>>didn't allow for any kind of property division other than percentages of the total.
Knowing someone who works in Trusts & Estates, that is terrible. I've often heard complaints about drafting by percentages of anything but straight financial assets which have an easily determined value, because that requires an appraisal(s). Yes, there are mechanisms to work it out in the end, but it is definitely better to be able to say $X to Alice, $Y to Bob and the remainder to Claire.
You have to think of not only what you want, but how the executors will need to handle it. We all love complex formulae, but we should use our ability to handle complexity to simplify things for the heirs - it's a real gift in a bad time.
Heh, okay I guess what I wanted was going to end up as the worst of both— fixed amounts off the top to some particular people/causes, and then the remainder divided into shares for my kids.
I guess there's an understanding the being an executor is a best-effort role, but maybe you could specifically codify that +/-5% on the individual shares is fine, just to take off some of the burden of needing it to be perfect, particularly if there are payouts occurring at different times and therefore some NPV stuff going on.
Knowing someone who works in Trusts & Estates, that is terrible. I've often heard complaints about drafting by percentages of anything but straight financial assets which have an easily determined value, because that requires an appraisal(s). Yes, there are mechanisms to work it out in the end, but it is definitely better to be able to say $X to Alice, $Y to Bob and the remainder to Claire.
You have to think of not only what you want, but how the executors will need to handle it. We all love complex formulae, but we should use our ability to handle complexity to simplify things for the heirs - it's a real gift in a bad time.