in common. And so the conveyancer immediately gave him half of her equity. And she didn’t get independent legal advice. So she didn’t sort of really realize what was happening. He then died twelve months later, and his half of the house went to his daughter. The daughter did evict my client, the stepmom. It was awful. So the deceased sister was the executor.

And she was like, this is not what he would have wanted. And was acting in a way that really substituted her judgment for what the will said and what she thought was morally right. And she got removed. She was successfully removed because it’s not what you think, sister in law. Morally, you’re on the right track. But actually the will says, we have to do this and this, and it has to go to the daughter. And you don’t have the authority to substitute your judgment for what the will says. And if you can’t enforce the will and carry it out, you’ll be removed. And she was. So that’s a really great example, I suppose, to, you know, explain. Sometimes when people think, you know, sometimes people say, oh, the will is going to be contested. Should I be executor?

And I’m like, absolutely, because your job is to uphold it. If you don’t, you’re not an executor, then you’re really going to have three parties, you as the beneficiary, the executor defending it, and then the claimant. We might as well, you know, if you. Lots of reasons why we wouldn’t. But I’m like, let’s cut it down to two. Like, you’re going to have to defend anyway.

Jordan Vaka
We’ll expand our beneficiaries in a sec, but let’s go to the big document. I guess the core part of any estate plan is the will. Can you walk us through even just really, basically, what is a will?

Lucy Percy
Yeah. So a will is it should be in writing, but there are case law about informal wills that are, you know, video or voicemail. I’m not even going touch on them, because you should just go and do the proper thing. So it should be in writing, and it has to have a few key elements. So the person writing it has to have capacity to make a will. That’s really difficult to prove in the world. That’s why. Another reason why, working with an expert, we’re gonna have file notes and be able to say, we have evidence that this person had capacity at the time of writing it. So that’s a key element of it being valid that you’re not gonna spot on the paper. It needs to revoke all former wills.

So typically, the first line will say, I, Lucy Percy, revoke all former wills made by me. And we could say, in Australia or across the world, you know, there’s lots of nuance there if you have assets in another jurisdiction. I did have a matter where it was actually a lawyer who had forgotten the revocation clause. $20,000 to go to court and say, actually, here’s the latest will. But it didn’t revoke this earlier will. Dear court, what do you think you should do? You know, the outcomes are just catastrophic when you miss a word or two. So, yeah, revocation. And then the next typical thing is that the will appoints an executor. The will, if it doesn’t do that, like, if it’s a DIY again, we’d just go back to the principles under intestacy and then be an administrator.

But then the gifts in the will that didn’t fail would still work. So an executor we’ve talked about, and for me, I like to have lots of contingencies, and we’re really deliberate. If this happens, then that happens. They might be executors after this date, but not on this date, or conditional upon them living in Australia or not, because there’s lots of tax reasons why we want at least one Australian resident executor. My will then goes into gifting of personal belongings or specific gifts. So is there a cash sum we want to leave? Do we want to gift the executors something for acting? I’m really in favor of that, because.

Jordan Vaka
Can charge the estate for discharging their duties, can’t they?

Lucy Percy
Well, there’s three ways an executor might get paid. So one, and what I favor is a specific gift. I like to give specific gifts if there’s enough money there. I think it motivates executors to work quickly and efficiently. Nothing is worse than in the state where the executives dragging the chain and they’re a little bit accountable. You know, if you’ve been paid for this, stop and take the time off work you need to, and get the job done. So specific gifts, they can apply to the court for commission if there is no gift in the will or with the consent of beneficiaries. So commission is a percent of what the value of the estate was. I definitely steer clear of that. That is often what the trustee companies do.

So they might have a really high commission, and that’s how they can afford to do cheap wills. And then the third is hourly rate, so, you know, they record their time and they put in a bill. But then, you know, all of these need a specific clause in the will to do that, except the commission that’s in the legislation. But it’s not always easy to. I wouldn’t rely on it. That’s just time, cost, complexity. Yeah.

Jordan Vaka
So the will needs to nominate the executor, revoke all former wills. What else has to be in a will for it to be valid?

Lucy Percy
Yeah, it needs to gift the residue. So there are. There’s lots of great case law. There’s a wonderful case where a man went and saw a really expensive lawyer. He had six children, I think, and over ten mil, between ten and 20 mil. And he must have got sick of paying the legal fees. So he took the draft that the lawyer had done and he finished it himself. And this clever man successfully set up six testamentary trusts. He got the revocation done. He did a great job. He didn’t gift anything into those trusts. He just forgot to gift the residue. So I’m going to say that’s where the heart of your will is. Who’s getting the residue?

