ESTATE PLANNING

Estate Attorney Referrals and Recommendations

By Scott H. Levin, CFP®, ChFC®, CAP®, CEP®, MCEP®

You had the estate planning conversation with your client and now are unsure how to proceed. What is the best way to determine who to recommend the client work with to have their estate documents prepared? Should you recommend 1) engaging an online document preparation service, 2) using the attorney who assisted them with their auto accident, 3) finding a local estate planning specialist, or 4) referring them to a nationally recognized estate planning attorney? Let’s discuss these options, which include very different types, levels of service, and costs.

Online Document Preparation Services

In the past few years, there has been an explosion of companies that market the preparation of estate planning documents. These include:

While this list is not exhaustive, you can see there are many online options now. But the question remains, are these services a desirable choice for your clients, and by recommending them, is there a risk you could be perceived as crossing into the realm of the unauthorized practice of law (UPL)?

Additionally, each of these estate document preparation services can differ significantly from the next. Some enable the client to have only a will-based estate plan. Others provide revocable living trust-based plans. Some work directly with the client during the document preparation phase, while others work with the financial advisor during the process. Some charge the client directly for the service, while others charge the financial advisor, who can include the fee in their service model for the client.

Issues with using these services include: 1) How will the client, who does not have expertise in the estate planning area, know what type of plan best meets their needs and what options are even available to them? and 2) How much expertise does the financial advisor have in the estate planning area to know how to guide the client during the decision-making process?

Simple Is Not Always Best

Often, without proper guidance, clients just assume the simple approach is best and decide to leave all their assets outright to the surviving spouse at the death of the first spouse. Then they leave all the assets outright to their children at the second spouse’s death. While this is a simple plan, it does not provide creditor and divorce protection. It also does not protect the assets from future probate or federal/state estate or inheritance taxes when the children eventually pass away. Another issue is that an outright distribution can be redirected and may be left to someone the client does not intend to receive the assets and is not a member of the family tree. 

Some scenarios include 1) an auto accident resulting in a lawsuit where the outright assets are accessible; 2) a child or grandchild who is a professional, such as a doctor or lawyer, who may be sued beyond their malpractice limits, and the assets left outright can be available to the creditor; 3) the child passes away and leaves the inherited assets to their spouse, who gets lonely, remarries, and then dies, leaving your client’s assets to their new spouse instead of your grandchildren; and 4) your child gets divorced, and half of your assets go to your ex-in-law.

By using a trust-based estate plan, these situations can be avoided. Your client may not even be aware these issues exist and can impact their decision-making. These online services will likely not educate your clients to the full range of options. 

Furthermore, these services tend to only address simple planning issues with their offerings and will not provide options for special needs heirs and pet care after the client dies or address issues related to non-U.S. citizen spouses. For example, if IRA assets are left to a trust for a surviving spouse or children, the trust must be a “see-through” trust to qualify for certain distribution rules under the SECURE Act. There are determinations regarding whether a trust in this situation should be a conduit or accumulation trust and what provisions are needed to impact whether the trust itself pays the income tax on trust assets at a significantly compressed tax bracket or whether the beneficiary pays the income tax at their likely lower income tax rates. These issues are among those that are not likely to be considered by online providers.

Don’t Cross the UPL Line

Another very significant issue is that you, as the financial advisor, need to be careful that in providing the estate planning document preparation option, you do not cross the line into the UPL. How do you ensure you do not have this issue? I recommend you first recommend that an estate planning attorney prepare the documents. If your client is very cost-conscious and wants to use an online service, then you should not make specific recommendations to the client as to the type of plan, documents, or provisions that should be prepared. You can generally explain what different documents can accomplish, bringing up the issues the client should consider, but let the online service provider guide the client to determine how the estate plan will be structured. If you plan to bundle the estate document preparation fee into your fee to the client and pay the service provider yourself, you should discuss this with your legal counsel and E&O provider to get their input on whether this could create a problem for you and your firm.

While these issues exist with online estate planning platforms, that does not necessarily mean they are not the right option in some circumstances. For a client who has a relatively low net worth and wants a simple plan, online services could possibly make sense. These services tend to be less expensive than having estate documents prepared by an attorney, so this may also be a consideration for certain clients.

Use the Attorney Who Assisted Them With Their Auto Accident or Non-Estate Legal Matter

I have unfortunately had situations where clients used an attorney they knew from a prior legal issue and hired them to prepare their estate documents. Unless the attorney prepares a substantial number of wills and other estate documents and is familiar with the issues and laws involved, this is a bad idea. I would recommend a client use an attorney who specializes in estate planning for their document preparation.

Find a Local Estate Planning Specialist

For most clients, it would be appropriate to identify a local estate planning specialist for their document preparation. You can even create a relationship with a few of these attorneys so you can become familiar with their process, documents, fees, and time frame for document preparation. This will also allow you to get feedback from clients on how the interactions with the attorney went and provide an opportunity for you to review the documents to determine if the attorney made any glaring mistakes.  

After having the client sign an attorney authorization form, you can then provide the attorney with the client’s net worth information, titling of assets, and beneficiary information to enable them to not have to start from step one in gathering this data from the client directly. This should save the attorney time, and because of this, you can potentially negotiate a lower fee for plans prepared for your clients.

Some attorneys use their own custom estate planning documents. Others work with a service, such as Interactive Legal or WealthCounsel. These services provide all attorneys on their platform with a standard set of documents. The attorney can then choose which provisions to include based on the state law and the client’s objectives. When new laws are passed, or case decisions impact the provisions needed within the documents, the service makes these changes and provides the revised document language to the attorneys on their platform. I find collaborating with attorneys on a platform helpful because I work with clients in various states throughout America, and the format of documents is consistent, making it easier for me to review them to determine if the appropriate provisions were included to meet the client’s objectives. This option will likely be more expensive than the online document preparation services but will enable an estate attorney to prepare a plan that meets the client’s needs and objectives.

Refer to a Nationally Recognized Estate Planning Attorney

If you have a client with a large net worth above the exemption amount (in 2025 it is $13.99 million per person) who will be subject to federal estate taxes, a special needs beneficiary, a multiple marriage situation or children from a prior relationship, heirs who have spendthrift or addiction issues that live in a state with a state estate or inheritance tax, as well as other more complex issues, then you may want to refer the client to a nationally recognized estate planning attorney, such as Martin Shenkman, Alan Gassman, and others. You can find these attorneys by searching for them on websites such as Martindale.com and looking for AV-rated estate attorneys where peers have provided high ratings for the lawyer. You can also check for ACTEC attorneys (American College of Trust and Estate Counsel) who have demonstrated a high level of professionalism in wills and trusts, estate planning, and tax law. Furthermore, you can identify speakers at conferences, such as The Heckerling Institute, who specialize in providing a very high level of education to estate professionals. You can also contact the bar association for the state in which the client lives and ask for attorneys involved in their Real Property, Probate, and Trust Law section. 

These attorneys should be able to handle more complex planning issues for your clients. They typically will also be able to address asset protection planning-related issues. They will design an estate plan that is specific to the needs and objectives of the client. While this option can be very valuable, the cost can also be more expensive and may not make sense for a client with a more modest net worth and no estate planning complexities to consider.

I hope this article has been helpful in determining the approach you may want to pursue for a client in the design, preparation, and implementation of an estate plan. With a better understanding of the available alternatives, and their pros and cons, this information can be used to better assist your clients in addressing their estate planning needs.

Scott H. Levin, CFP®, ChFC®, CAP®, CEP®, MCEP®, is a Financial Advisor, Senior Estate Planning Specialist with Wescott Financial Advisory Services in Pennsylvania.

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