Why People Delay Estate Planning

This week on Judica County Radio, hosted by Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer, Managing Partners, Whitaker and Hamer Law Firm, practicing attorneys here in the great state of North Carolina. The top reasons people delay estate planning. Stay tuned. We'll also have those complimentary consults coming up on Judica County. Whitaker and Hamer present Judica County.

with Joshua Whitaker and Joseph Hayner. Welcome into Judica County Radio. Your hosts are Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer, managing partners, Whitaker and Hamer Law Firm, the power behind the program. They're practicing attorneys here in North Carolina. Offices located in Raleigh, Garner, Cleveland, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuque Verena, Gastonia, and down on the coast at Moorhead City.

I'm Morgan Patrick. Absolute pleasure to jump on with the attorneys, talk legalese, and other things. We also give you an opportunity to get on their calendar complimentary consult in and around estate planning. You can call at any time during the show, 919-7727000, or visit the website wh.lawyer. Get signed up for those.

Again, complimentary, meaning you're not paying for it, and also you're not agreeing to become a client. This is, again, no obligation. 919-77270000. And we start off the show. We're going to get into top reasons people delay estate planning.

But before that, we always do this. Josh, how was the week? It's been fun. The week has been fine. I've been.

You guys don't know this, but when I'm working, you know, I got a two-monitor setup like most of the country at work, right? They're all. Yeah. I think it's the basic setup now, right? Have you ever?

It's fancy, man. That's fancy. If I've ever had fine.

So I have two monitors set up and then I I usually will open my laptop in the middle. And then I got a T V on the wall. Wear out his watch, whatever. You know, I'll just in the background, you know, and I like to have. I like to have like jazz on there, not like concerts, like old concerts from the 50s and the 60s and the 70s.

So if you go on YouTube, you know, I'll just have Coltrain. you know, a concert from France or something going. It'll just go and go and go. And then, like, I'll come in the next day and I won't know what's on, right? Because it'll just keep playing whatever it wants to play.

You know how YouTube works? Yeah, we've. I think we've got some experience with YouTube, man.

So it'll just keep going and going and going. And so one morning I came in. And it was all like super like uh Ni like people from the nineties who have grown up, but they're just DJs now, right? But now, like, DJs making their own music, just GJs playing old, old music.

Okay. And so, my favorite one is this guy. I can't read his name, he's on right now. But um so he plays like old seventies and eighties and nineties music and then he's got a big stack of VHS tapes in the background and he just shows you what movie he's playing on VHS. He just changed it to Friday.

And so he has that going on in the background. And that's my favorite thing to watch, just have on in the background now while I'm working, you know. The movie Friday or that guy's channel? He's put, yeah, on his TV. He's got a little TV in the back, and he's got Friday on the TV.

It was Waterboy earlier. And then he's got his turntable. But I was thinking that's how we should do consults now. Like you should just come meet me. At my turntable, and I'll lay down some vibes for you and then just talk to you about your legal matter.

Well I I dunno, theme music. Smooth jazz. I I yeah, I think maybe smooth jazz, some theme music, might make the uh consult go, I don't know. A little smoother. He was doing some 70s like yacht rock.

He had Poco going, you know. The people, a lot of the people, they don't know. He put on some little feet. He was just. He was easing me into my day, so I appreciate that.

Well, I'm happy for you, man. You seem like you're in good spirits.

So, shout out to that guy for doing that. The other thing, I don't know if I told you guys this either, but I had like the flu or I had something like three months ago. Mm-hmm. It it took me out and I came when I got better. I couldn't drink coffee.

For a while, I couldn't do it. I couldn't drink. Coffee was disgusting. What kind of disease? Like, disgusting, like acidic?

I mean I just didn't like the taste. My body did not want coffee. And then I eased back into it.

Now I can drink like I used to drink coffee all day long. And now I drink coffee. I had like two cups in the morning. That's all I can do. I don't know why.

I don't know the medical explanation for what happened. Yeah, I've weaned off coffee. I do morning, but then after about 11 o'clock, I don't want it. I bought I bought to replace my all-day coffee because I've tried a lot of different things because I get really Groggy, what between like one to three, and I need some kind of pick-me-up, and now it's not coffee. And so I got these little pouches that are ground coffee and vitamin B.

Uh-huh. You put them in like dip, give them a plug. I no, I'm not gonna do it. I'm like, they haven't paid us any money for it. I was going to say, I didn't know if it was a bad thing.

So, it's like ordering it all to yourself. You don't want them to sell out because you're the one. It's like one of those old school tobacco pouches, but it's got coffee in it. Yeah, it's ground coffee. Vitamin B, and then they flavor it.

This one's some kind of vanilla. That vitamin B is big, too, man. Yeah. So I have one in right now. That's why I'm so.

Energetic. Show is so much better.

So much better. Say, man, normally, as soon as you start talking, I get depressed because. I always feel like I should be the one opening the show. Morgan always throws it to me, and I'm usually the least energetic of everybody. It's a tradition.