And, yeah, you know, if that fails, then we go back to the intestacy and we look at that chart and it’s like this person gets this amount. This person gets this amount.

Jordan Vaka
Yeah, you mentioned something there. And again, an upcoming episode. We’ll go into more detail, but can you quickly run through what a testament to your trust is?

Lucy Percy
Yeah. Trust is instead of gifting something to a human being outright, we are going to skip the human being and we’re going to pop it into a trust. The word testamentary means that it can only be created by testator, a will maker, in their will. So it’s actually identical to a family trust that people would be really familiar with, but it can only be created by will. The assets come from the deceased only, so we don’t intermingle assets after the fact, and it only becomes enlivened when the will maker dies.

So one of the reasons we might do that is that instead of my dad leaving me a million dollar inheritance, he could put it in a testamentary trust, and then I can stream the income to my children, get some great tax benefits if I get sued in my job, the inheritance dads left me is safe in the testamentary trust. Or, you know, typically family law is also another area where they can add value. They’re not watertight, but can add a lot of value in family law as well. Yeah.

Jordan Vaka
And I think where we’ve seen them used really well for clients is when they want to leave money to kids that are 15 to 17. And if you left me a million dollars when I was 17, I’m not going to have a million dollars when I’m 18. I don’t think.

Lucy Percy
Yes. Can I actually say, even if people think, and again, this is a general law firm, might get this wrong, I gift 50% of my estate to my child upon them turning 25, or I’m going to give 10% when they’re 21, 30% when they’re 25, 30% when they’re 28, and the remaining 10% when they’re. I don’t know, is that something.

Jordan Vaka
I lost track, too.

Lucy Percy
When they’re 30, that actually will fail. There is great case law that says that a beneficiary can apply to the court and say, actually, I want the whole lot when I’m 18. So the only way to make sure your kids can’t make that demand on the court is by using a testamentary trust. That is well established case law. Yeah.

Jordan Vaka
Yes. That’s fascinating. Having seen a few wills, I have to say this is probably true of most legal documents. They’re not the most readable thing. They’re not the clearest document to read. It’s whatever language they’re written in. It looks like English, but it’s not quite the same. But these documents provide a great bill of clarity. So I’m curious, if I’m just an executor, how do I use that? But really, you need a lawyer to help you with it, don’t you?

Lucy Percy
Yeah, that is a great question. New South Wales and Victoria are increasing and I think doing the services to help executors. DIY, I think, is as good as it’s ever been. I must admit, there are some wills and estates that are so straightforward that I split my deceased estate work up into two parts. So there’s application for probate, and then when we’ve got probate, I might say to you’ve got this, you’re just going to call in the aged care bond divided by four, get your accountant to do an ill tax return, and then you’re done. Do it yourself. Or there are others that I say, this is really complex and you’re going to need to keep me on board for the administration phase and here’s my cost agreement for that.

So, you know, I will say, as long as you’ve had a lawyer give you advice about what’s in the will and the steps to do for some people, you really can diy. And I definitely empower clients to do that where it’s appropriate and simple enough and low risk, like siblings getting along, all that sort of thing, and having.

Jordan Vaka
Good advice upfront or through the process, you presuming that you’re a married couple or a couple that have been through the estate planning process together, you will have had that clarity by dealing with the expert of saying, here’s what this clause actually means, here’s what it will mean in action. So it should be a little bit more familiar. But one thing I just popped into mind, everybody in Australia thinks that there is a great big reading of the will around the lawyers boardroom table where everybody acts shocked.

Lucy Percy
Yes.

Jordan Vaka
Does that happen in Australia?

Lucy Percy
No. And I. So it’s a great question. I have a booking on my website that’s like half an hour advice, and sometimes it’s beneficiaries saying, I’ve been given a copy of the will and I can’t see myself in there, I don’t know what it means. And so we’ll just read it together and that’s. I’ll charge for that. But that’s an invaluable service. So instead of sitting back and being like, why isn’t the executor telling me more, or why isn’t the estate lawyer explaining this to me? I say to these people, don’t be offended. The estate lawyer is actually not meant to give you advice at all. So the estate lawyer is their client, is the estate, and they can’t meet with you beneficiary. So a reading of the will would be dangerous from a legal perspective.

