How To Will Your Estate To Charitable Causes

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How To Will Your Estate To Charitable Causes

15 December 2017
 Categories: Law, Blog


You always hear these stories about eccentric millionaires leaving their estate to cats or to some charitable cause they supported in life. If you have no heirs or no heirs to which you want to leave anything, you can leave your estate to animals, human causes, and charities too. Here is how.

Hire an Estate Attorney

First and foremost, hire an estate attorney. If you have any human children, they may contest your will after you are gone. The estate attorney can make sure that whatever arguments they present to the courts, the lawyer can knock them down and move on with your final wishes. You will also need your attorney to properly word your will so that it is properly dispersed and the heirs to which you leave everything to honor your will as well.

Leaving Your Estate and Fortune to Animals

If you are going to leave your home and all of your wealth to animals, be as specific as possible. Do you want the local animal shelter to use the property as an overflow shelter, or do you want them to sell the property and use the proceeds to fund the current shelter? Leave out no details. 

If you leave the property to your own pets, you must appoint a caretaker to look after the pets. Be sure to choose someone you trust, who will not sell this or that off every time he/she enters your home. This may be difficult, especially if you are not certain that you know of the perfect person for the job. Think this over very carefully before naming your pets' caretaker in the will.

Leaving Everything to a Specific Charity

What kind of charity are you naming to receive your estate? Will it house and protect battered women or runaway teens? Maybe it will be a safe house for those who were part of human peddling ring, or maybe it is a shelter for the local homeless. Whatever you want your home used for, your lawyer will need to use very specific language to avoid having the rules broken or bent to fit other projects.

If you want the whole of your estate liquidated and the funds turned into a check to give the charity, put that in your will. Everything you have will be turned into cash and either deposited into a trust for the charity or turned into a cashier's check. All of this will take place after your estate attorney has managed to get your will through probate.

Contact a law office like DOUG NEWBORN LAW FIRM, PLLC for more information and assistance.