You set the tone. You are the tone setter for our group. Yeah, you know, when they test cars and they put the test dummies in the car and they run it into the wall. That's how we open the show. We're going 55 miles an hour, and I go, Josh, up to you.

Smash. Yeah. You are the brakes for the car that is our radio show, man. I think I need to train one of our paraleles to give me like a vitamin B shot every day. Like right when I come in.

That's a vitamin B shot, right? Just get you juiced up, man.

Well, at least you said shoulder, right? Yeah. You're full of. Yeah. That's where the vitamin B shot goes.

So it's so dense. All right.

Well, no, wait a minute. Wait a minute. What about Joe? We can't leave Joe out. We do lead off with you.

Yeah. I'm doing good. Joe, man. Joe is the, you know, he's half the show. Go ahead, Joe.

I'm doing good, man. Everything's going fine. No complaints. Um, Nothing nothing super exciting to report. Joel Joel win last night, basketball?

Yeah, we had our uh We had our 35 and up men's league basketball game. We were victorious. I think we're going to be the three seed in the playoffs coming up. Come check us out.

Okay, good single. Do you currently have ice bags on your knees? Do you currently have ice bags on your knees? No, I feel pretty good, man. I feel pretty good.

We've had a couple of games where we had like six people. And my minutes limitation gets exceeded. And those are tough, man. They shouldn't let you play. In an over-35 league, they shouldn't let you play unless you have a certain amount of subs.

Like, you should just. I I'm getting older and uh I don't feel that much older. in like stretches, right?

So like two to three minutes of game time. I feel okay. But if I get over like three minutes of continuous Up and down. That's when. The gas tank starts to show, man.

I was watching, there's so much sports on right now. I was watching with the boys. You know, we had the, you know, Monday night. Monday night, we were watching the Kansas City game. You had the Dodgers and the Cubs on.

And the Philly was the Philly, was Phillies and Dodgers, Cubs and Brewers. Correct. But the Cubs. Who's the guy on the Cubs? There's a Cubs.

I think there's a Cubs player. I think they said he was 40. Is it Tucker? There's a Cubs player that's Aged. by Major League Baseball standards.

I think they said he was forty. You don't you guys don't know who this is. Oh no. Let me see. I think it's I think it's Jason Tucker and I think they said he just turned forty.

'Cause he's like a coach but he plays and he's doing really well. I could have all these Justin Turner. 40 years old. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Justin Turner, he's 40 years old.

What position? Oh, he's starting. Yeah, he's might be the infilder.

Okay, an in-filter and a DH. That's right. I think he's DHing, but he's going nuts. And so I was watching it, but they were showing him in pregame, and he has like a cub shirt. It's got a Cubs logo on the back.

It's blue. On the front, it says everything hurts. I thought we should get a Whitaker and Hamer shirt, and it says, Everything hurts. All the time. I like that.

That's a good idea. It's not legal-related, but still, everything does hurt all the time. Yeah, we can give it out to the listeners. Everything hurts. But um All right, as always, I've talked to a lot of people.

Last week, I sat down with a lot of people who Who were getting their estate plans done? And I was talking to one couple, and we were actually talking about all the different ways where. How easy it is to delay doing it. Because they were talking about how the process was a lot easier than they thought it was. And they were in and out.

We answered all their questions. And so it was a good opportunity for one of those Google five-star reviews, right? The folks were very happy with us, and that was great. But it got me thinking about all the reasons. We delay.

Estate planning. And so I've got this list. I was going to say a top 10 list, but I don't know if there's more than 10 or less than 10 on here. But I have this list of the top reasons why people delay estate planning and why you shouldn't let that delay your estate planning because it's easy, easy to do. Easy peasy.

Well, why don't we hold off and we'll get into our next segment and we'll start those reasons why people are delaying estate planning, but also remind our listeners that one of our giveaways today is the complimentary appointment on estate planning. All you got to do is call 919-77270000. That's 919-77270000 or visit the website wh.lawyer and you can get signed up for that. Again, complimentary means you're not paying for it. You leave the checkbook at home and there's no obligation to become a client, but you're going to get a pretty good idea if you are in a good spot as far as estate planning.

If you haven't started, this is a great way to get the ball rolling. 919-7727000, 919-77270000. And you can also visit WH. We've got more Judica County coming up on the other side. Again, top reasons people delay estate planning that's coming up.

Next. Back on Judica County Radio, your hosts are Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer, managing partners, Whitaker and Hamer Law Firm. They are practicing attorneys here in North Carolina, and they placed offices all around the state for your convenience down at the coast, Moorhead City, over near Charlotte, Gastonia, Fuquay Verena, Goldsboro, Clayton, Garner, Cleveland, and the Cap City, Raleigh, North Carolina. If you've got a question you'd like answered on the program, you can always send it to us a la email, questions at judicacountyradio.com. That's questions at judicacountyradio.com.

And again, complimentary consults available on estate planning. Simply call 919-7727000, 919-77270000, or visit the website wh.lawyer. Josh. All right.

Alright.

