Recently a talk radio show had a guest discussing estates and how money is dividing families. If you are fortunate, you get along with members of your family and remain close connections with them. Your parents did all the right things and money can be distributed upon their death. Many people do not want to talk about death – it seems morbid, most of us want to continue living. One aspect of death is what do you want to do with your assets. Traditionally, the assets went to immediate family members, however those who have families similar to the show Modern Family know there are many combinations and tradition. while an ideal, is not always a reality. Everyone who lives has some assets, many also have liabilities or debts, but as you accumulate your assets, you need to consider what distribution you want to leave. A will is a great place to start and if you look in the financial district of the closest city to you, you will see office buildings with the word trust or estates. Depending on the size of your assets, the family may have ideas of what to do with the money if they inherited it, does it match your ideas?

Linking to dividend paying stocks, the type of stocks you wish to own are those that have paid dividends for a number of years and increase the size of the dividend. While you are living, the dividends can provide you with a cash flow; if you are deceased as the estate goes through the time to liquidate it, they continue to provide cash flows as well as capital gains. Most estates take a year or two to come to the point of dividing all the assets up. As you are investing think in those time periods, it should make decisions come easier or when to say no.

There are more questions than answers, till the next time – to raising questions