why you need a Will
In June 2020 Rachael’s partner, Tony, died suddenly without a Will. Rachael then had the task of sorting through the details of his estate and her own grief, without any written direction provided. Rachael (based in New Zealand) joined Glen to share her story on my millennial money, and she also shared the points below around what she learnt, and what she wants others to prepare for so they don’t experience what she went through. Special thank you to Rachael for being so honest and sharing such a personal story.
Listen to the episode with Rachael below:
Here are Rachael’s thoughts on how you can be as prepared as possible:
What you can organise now to prepare for death
A relationship property agreement/contracting out is a MUST as soon as you and your partner move in together. A non-negotiable especially once property is purchased jointly or solo with another partner paying ‘rent’.
Because Tony and I had not added my name to the mortgage, upon his death I was effectively a tenant in his property. I had no say on any potential changes to the mortgage which is the second major factor in why I needed to sell the house. Thankfully because I had put $110k cash into the property several years earlier and we had a joint bank account it was obvious we owned the property together.
Do not make a Will via an online template. Seek out a lawyer who specialises in Wills/Estates/Trusts. Get it done right the first time. Also consider appointing a Power of Attorney/Enduring Power of Attorney.
Because Tony had no Will, he died intestate. My lawyer had to apply to the High Court in Wellington (NZ) to make me the Administrator for the Estate. That process alone can take at least 6 weeks. Until the Letters of Administration were approved, I was not able to do anything. I couldn’t make any changes to any of our utilities providers, I couldn’t start approaching the banks to sort out his accounts. Nothing.
Have a shared email address purely for utilities/house matters. And shared folders for all details pertaining to death admin.
Create a shared Gmail and Google Drive for all shared documents, budgets, utilities etc.
Shares: keep it simple. Have your CSN/HIN/CHESS etc numbers stored in a shared folder.
Utilities should be in each person’s name. Upon death if the next of kin or a beneficiary of the estate is not a named contact person, this will hold up closing the account etc.
All the utilities were in Tony’s name because he had lived in the house for around 7 years before I came along. Because I was not named on several of them and nor was I his next of kin, until the Letters of Administration came through, I could not do anything. All utility providers are happy to continue accepting payment from anyone but only a next of kin or named account holder can make changes/close accounts.
*one utility provider said they would highly recommend the next of kin be a named contact as well.
Have a financial AGM every year at the very least. Probably twice a year is best.
We would hold an AGM at least once a year. This was to look at how much we had paid off the mortgage, what financial goals, projects, holidays we wanted to work toward. We also discussed any tasks that needed doing and who would do them.
Look at a pre-paid funeral. Some insurance policies cover this.
In NZ head over to FDANZ for details on My Life My Funeral – a booklet to help in preplanning a funeral: https://www.fdanz.co.nz/planning-a-funeral/prepay-preplan/
https://thefuneraltrust.co.nz/ prepaid funeral trust account via FDANZ
Talk about burial/cremation. And if a burial, where. We did not, now I live an hour away from cemetery.
When I Die, A record of personal details and end of life planner https://www.rnz.co.nz/national/programmes/ninetonoon/audio/2018794059/organised-to-the-end-when-i-die
I now have a Google Drive spreadsheet with all details of my utilities, investments, my accountant, insurance broker etc. Each item has my account number and who is the contact person at that provider. Also consider your social media accounts. Facebook you can appoint someone to be the Legacy Contact for your profile once it has been Memorialised.
For Australian residents head to the Moneysmart website for information about paying for your funeral: https://moneysmart.gov.au/paying-for-your-funeral#:~:text=Prepaid%20funerals%20let%20you%20choose,doesn't%20increase%20over%20time.
Funeral/Estate
You can use any funeral director. In our situation the funeral director appointed to the Police who came and uplifted Tony from our home the night he died was not the director I chose to arrange the funeral. It was a completely different company.
We had a bespoke casket made for Tony. It was around $2000 but it was worth is for us (www.dyingart.co.nz). But to save money you can have a very plain, almost an MDF casket that has a decorative façade over it. The façade is removed prior to cremation.
Keep a book – every time you need to call/speak to a service, record the date, time and name of person and bullet point their responses.
During times of high stress (grief) your mind is fried. Mine was and still is very foggy. While I was settling the estate, every time I had to call a provider I would record the date, time and person I was speaking too and then I would bullet point the conversation. Don’t be afraid to ask the person you are speaking with to slow down. I told most people I had to talk with that I was taking notes. At one stage I was receiving communications via email from ANZ. Their ‘estates’ team was sending me emails via 4 different addresses. In the end I kept a spreadsheet of them all and the comms and gave feedback to ANZ. They were a bit embarrassed at how complicated their ‘specialist’ team was making the process.
Settling an estate: ask to be assigned to one contact at the bank or your insurance company (If you are not using a broker).
Some banks have an Estates team and then the case can be moved to the Recovery team. It’s extremely complicated and while the bank say they know what the process is, they were not very forthcoming with communication with me. After at least a dozen emails from various ANZ email addresses and incorrect information given to me on the very first contact (about a week after Tony died), I insisted on being assigned to just one person at the bank. Some banks have quite a bit of information on their website about Estates.
You will need to have several documents witnessed and/or notarised somewhere along the way.
Not every lawyer can do this. If you are instructed to have documents witnessed, try to remember to ask if they need to be witnessed and notarised. Otherwise you will be double handling a trip to a lawyer and a JP.
Forms, forms and more forms
You will need access to a printer. Unfortunately, in this process, many times you will need actual hard copies and at times, the original. So many places are yet to get up to speed with being able to fill in and sign an electronic document. If you don’t have a printer, it is worth the small investment to have one on hand at home.
Reduce stress before death and don’t be ignorant – if you really love your spouse, the kids, extended family, then you will make sure they go through the least amount of life admin stress as is possible when you are no longer around to take the load off them.
Podcasts I have listened to around grief and other people’s lives:
Curveball. The Club You Did Not Want To Be Part Of