If I did a reading of the will and there’s six beneficiaries and one of those beneficiaries then went on to make a claim, I would possibly have to stop acting because there’s the perception or the possibility that I learned something about that beneficiary in that room, or I gave them advice and I’ve now got a conflict at law. So that’s why you’re not invited. We’re not being nasty.

Jordan Vaka
The beneficiary is simply not their client. It would be as if they were talking to a stranger on the street about the estate.

Lucy Percy
Correct. But even worse, if the beneficiary in the room said, I’m so upset, I should have got more than that, because. Or I’ve got it, I need the money because. Or mum and dad promised me this. I now have information that if that beneficiary goes and sees a lawyer, I shouldn’t have that information. So. And I can’t control what the beneficiary is going to say in that room, so I simply shouldn’t meet with the beneficiary unless they’ve got their own lawyer present.

Jordan Vaka
So it’s not just the quirk of Australian versus American law. There is a really fundamental reason, and it’s to protect the interests of the estate. Some of the mechanics around wills, once they’re written, where do they get stored?

Lucy Percy
I love that you included this question. I saw it on your planning list, because it is actually an enormous problem. There is no register. So probably the safest thing that you can do is the courts. The Supreme Court in each state does offer to store the will for you as part of the probate process. Every executor has to do a search of the court records and they say, yep, there’s no other will stored here. Now, in practice, that is used very seldomly because I suppose it doesn’t offer a practical solution to things like, where do I store my power of attorney? You know, it’s only part of a.

Jordan Vaka
I was going to go the cynical path, thinking that, well, lawyers want them in their office so they can pick up the estate.

Lucy Percy
Yeah. Well, do you know. I mean. So, yes, look, that is my preference. I want to store your will. But the only reason is, and you’re right, lawyers used to put clauses in there that were unenforceable, but, you know, executives would follow them in good faith. I direct that the firm of head and Heart estate planning is employed in the administration of my state. That they’re not binding.

Jordan Vaka
They’re not binding. Let’s just clarify. They’re not binding.

Lucy Percy
They’re not binding.

Jordan Vaka
Okay.

Lucy Percy
And I don’t. I don’t write them. I mean, people will come back to me if they want and they won’t if they don’t want. That doesn’t worry me. But we practically. I get from the law society that I’m in. So the local area and back when I was in Melbourne, the same thing. I’m going to say at least five emails a week saying, does any other lawyer hold the will of XYZ deceased on this date? The family’s looking for the will and it is so stressful. I just sit there and think, oh, my goodness. Like the family. No, mum or dad did a will. They don’t know where it is. And it’s so hard to find it. We used to do things like, so you can advertise, you can reach out to your law society, you can advertise in the paper.

I see it on LinkedIn all the time looking for a will. We used to do things like, okay, who was the last firm that did a discharge charge of the mortgage? You know, who had the title? So we do historical title searches and we’re like, who are the other firms that this person worked with at any time in their life that’s going to be less effective going forward because we’re location independent now, I can’t assume, and we’re specializing, so I can’t assume that whoever did the conveyancing work did the basic will. So it is an enormous problem and it is something that I see all the time. So I do also, there have been two times where I have suspected that a beneficiary or an executive found it in the house, didn’t like it and destroyed it. That is. That is a criminal.

That’s a criminal offense. But I think it’s. Yeah.

Jordan Vaka
Like, the burden of proof is pretty difficult to hit.

Lucy Percy
Correct. Yep. So it’s, you know, I mean, and what. Even if that’s not true and I’m wrong on that assumption, for those two matters that I had, what’s not to say that it’s not happening? Tell me. Prove to me it’s not happening.

Jordan Vaka
Yeah. Even if 1% of wills that’s occurring, that’s bursting.

Lucy Percy
Burns them. Yeah. Yep. So if you’re storing them at your house. I just think people don’t realize. I think they think common sense will prevail and it’ll be like, but I signed a copy, or, but someone will find it, or my lawyers got a copy. No, we really need the original, and there’s just no substitute. Like, the court system is doing the best it can to modernise, but we have these overarching laws and accepted cases that just tell us that we just need the original.

Jordan Vaka
You used the term common sense there. I’m starting to get the feeling the common sense is to a state law what fairness is to family law, which is everybody has their own interpretation of what it is because common sense, you cannot rely on that when it comes to this kind of thing. So. So what would best practice be? So I get my will done. It’s all signed, it’s witnessed, it’s. It’s very perfect. What’s best practice for storing that?

