SPEAKER 03 : 0:05

Welcome to Mobile Estate Planning with your host, Michael Bailey. Over a decade ago, attorney Michael Bailey turned his attention to estate law after he recognized the unacceptable number of adults without proper end of life planning. Michael recognizes that many of his clients have difficulty finding the time for making a proper estate plan. That’s why he became the Mobile Estate Planner. He will go to wherever you are to assist you with your estate planning, including writing wills, trusts, and giving you the information you need to avoid probate. Now, ATX, Ask the Experts, presents Mobile Estate Planning with your host, Michael Bailey.

SPEAKER 02 : 0:57

Good afternoon, welcome to Mobile Estate Planning with Michael Bailey, so we can do something besides just leave your family alone. You’re listening to KLZ 560 AM, also 100.7 FM, or the KLZ 560 radio app. phone number to talk to me on the air 303-477-5600 and again that’s 303-477-5600 and my direct line is 720-394-6887 once again 720-394-6887 so You know, we’re trying to do something besides just leave your family alone, trying to do estate planning, trying to do all these things. And there’s lots of different factors that go into estate planning. And, you know. There’s all sorts of things that go into it, like whether it’s a – you’ve got an estate planning. So what do you want to do in an estate plan? Okay, we’ve got to do what you’ve got to do in an estate plan, and we’ve got to figure out who you want to leave stuff to, who you want to leave in charge, who you want to handle things, and all that type of stuff. So that’s kind of the substance of what an estate plan is. But there’s also many other things that go into getting an estate plan done, like meeting with an estate planning attorney or getting a draft copy of things and reading through it and getting questions answered. Or like we had this week, trying to figure out how to get things signed. So you’d think that wouldn’t be a big deal. Oh, hey, we’ll sign things. We can sign them in front of witnesses. We can sign them in front of a notary. Yeah, we should do that. And the reason we should do that is because those are the technical requirements. Well, on Monday morning, about 9.30, 9.45, I got a call, and it was the lady that I have notarized a bunch of things for me. Usually I will take on notarizing the trusts that I write. Because I want to be able to talk to people and give them, go through, okay, here’s what you need to do to get assets into the trust. And here’s the next steps you need to take. And if they have questions, I want to be there for it. But my clients who just need wills and powers of attorney and things like that, I try to get their questions answered first. and then I will set up an appointment between them and a lady that I know who works for me, and she’s a notary. So I’ll send my notary to meet with people and get things signed, witnessed, and notarized because I’m booked multiple weeks out. I’m booked out 10, 11, 12 weeks at any given time. And so a lot of people who are just trying to get their will and powers of attorney done, they don’t necessarily want to wait. another three months to get things signed when they’re ready to go. And I totally understand that. But the phone call I got from my notary on Monday morning was telling me that she was sick. Apparently she got the flu. And you know, this is not overly surprising because her The son had the flu the week before. And so, you know, when someone in your household has the flu, it seems like it’s usually only a matter of time before you get the flu. Unless you’re Luke and one of Luke’s superpowers is he does not get the flu ever. I mean, he has had, you know, multiple colds and, you know, various things, but never the flu. Am I correct, Luke, or am I being just completely off the rails here?

SPEAKER 01 : 4:43

uh you know i think we’re closer to off the rails okay good i think so i figured as much but you know as long as i keep trying to guess your superpowers no as much as i would love to claim that i never had the flu i just i don’t think it would be honest if i did dang it

