By Gordon Williams
August is National Make-a-Will Month and Julie Kent, Gift Planning Officer for the American Red Cross Northwest Region, offers advice on how to mark the event.
If you don’t have a will — and 46 percent of all Americans don’t have one — make a will before end of life throws your finances into chaos.
If you have a will — or are about to make one — consider leaving a legacy of support to the Red Cross mission and those it serves. Making the Red Cross one of those who benefits from what wealth you have accumulated.
Even if you can’t give much to the Red Cross, every little bit helps. The organization responds to 60,000 disasters and processes 14 million units of blood each year. That doesn’t include money spent teaching disaster preparedness. It costs around $3 billion a year to run the American Red Cross, and while there are corporations that make donations in the millions, the majority of donors contribute less than $100.
Don’t worry if your legacy to the Red Cross is modest. Julie Kent says that money left to the Red Cross nationwide through estate gifts comes to $100 million a year, made up of thousands of legacies left by people like you. If the idea of creating a will intimidates you, the Red Cross offers tools to make the job easier. Kent offers this three-step guide to get you started.
First, download the free Red Cross “Touching the Future” guide and workbook. You can use the electronic booklet to gather the information needed to make a will — noting your assets, gathering financial documents, and determining your wishes for how your assets will be distributed at your death. You’ll find the booklet at redcrosslegacy.org/workbook.
Second, when you have collected the information you need, turn to the online tool at freewill.com/redcross. FreeWill has partnered with the Red Cross to create a tool that will lead you, step-by-step, through preparing a will. The program is free and can help you direct your giving to any of 1,200 non-profit organizations.
Third, print your FreeWill will and have it signed and witnessed. Put it with your other important documents.
You can follow this do-it-yourself approach if your finances are pretty straightforward. If your affairs are complicated, or if you would be more comfortable talking to a legal professional, let a trained trusts and estates lawyer do the job. Kent says the Red Cross maintains a list of trusted estate planning professionals.
Designating the Red Cross as a beneficiary of your estate is as easy as requesting a form from your workplace or changing your beneficiaries online to include the Red Cross. You could direct all your assets to the Red Cross or give a percentage to the Red Cross with the rest going to kids and other worthy recipients.
Once you designate the Red Cross as one of your beneficiaries and let them know, you become a member of the Red Cross Legacy Society. That will bring you, among other things, a newsletter filled with estate planning advice and invitations to Red Cross events. Kent says the Legacy Society has around 300 members in the state of Washington.
You may wonder why the Red Cross involves itself in estate planning when its primary mission is aiding disaster victims. One obvious reason is that the Red Cross relies on legacies to help pay for the fortune it spends on disaster relief. But there is another reason as well.
Kent explains that a basic part of the Red Cross mission is preparedness. “Having a will is part of preparedness. Without a will, the laws of your state or a ruling by the courts could supersede your wishes in determining who inherits from you. “If you don’t make a will you can create a financial burden and difficult decisions to be made by those left behind you,” says Kent. “They must guess at what your intentions were.”
Also, the federal and state governments levy taxes on your estate. A trusts and estates lawyer can help reduce or eliminate taxation.
If you wonder what assets might be used in a legacy, the Legacy Society has a list.
You may have donatable assets in:
Wherever the money comes from, a will can make certain that it benefits those you want to support. Nor is age a limiting factor. “No matter what your age, you need a will if you have any financial assets to distribute or children to distribute them to,” says Kent. “We have the tools to allow you to prepare for the future with a will, to support the people and causes dear to your heart and to leave a legacy of compassion to support the humanitarian mission of the Red Cross.”
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