Lucy Percy
Well, I. I mean, I do offer to my clients to store it for them, and I do that, you know, no charge. It is actually at a significant cost to me. Like, that’s an overhead?

Jordan Vaka
Yeah.

Lucy Percy
Yeah, it’s a burden in terms of, like, responsibility, but also, I store mine at a safe, secure place in Melbourne, so I pay a subscription. But I do that because I’m. I don’t want any of my wills to be missing. So, you know, and I might change where I store them in the future, but any storage has a cost. And, I mean, I just genuinely believe that. So the lawyer has legal responsibility to keep a deeding record. If something happens to the lawyer. If I sold my firm or I died, the law society is going to track where did Lucy’s deeds go? Or it should, in theory. So I have had, in the law journals in Victoria, we’ve tracked, okay, this firm closed in 1985. Who took the. Who took the deeds? Then? What happened after that?

So if you’re in the legal system, your lawyer has liability and obligations, and they should be doing the right thing. And if they don’t, you know, there’s a question of negligence, and that’s not.

Jordan Vaka
The case with a post office will. Or an online.

Lucy Percy
No. Or you storing it. Yeah. Or you storing at home. That’s on you. So, yeah, I suppose they’re the two main options. If a client was storing at home, I would want to see a fireproof home safe. I think, actually, technically, flooding is more common to damage wills than fire, so, you know, something to think about. And you should also tell the lawyer where it is. And I say to my clients, if you’re not sending them back to me, can I have a scanned copy? Like your iPhone will scan, so there’s no excuse for not scanning, but at least then I’ve got a record of a signed copy. But it’s not my preference. I just. I just think they just get lost too often.

Jordan Vaka
So, best practice, keep the original with your lawyer. Make sure their storage facility is secure, safe and consistent. Have a copy at home somewhere, store safe with your lawyers details on there, you know, staple a business card or something like that and let your executor know. Either they’re going to. They’ll be your executor, but also where the will is and who to speak with.

Lucy Percy
Correct. And I’m favoring it. I have a letter that’s like, you know, you’ve been included in this client’s estate planning. If something happens to me, go to the New South Wales Law Society. Like, if you can’t find. I’m Lucy Percy. This is what you do. I used to post those, but now I’m more in favor of emailing because I feel like in 20 years time, someone might be able to search the inbox, whereas a piece of paper, a business card. I’m like, we’re just. People are not holding on to that stuff.

Jordan Vaka
It’s funny, the legacy thinking you need to do, like, the document you write today needs to be active. Could be active in 30 years.

Lucy Percy
Correct? Yeah.

Jordan Vaka
So we’ll hop into. Because aim conscious, we’ve been talking for a while, it’s been really good and enjoyable. But I do want touch on beneficiaries. So, specifically, who can, what is a beneficiary and who can be one?

Lucy Percy
Yeah, I mean, it’s a great question, actually. A beneficiary doesn’t have to be a human being. It could be a trust, a company. I mean, that is not what’s happening in day to day practice. But it is a charity. But it’s someone who is going to receive a gift under your will. So it could be a gift like $100,000, or it could be a percentage of the residue, or a beneficiary could also have a right to something. So I give the rights to my intellectual property to this person, or I give a right to occupy my property to this person. But typically we’re going to think about a beneficiary being someone getting cash or a percentage under the will. We want to think very carefully about. About how we want to gift it to them.

So outright, you know, from human being to human being, or are we going to put it on a trust and they’re a beneficiary of that trust, and we also need to think about if that beneficiary dies, what do we then want to happen? And then what? And then what, you know?

Jordan Vaka
So, yeah, and I think on the estate side, I’ll turn it around. On the superannuation side, there are restrictions around who can be the beneficiary of the payout from the superfund upon death. Apply so much on the estate side, does it?

Lucy Percy
No, no, there’s no exclusions. Pets can’t beneficiaries. That is something I will say that we do get asked every now and then. They are personal belongings. They’re property that you own. So, no, your pets can’t. But other than that, I haven’t had anyone request a beneficiary. And I’ve been like, no, no.

Jordan Vaka
Do you have any guidance around kind of, how people can go about choosing beneficiaries? Like.

Lucy Percy
I mean, it’s a great question. Yes. That is something that I love doing. So, you know, we can do something straightforward, like, to my children in equal shares, you know, to your spouse, to your partner. I suppose sometimes that’s quite obvious, actually. Child free couples or child free people say, oh, my will’s going to be so simple. I don’t have children. It’s actually the opposite. When you’ve got a spouse or children, it’s kind of simple. And the first two layers are done. For us child free clients, we think really deeply about, what’s the legacy you want to leave? Who would benefit from it the most? Yes. You want to give it to your friend who’s having a hard time. If they die, should it go to their spouse, to their children, or. No.