SPEAKER 02 : 4:57

Okay. Well, okay. Now I’ll sit here corrected then fine, whatever. But anyhow, so my notary, she had two appointments on Monday and two yesterday. And so we, so she was like, Oh, well, what should I do? I’m like, well, I don’t think it’s a great idea. Um, um, uh, I still don’t think it’s a, you know, I don’t think it’s a great idea for, uh, them to, you know, to go visit people, especially where my clientele can be a little bit older or, you know, one of the appointments was going to be at an assisted living facility. I don’t think the assisted living facility would appreciate us sending somebody with a flu in to get something signed. You know, that just doesn’t seem like a great idea. And so because of that, I was like, okay, well, let’s see if we can reschedule things. So the ones on Monday, one got rescheduled to Friday, one got rescheduled to next Monday. The ones yesterday, my wife went and did one of them in the morning. And then the other lady, as it turned out, her fence had been blown over in the wind. So she was super concerned about how she was going to be able to get to this appointment on time and very concerned about it. So when she got a call saying, hey, you know, it would be a whole lot better if we were to do this a different day and a different time. She was thrilled, just like we were thrilled that it wasn’t going to work that day. As a matter of fact, so that one got rescheduled for today, and it was a 2 o’clock appointment. It’s all done, according to my lovely wife, who she’s also a notary. She’s a reverse mortgage loan officer, so she does that for work, but because… of the flu and the way it worked out. She could take a couple of the appointments yesterday morning, this afternoon to get things done. But it’s always interesting when you have, you know, busy schedules like that and you want to try to get in and then something happens. I had somebody on Monday who, It’s like, oh, you know, I want to be able to meet with you, but my spouse got called out of town on work and so we can’t do it. When can we reschedule? So I let them know that I’m scheduling out in April at this point. And if that time frame worked for them, please let me know and we could certainly get something taken care of. But I don’t know that that’s going to work for them because they’d already waited three months or so to get in to see me. And right around the holidays when I took some time off to be with family, it meant that the timing was not going to be such that you take a week of vacation. It’s amazing how that pushes everything else back a week. And so I tell my clients, I’m like, look, I help. There’s a lot of people to help. I help as many people as I can as quickly as I can, including you. But if you want something quick, I might not be the wrong. I might be the wrong person. So, you know, something as simple as scheduling conflicts, something as simple as timing issues can be an important thing in an estate plan. I got a call from somebody today who they were asking about their mom’s will, and apparently mom’s will is 20 or 30 years old. I’m like, well, it’s still good. It still can do things. It might not be what you want to do unless your life looks exactly the same now, 25 or 30 years later than it did back then. And I suppose for somebody where if you set up a will when your kids are in their mid-30s and then, you know, 30 years later, your kids are in their mid-60s and you’re in your 80s and you’re like, okay, but I still want to leave things to the kids. I’m like, cool, that’s perfectly fine. But most people that I know, their lives change over time. I mean, you know, I have my three kids and I have how I want to, you know, I want to split it up between the three kids equally and that’s perfectly fine. Mine are young enough that I don’t want to go to them all at once. But if my kids are in their mid-30s, then I’m like, hey, I’m okay with everything going to them all at once. And so I have it set up that way. But the timing of setting things up and the timing of how things are distributed, the timing of how your estate plan gets set up or gets signed becomes very important too. I’ve had people who sign an estate plan after they’ve been diagnosed with dementia or Alzheimer’s. So then the people can get very concerned about, oh, well, is this person capable of understanding what they’re doing? And usually I’m like, well, yeah, we could have a whole conversation about what they were going to do. And then I came back a few weeks later and they still understood everything and could follow everything. That’s great. Well, now that I’ve been an attorney for long enough, I’ve seen people challenge things like that. So normally, if somebody comes to me and they’re like, oh, well, you know, mom or dad or I or husband has a Alzheimer’s or a dementia diagnosis, I say, OK, cool. Really what we’re going to need is a doctor’s note where a doctor has administered some sort of cognitive test that they can determine that this person is capable of understanding what they’re doing and making their own decisions. Because I’ve learned over the years that I don’t necessarily want it to just be my word or the word of the notary and the witness’s. against somebody who’s like, oh, but I have a medical diagnosis here of dementia. I’m like, yes, but a medical diagnosis of dementia doesn’t mean the person doesn’t understand what they’re doing. So you are listening to Mobile Estate Planning with Michael Bailey here on 560 KLZ AM, also heard on 100.7 FM or the KLZ 560 radio app. Phone number to talk to me are in the air. The studio line is 3 0 3 4 7 7 5 6 0 0. And again, that’s 3 0 3 4 7 7 5 6 0 0. And my direct line is 7 2 0 3 9 4 6 8 8 7. Once again, 7 2 0 3 9 4 6 8 8 7. And so. Part of it is not that necessarily a medical diagnosis is better than a personal observation, but in the world of evidence, people tend to look at, oh, we’ve got one sort of medical evidence, we should need another type of medical evidence to offset it. Yeah. And that’s not necessarily what the law says. It’s not necessarily what is required. But it’s not a bad thing to have is to have some sort of medical thing there. Because if we’re going to have questions about somebody’s mental competency or we’re going to have questions about somebody’s mental ability to understand what they’re doing and to actually make an estate plan, I’ve learned over the years, I mean, I think I’m a decent judge of when somebody is just a little bit forgetful or has… What I consider age appropriate memory loss, you know, or as my wife and her friends are like to say, have pregnancy brain where you just forget things. You know, just those type of things are different than you’re truly incapacitated or demented or, you know, stricken with Alzheimer’s and don’t have the ability to make your own decisions or to understand what you’re doing. You know, oftentimes I’ll, you know, when people will call, they’ll be like, oh, you know, mom already has Alzheimer’s or dementia. I’m like, okay, how’s their mental state? Well, it’s okay. All right, cool. So would they understand what they’re doing if you sign something? And if someone says, okay, Well, you know, if you put something in front of them, they’ll sign it. I’m like, well, that’s a different question than what I asked. You know, somebody being able to sign their name doesn’t necessarily mean that they understand what they’re doing. And, you know, on the flip side of that, someone who there are plenty of people who understand what they’re doing, who lack the capacity or the ability to sign their name. You know, I’ve had clients who have lost limbs or. Have Parkinson’s bad enough that their signature is going to look a lot more like a seismograph printout than an actual signature. It’s still the person. They still understand what they’re doing. They just don’t have as good of control as their motor functions. And, of course, it’s amazing how often with my elderly clients, they’re always apologizing for their penmanship. Right. They’re like, oh, you know, I’m sorry, I can’t write very well. I used to have the best penmanship. And then they like to tell me about their teacher growing up and It’s amazing how everybody seems to remember the name and the important characteristics of the person who taught them penmanship. So, like, oh, yeah, it was Mrs. Green in third grade, and she was super mean about stuff, and she’d have us, you know, write, you know, when we couldn’t go out to recess, she’d have us write the quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog, you know, 50 times during recess, and we thought that was a terrible recess, and so I’ve never liked Mrs. Green ever since, and I’m like… I can see that. Or they’ll tell me about Mr. Jones, who was their teacher, and he had a ruler, and if you didn’t hold the pencil properly in between your thumb and index finger and middle finger, then he would slap you on the back of the hand with a ruler, and so you’d have to hold the pen or the pencil properly. And I usually tell them, I’m like, yep, I can see how that could be a thing. Because all three of my children hold a pen or a pencil differently. And the quote unquote proper way that teachers were trying to teach you. And I’m like, yeah, whatever. It’s how I hold it. Just mostly because that’s how I got taught. But like my daughter, each of them hold their pens or their pencils differently, and my son does. And I think that’s part of why you hold a pen. It tends to be a little bit more free-flowing and better for cursive. Well, then we get into a whole conversation about cursive writing. And my oldest daughter learned cursive. And so she can sign her name. My middle daughter learned a little bit. My son was right in there where they didn’t learn cursive. So he doesn’t know cursive. He doesn’t know how to write in cursive. And he doesn’t know how to read cursive. We were reading him a story of… some sort of hamster that was a class pet. And one of the pictures was a picture of a handwritten note in cursive. And so he needed to read this note to understand the story. And he comes to us a little bit panicked because he couldn’t read the cursive, and what was he supposed to do? And I said, well, kiddo, do we need to read it to you? He’s like, what, you can read this? You can understand this? I’m like, well, yes, yes, we can. So we read him the cursive note, and he was excited, and he moved on. And so sometimes I think of cursive as like this secret written language that those of us who are adults will be able to use to communicate with each other. Now, I’ve been told by some of my clients that there was that we’re not going to do cursive, and it kind of disappeared for a while, but now they’re going back to it because they’re finding that it helps with brain development to be able to do cursive. Similar type of things with analog clocks and being able to know that 12 is the top and 6 is the bottom and being able to read that type of clock. So many