THE COUPLE YOU’VE NAMED AS GUARDIANS
This is the second newsletter in our series discussing the 6 common mistakes parents make when naming guardians for their children. Mistake #2: You may have named a couple to act as guardians and you have not indicated what should happen if the couple broke up or if one of the partners in the couple died. This means your children could end up in the care of someone you wouldn’t really want.
As an example, you name your brother and his wife, Bill and Mary, as guardians. But what if they divorce? Or, what if Bill died before you? Would you want Mary, who is not related to you, to still serve as guardian for your children?
Some options to consider would be: 1) naming Bill and Mary to serve as guardians only as a couple (jointly only); 2) naming Bill and Mary to serve jointly, or the survivor can serve, if you are comfortable with either of them serving alone; 3) Bill to serve alone; 4) Mary to serve alone.
As this series illustrates, there is more to naming guardians than most people think. This helps explain why the real value received by consulting an estate planning attorney is in the counselling, not the documents.