Does it stop there with your friend, and then it goes to a charity instead? Or, you know, I divide my estate in this way. If I’m survived by Nick, that if I’m not survived by Nick, actually give Nick’s children 200 grand, and then the residue goes this way. Like, we just do so much. If this, then that. And I say to people, they, oh, it’s a lot of questions. And I say, yeah, but we’re just methodical. We just pick through them one by one, and it might seem overwhelming, but actually, if we just make one decision at a time, you’ll get to the end and you’ll be like, wow, I’ve done, like, three layers, or I’ve got three generations or contingencies done.

Jordan Vaka
Yes. Defining that path. And then, you know, the experts just document it and make sure that it happens the way you want it to. But until we know what you want to do, we can’t really do that. One thing that I think a lot of people fear or worry about or may have even been through people listening to this, what happens when you’re unhappy with your allocation or what the will maker has left you in their will? I mean, this is a big topic, so we can just touch on.

Lucy Percy
Yeah, well, this is like a. To be continued. But. So there’s really two elements to a claim on an estate or a claim against a will. The first, I would say, is about someone saying the will is invalid, so the test data didn’t have capacity or there’s a construction issue. So the gifting in the will is not clear. What did they mean? Or, you know, they’ve done something in the drafting that’s not quite right or, you know, it’s been amended or there’s hand notes on it or something like that. So that’s. Is the will valid? Is one whole area of contested estates. Then when we’ve got a valid will, or we all agree the will is valid, then the next element over contested estate is, I would like more provision.

So I’ve been left nothing and I would like something, or I’ve been left something, but it is not what I was promised. I was promised something else and I acted on this promise in my lifetime, or it’s just simply not enough for the situation I’m in now.

Jordan Vaka
Yeah. Okay, so. And that we will have. I think we have two episodes coming up around disputes. One, one on the collaborative piece. So trying to work together across the different parties and the other one on a less collaborative, more litigated aspect. So that’ll be. They’ll be coming out shortly as well.

Lucy Percy
You’ve got Harvey Spectre coming in, do you? Harvey and Zinter.

Jordan Vaka
As long as. I don’t know. I probably shouldn’t call them toe cutters, but, yeah, it’s very. I mean, we make light because we’ve seen how awful it can get.

Lucy Percy
It’s actually not funny, is it?

Jordan Vaka
No, but Lucy, I think that’s covered so much of the gamut of estate planning. It is such a big topic. And I think to emphasize that point of that sort of spectrum of quality, I would. I mean, I don’t know if you can say, but I can say, get an expert to do it. Don’t do it yourself. Certainly don’t leave it up to the intestacy act or the intestacy rules. And I would stay away from a generalist, too. Get an expert, invest the money in that process and have that certainty for you and the people you’re leaving behind. Lucy, did you have any sort of final comments before we wrap up?

Lucy Percy
Yeah, well, just building on that point, you know, if listening to this episode wasn’t enough for you to identify that you need to invest in an expert, have a free call with any of the expert there are so many sole practitioners or big firms who do estate planning. Well, have a free call. The reason why you in particular shouldn’t do a basic will is going to be fact specific. So what are the facts? What is happening in your life? How do you earn your assets? Tell the person and then they’re going to tell you back. Wow, I’m so glad you came to me because if you did this wrong, there’d be this really bad outcome. So let us tell you why you should spend your money on it. Does that make sense?

Jordan Vaka
Absolutely. And I think another topic we’ll look to cover down the track is, again, the people that are listening may have inherited a pot of money, and it’s in a very complex structure and there’s some, your facts will be different to the next person’s facts and definitely seek out that expert advice.

Lucy, if people have further questions for you or they wanted to have a chat with you, where’s the best place to find you?

Lucy Percy
Yeah, on Instagram (headandheartestateplanning) or email [email protected]. I will most likely send you a link to book a call. The link is also on my website. But, you know, sometimes I check that you’re in the right state for me and all those sorts of things.

Jordan Vaka
Wonderful. Well, Lucy, thank you so much for that. Thank you for providing all that information. And yeah, if anybody’s listening has any questions, reach out to Lucy. Thanks a lot.

Lucy Percy
Thank you.