kids have grown up with digital clocks that they don’t know how to tell time from an analog clock. And I’m like, well… I’m glad that my kids do know how to read an analog clock. It seems like a good thing. There’s still plenty of analog clocks, and especially for someone like the important clocks or the clocks of historical significance. If you’re in London and you’re looking at the Big Ben, the big, giant, multiple stories tall clock tower, and you’re like, oh, gee, what time is it? huh someone needs to install a digital face on big ben i’m like well that would be like not what you want to do with an architectural wonder like big ben you don’t want to be you know ruining it by trying to put some sort of digital readout when they would just mess with the architecture of it all i mean i suppose if you were to integrate like the bricks could like flip and turn different colors or something okay that would be cool But it would still mess with the architecture and we’re trying to not mess with a cool architecture. And yes, I can appreciate cool architecture. You know, I’m not necessarily a huge architecture fan. I’m not like, oh, this has to be the greatest architecture ever. But when I was in college, I had a I took a humanities class and it was required for my major. And one of the professors I took it from, that was his emphasis, was like styles of architecture. And so he was like, okay, this is the Tudor style, and this is the Roman, and the Neo-Roman, and the Classical Roman, and this is the Art Deco, and this is the Classical and Romantic style. So he went through all of the things, and he’s like, oh, and And just so you know, here’s the buildings on campus where you can go find these styles of architecture and tell us all about it. I’m like, you know, I don’t really get as enthusiastic and as jazzed about architectural styles as this professor did. But it was pretty cool to be in class and be all excited about it. I mean, I had a biology professor who got super enthusiastic and jazzed about all the different types of trees on campus, too. I didn’t go with him on that journey. I’m like, there are trees. There’s deciduous. There’s evergreen. Don’t really get that excited about trees. But, you know, trees were his thing. He was super excited about them. And, you know, this, my professor was super excited about architecture, but you now I’ll be driving around. I’m like, huh, that’s kind of an interesting place to have a Tudor style house amongst all these, you know, new classical architecture houses. I wonder if it was built at a different time or if somebody decided that they were just going to be different and, you know, crazy. And then you drive the, uh, some of the older neighborhoods in Denver, and you can clearly tell which are the new houses where somebody bought an older house and tore it down and built a new kind of more modern architecture type of house. You’re like, yep, that does not fit with the character of the rest of the neighborhood. That’s fine. It’s cool. But I notice things like this because for some reason it stuck with me. So be it. But as you’re, you know, so what does architecture and architectural things have to do with estate planning? Answer, absolutely nothing. It’s just kind of, you know, kind of a fun story. So anyhow, you are listening to Mobile Estate Planning with Michael Bailey here on KLZ 560 AM. Also heard on 100.7 FM or the KLZ 560 radio app. Phone number is 303-477-5600. And again, that’s 303-477-5600. And my direct line is 720-394-6887. And once again, 720-394-6887. But I suppose in the same way that my professor got super excited about architectural styles, I get super excited about estate plans. Now, I’m not going to be like, ooh, let me tell you all the cool, exciting, different types of estate plans. People are like, yeah, I don’t care. And I’m like, yeah, it’s very simple to those people. I’m like, we can talk about wills or trusts, and that I can at least hold people’s attention for a couple of minutes talking about the differences and the similarities and why you might want one over the other. But when I’m at social gatherings and Christmas parties and things like that, there wasn’t a whole lot of, oh, let me talk about what I do for a living. now my brother-in-law who’s an interventional radiologist he can talk about cool medical cases and things like that people like oh it’s so interesting and i’m like yeah so i met with this person and we figured out what to do with their stuff and then we got it all signed and now when they die they’ll know what’s going to happen and people like is there a point to this story? Is it going anywhere? Is there anything interesting in this story? And I’m like, no, there’s really not. It’s important and necessary, and it’s something you have to have of your estate plan, but it’s not that exciting. It’s really not. I get excited about stuff like that, but then again, I’m weird and crazy. But it’s kind of like, My wife, her degree is in finance, but it could very easily be an accounting degree. And she had a boss who was super enthusiastic and super excited about accounting. And she’s like, it was just what she did. It was accounting and tax and international tax at that point. It was what they loved to do. I’m like, well, that’s super cool. That’s super awesome. That’s super not what I would want to do. You know, I have like I can do my own taxes and I do. And when my wife worked for the accounting firm, I said to her, like, oh, so you’re going