Are Digital Wills Coming Soon?

Digital Wills

I was surprised to find that some states have opened the doors to digital wills. As described in The Lawletter from The National Legal Research Group, Vol 37, No 7, it is inevitable that states will soon have to address the rise of the digital will. At presentNevadais the only state to have codified requirements for such wills. TheNevada“Electronic Will” statute is instructive regarding how will execution formalities might be modified to accommodate digital will execution. It also highlights areas of technological improvement necessary to put digital wills on a par with paper wills in protecting against fraud and undue influence. The Nevada Statute requires the testator’s electronic signature as well as an “Authentication Characteristic”. This phrase is designed as “a fingerprint, a retinal scan, voice recognition, a digitized signature or other authentication using a unique characteristic of the person.” Such protective features are not widely available in the market it seems so how practical is this statute? It is easy to imagine the potential for abuse. It is difficult enough to avoid abuse when utilizing the ancient tried and true will formalities. One can only wonder whether future (evil) computer wizards can be restrained from attacking will formalities by staying one step ahead of the authorities. Can we rely upon a digital will “written” twenty years before the death of the decedent at a time when the computer world might have changed so drastically in that twenty year period. Think a 3.5 “ floppy disc written in 1985 on MacWrite, now obsolete. While society is racing into the digital age, this is one advance that will require a lot of thought before implementation.

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 The Law Offices of Jeremy W. Howe, LTD. are ElderLaw attorneys in Rhode Island who specialize in wills and trusts, estate planning, guardianship, probate, and Veterans Aid and Attendance Benefits.

They also are Newport Rhode Island Divorce Lawyers, Attorneys, Mediators, and Arbitrators providing services for family law issues such as divorce, child custody and visitation, support, and military family law.   

Call them today at 401-841-5700 or visit them on the web at http://www.CounselFirst.com.

May Someone With Dementia Sign a Will?

Signing a Will with Dementia?

Millions of people are affected by dementia, and unfortunately many of them do not have all their estate planning affairs in order before the symptoms start. If you or a loved one has dementia, it may not be too late to sign a will or other documents, but certain criteria must be met to ensure that the signer is mentally competent.

In order for a will to be valid, the person signing must have "testamentary capacity," which means he or she must understand the implications of what is being signed. Simply because you have a form of mental illness or disease does not mean that you automatically lack the required mental capacity. As long as you have periods of lucidity, you may still be competent to sign a will.
Generally, you are considered mentally competent to sign a will if the following criteria are met:

• You understand the nature and extent of your property, which means you know what you own and how much of it.   
• You remember and understand who your relatives and descendants are and are able to articulate who should inherit your property.  
• You understand what a will is and how it disposes of property.  
• You understand how all these things relate to each other and come together to form a plan.

Family members may contest the will if they are unhappy with the distributions and believe you lacked mental capacity to sign it. If a will is found to be invalid, a prior will may be reinstated or the estate may pass through the state's intestacy laws (as if no will existed). To prevent a will contest, your attorney should help make it as clear as possible that the person signing the will is competent. The attorney may have a series of questions to ask you to assess your competency. In addition, the attorney can have the will signing videotaped or arrange for witnesses to speak to your competency.

Read more HERE

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 The Law Offices of Jeremy W. Howe, LTD. are ElderLaw attorneys in Rhode Island who specialize in wills and trusts, estate planning, guardianship, probate, and Veterans Aid and Attendance Benefits.

They also are Newport Rhode Island Divorce Lawyers, Attorneys, Mediators, and Arbitrators providing services for family law issues such as divorce, child custody and visitation, support, and military family law. 

Call them today at 401-841-5700 or visit them on the web at http://www.CounselFirst.com.

Television Prepares for New Reality Shows

It recently came to my attention that television producers are developing two "reality" shows that deal with the distribution of a decedent's estate. The first, The Will, concerns a wealthy benefactor, still living, and the potential beneficiaries in his Will. As in the Survivor, there will be challenges and contests to determine who will be voted out and who will ultimately receive assets from the estate when the benefactor dies. The second, Estate Wars, reportedly will follow the heirs of a person, already deceased, as they fight over the assets of the estate.

While either show might appeal to TV audiences for the potential conflict and emotional scenes, most of us would prefer that our estates not be disbursed in such dramatic fashion. In fact, one of the most basic reasons for executing a Will in the first place is to avoid conflict and ensure that our assets are distributed as we desire.

Your Will is a statement that directs who will receive your property at your death and it appoints a legal representative to carry out your wishes. With a Will, you have the ability to choose the legal representative, your Executor, and to determine how your property is to be disbursed.

If you die intestate - without a Will - the state where you are domiciled will decide who receives the assets in your estate, not the participants in a TV show!
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The Law Offices of Jeremy W. Howe, LTD. are ElderLaw attorneys in Rhode Island who specialize in Wills and Trusts, Estate Planning, Guardianship, Probate, and Veterans Aid and Attendance Benefits.

They also are Newport Rhode Island Divorce Lawyers, Attorneys, Mediators, and Arbitrators providing services for Family Law issues such as Divorce, Child Custody and Visitation, Support, and Military Family Law. 

Call them today at 401-841-5700 or visit them on the web at http://www.CounselFirst.com.