Your final will can give you peace of mind. Knowing that your properties, assets, and money will be taken care of exactly according to your wishes. Another thing that you can include in your will is establishing who will be the legal guardians for your minor children. This is incredibly important. If you have young children, you have to include your guardianship choices in your will as well.
Here are some of the key considerations you need to keep in mind when choosing a guardian for your children:
You know your children and you know their preferences. So you should make sure that the guardian you’re going to assign your children to can cater to your their needs. This includes everything from their personal worldview and religion to political alignment. You want your children to be brought up the way that you would want them to. So you shouldn’t let someone who you disagree with on a personal level raise your child.
The death of a parent is traumatizing enough for your children. You don’t want to make it any worse by keeping them apart from one another. Orphans siblings usually have a tight bond with one another. They are the only immediate family members that they have. Unless it’s an absolute necessity, don’t assign your children to different guardians.
Raising children is not cheap. So you want to make sure that the guardians you assign the responsibility to are someone who can handle that financial burden. You want your children to have the best life possible when you’re not there to care for them. This is why you should trust someone with enough resources to give your children a good life.
If your children have special needs such as severe asthma or other conditions that need to be tended to regularly, it’s going to be incredibly tough for the guardian to deal with. You have to make sure that the legal guardians are able and willing to take on that responsibility.
The personality and availability of potential guardians should come first. However, age is an important consideration as well. This is because you have to consider how their age is going to affect how the guardian can care for your children. If your kids have always been active and energetic, it may not be the best idea to entrust them with an elder.
Having to move far away from their hometown after the death of their parents can be very difficult for children. If at all possible, you should look for guardians who are in the same area. So that your children don’t have to part with both their friends and their parents.
Once you have chosen a guardian to include in your will, you need to talk to them. Make sure that they are aware and willing to take on the responsibility. When you have come to an agreement, you can start by having them fill out the legal guardianship forms so that you can include in your will. Once all the information is filled out, the named guardian will have to sign an agreement form along with a witness. This makes the form to take effect. You can include all the necessary evidence, notes, and information as to why you have chosen this guardian in case a relative shows up to claim the children’s custody. This additional information can make a huge difference if the case is to go to court. It will be a lot easier for an attorney to build a case for your assigned guardians if you include a reason why you chose them over everybody else.
Death is understandably not something that many people want to think about, but making plans in the case of death is essential to ensure that your children have a good future.