to do our taxes? And she said, if I have to see one more tax return, I’m going to have to, you know, kill somebody. And you’re the closest one. I said, right. So I’m doing our taxes. And that’s been the case ever since. And I suppose it doesn’t hurt that I’m licensed to practice in front of the IRS, so I’m licensed to be able to resolve tax things, and I’m licensed to be able to prepare taxes for other people, although I used to do that as part of my law practice, but I’ve gotten so busy and haven’t done it in several years that it probably wouldn’t be the greatest idea for me to just jump right back into it. But I still do know how to do my own taxes, and that’s a good thing. At least for me. Other people, I do remember I had a friend my freshman year and he was always like, oh, I can’t do my own taxes. I’m going to, you know, I want to have to go to the free tax seminar so they can help me do it for them. I’m like, okay, cool. Well, he is now a supply chain manager for one of the major defense contractors, and all he does is he lives with numbers and making sure that the numbers are, when he gets audited by the federal government, that all of the money and everything is accounted for and everything like that. And I’m like, well, we kind of ended up in a spot where the numbers are your thing and you have to keep track of them. keep track of all the necessary rules of accounting and the necessary rules of all that stuff so you know he’s excited about that i mean he gets more excited about he’s like yeah you know we have all these cool military technologies that i can’t tell you about but they’re super cool he’s like you know every once in a while he’ll be like yeah you know somehow some of these science fiction things they’re not quite as fictiony as you might think i’m like oh well that’s good to know i’m like well if I’m like, I’m not entirely sure what he’s talking about. I’m like, you know, is that that we really do have technology binoculars where you can like see through walls and see people? Because I’d be kind of cool. It’s like Superman with x-ray vision. And, you know, Superman with x-ray vision sounds fun. But, you know, Superman with x-ray vision is like, oh, you can see through the wall. You can see what’s going on over there. I’m like, what? Well, that’s not quite how x-rays work, you know, because if I could, you know, right now I can see Luke through the glass. I’m like, woohoo. If there was a wall there, if I had x-ray vision, I might be able to see your bones, but I don’t know that I’d be able to see the distinguishing features of Luke of his bones. Haircut and eyes and beard and mouth. Little kid’s song, head, shoulders, knees, and toes. It’s like if you just see bones, I’m like, I’m not sure that I could quite recreate what Luke would look like from his skeleton. So, you know, x-ray vision sounds really cool, but I don’t think it’s quite pure science with the x-ray. But, you know, it sounds cool for Superman. Superman could also, you know, outrun a train and stop or outrun a speeding bullet and stop a train and do all sorts of cool things because he had super strength and super speed and, you know, all those kind of things. I don’t have super strength or super speed or super hearing or I don’t really have a lot of superpowers. I believe my grandchild’s superpowers is zero. You know, maybe it’s the ability to put up with craziness because that seems to be what I do in a lot of things, both. as an estate planning attorney, and last night I refereed a basketball game, and plenty of craziness there. But as you’re going through and setting up an estate plan, you’re like, okay, we’ve got kind of the substance of it, of who gets what, who’s in charge, what goes where, and how do those things get distributed out? Is it all at once? Is it over time? Those are the kind of things I need to gather from my clients so that I can make that happen. But then there’s also the there’s a logistical part is the technical part of assigned witness notarized and done the proper way. There’s a logistical part of how do we meet and, you know, I’m a solo estate planning attorney. So that means there’s probably going to be a wait to see me, you know, if If I were a solo estate planning attorney, I’m like – and you call me, you’re like, oh, can I come see you? I’m like, sure. I’ve got time 5, 10, 15 minutes from now. Or tomorrow all day is open. Or, you know, Friday is all day open. And you’re like, wait a minute. Does this guy actually have anything to do? Does he have any work? Or is it not really something where he’s got work to do? Because it becomes a little bit concerning if there’s so much availability that he can get you right in. Now, if I had 10 other attorneys working for me, I think that would be an interesting challenge anyway. But then I could get people in a whole lot quicker and a whole lot easier. But then I would have to deal with supervising 10 other attorneys. Anyhow, so just, you know, all those things go into it to get your estate plan done. Now, Luke, am I correct that I have about 20 seconds left? No music for today? All right. Well, then. Hey, there’s my music. Usually Luke’s right on it about, you know, a minute to go. But anyhow, I will be back next week. Stay tuned. Rush to Reason is up next, and I’ll talk to you next week. Thanks and bye.

SPEAKER 03 : 28:13

Mobile estate planning with Michael Bailey will return to ATX next Wednesday at 2.30 here on KLZ 560, AM 560, FM 100.7, and online at klzradio.com.