My thoughts and prayers are with all of those who have suffered greatly at the hands of Hurricane Sandy. The majority of us in the DC Metro area are blessed to have come through it with little to no damage - nothing like our fellow Americans are dealing with along the coastal areas of the Northeast corridor.
My wife, Liz, and I have a long-time connection to New York, Long Island and the Bay Head, Pt. Pleasant coastal area of New Jersey. Liz spent 45 years of her life in the Pt. Pleasant/Bay Head area and we are greatly saddened to see the devastation along the coasts. I am sure many of our clients have enjoyed the Jersey Shore and created many happy memories in those coastal communities. We hope you will join us in making a donation to the Red Cross or The Salvation Army in an effort to help those fellow Americans in need.
Given my occupation, it should come as no surprise that I can extrapolate an estate planning lesson in almost every situation. In the case of this storm, while at Home Depot on the Saturday morning, I witnessed more than a dozen people buying generators (at about $700 each) in the event that power went out. As I took note of the sense of urgency on the faces of these individuals, I wondered how many of them had prepared their estate plan. It is, after all, human nature to deal with the crisis in front of us, not the one that we can’t see yet…