• Wills
  • Trusts
  • Living Wills

Virginia Estate Planning

An estate is property owned by a person until distributed through a trust or will. Real property is known as real estate and personal property includes possessions. Estate planning distributes your real and personal property to your named heirs. In order to ensure that your hard earned possessions are distributed in a manner that you desire, it is necessary to set up your estate with legal advisors who are interested in making sure your wishes are carried out. The law firm of Grenadier, Anderson, Starace & Duffett P.C. is interested in assisting you in planning for the things that are not planned.

Estate planning is the process of arranging how your family will distributed your assets after your death.

  • Will: a written document which leaves the estate of the person who signed the will to named persons or entities (beneficiaries, legatees, devisees) including portions or percentages of the estate. A will usually names an executor to manage the estate, states the authority and obligations of the executor in the management and distribution of the estate, sometimes gives funeral and/or burial instructions, nominates guardians of minor children and spells out other terms. If there is no executor named or the executor is dead or unable or unwilling to serve, an administrator ("with will annexed") will be appointed by the court. A written amendment or addition to a will is called a "codicil" and must be signed, dated and witnessed just as is a will, and must refer to the original will it amends. If there is no estate, including the situation in which the assets have all been placed in a trust, then the will need not be probated.