I’ll get to it some day…….

estate planning

It’s been said that the only certainties in life are death and taxes.  A vast majority of us comply with the annual mid-April tax filing exercise, yet many of us have ignored the other certainty. Here are some revealing statistics, courtesy of AARP and Caring.com.

  1. Only 4 in 10 Americans have a will or living trust.
  2. Almost 20% of Americans aged 72 or older do not have estate planning documents.
  3. Only 58% of Baby Boomers (ages 53 to 71) have estate planning documents.
  4. The vast majority of millennials (ages 18 to 36) —78%— do not have a will.
  5. Gen X (ages 37 to 52) members are only slightly better with 64% not having a will.
  6. Only 36% of American adults with children under the age of 18 have an end-of-life plan in place.  For this group, a will is particularly important as it is used to name guardians for minor children.
  7. Only 53% of Americans have a health care power of attorney.

Do we think that it won’t happen to us?