So I feel like your coffee pouch is Aiden. I was watching this DJ. This DJ is going bananas. That guy's stealing all your attention from us, man. Maybe maybe the key is we put the DJ on too and then we can all It'd be nice in the background.

Watching silence. I'm afraid. I'm afra you know, we don't have the license. We don't have a license for this show to play music, right? You have to correct.

You have to have a commercial license if you're gonna play music over the air at a restaurant or whatever. And of course. A show about legal things doesn't really need a commercial license to play music, as nice as that would be. But I feel like if we had one, all we would do would be play music. Yeah, yeah.

I like that. I like the idea of uh karaoke. Uh yeah. Just take a segment and we just Do a little karaoke. I think that would play well.

Well, right now, just to let you guys know, our show budget would allow us to go with the absolutely, positively free, really bad elevator music.

So think of the worst elevator music you've ever heard.

So we can fit that in. And we could probably do that. Back in the day when I used to work at Arby's and Belk's and the grocery stores, they all had Muzak. You remember Muzak? I do.

They had to come in and put it was like direct TV. They had to put a little dish on the roof, and then you had this little. dial, Musac dial, and it had like twelve channels. And they had no description. It was channel 1, channel 2, channel 3, and it was just different.

Garbage. That sounds terrible, man.

Well that's what you did instead of buying a car anyway We're not talking about this. I don't know, man, but you know what we haven't covered yet? We haven't covered the fact that. Morgan. Uh the greatest Radio host.

Maybe ever. Maybe in history. Destroyed your children in fantasy football this week. We ain't got your feelings on that. My kids, my two oldest.

My youngest is playing in the family. I have three leagues: the family league. Um another league and then I've got the league that we're we're all in. And the league we're all in has the most money on it, so it's the most important league. And my kids, my two oldest kids, have a team.

And then Morgan's got a team, and Joseph's got a team, and I got a team. But they tied. I could spend a lot of time talking about it. 'Cause they could win some real money in this league. and uh they were not happy.

They tied and the tiebreaker was bench scoring. But their whole bench is on a bye or injured, so they had no bench scoring.

So Morgan squeaked out. Whose fault is that, man?

Sounds like your kids need to learn to take accountability. They've learned an important lesson about what happens when you're tied and to know ahead of time what happens. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, I just want to thank the guys on the opposing side of the because we ended up dead even, and my bench helped me out there. But also, I want to give kudos to Travis Kelsey, which is hard for me to say because he's my tight end.

He had like an 11-yard catch. Late in that game, when KC was trying to come on back, and that 11-yard catch gave me the extra point. That tied me with your kids, and then, of course, my bench brought it home. You just know that Travis Kelsey in that moment was thinking. When he made that catch, yeah, he wasn't thinking about this for Morgan's.

He was thinking about Morgan's. Yeah, this is for Morgan. I'm doing this for Morgan. And uh, Shout out, big fan of the show. That's what I heard.

Big fan. Big, big fan. Yeah. All right, I gotta bring my list back up because that's what we were doing today. Hold on.

Yeah, that's right. That's right. Five reasons people delay estate planning. Yep. And I'm gonna get right to it.

They're fixated on YouTube and DJs playing. We could do this all day. We could talk about, you know. I don't know if the people who, you know, I don't know if our listeners would be happy that we didn't talk about legal stuff or unhappy, but we've got to fit some legal stuff in there when we're done. Yeah, you do.

Yeah, you do. I mean, there are always going to be distractions, but and sometimes that's very entertaining conversation.

So our list is broken into categories. And so the first category on top reasons why people delay estate planning, it's labeled emotional and psychological barriers. And the first one is, I think, obvious, and this is everybody, discomfort with mortality. Oh yeah. It's a morbid conversation, man.

And that's I like the lead with that when we sit down with folks. Like, look. It's a weird conversation to have. It's morbid. Nobody likes to think.

Not even just about yourself, because you've got to contemplate your own mortality. But we've got to. We gotta un you know, turn every stone over in that conversation and you know, people come in thinking about themselves, what's going to happen after I'm gone, but You got to think about potentially your kids predeceasing you. There's just a lot of things that are just uncomfortable. Yeah, and it and and that's tough.

And it I think it You know, it kind of Everybody has that problem. People don't want to think about it. And you do hit a certain age. I think once you have. For me, it was once I had kids, right?

And that's when you start thinking about, like, and maybe people do that before they have kids, or people are just really worried about how their spouse is going to be, but. You know, once you have kids For me, that's when I was like, hey, I got to make life as easy as I can for these rug rats, and I got to make sure everything's laid out because, you know, um. There's a lot. I know about our finances, where stuff is, how things are positioned that my wife knows. My wife knows things that I don't know.

But the kids have no idea, right? And so that's what I'm always thinking about.

Something happened to me and my wife. You know, who's going to be the guardian of my kids? who's going to be able to figure out You know, that's that's a real hard thing these days if you lose. And it doesn't happen often, but we always have to take that into consideration. If you and your spouse were both to die in a car accident or something like that, it'd be horrible.

Right. But How is somebody going to come behind you and figure everything out? You know, get your house. Or your house is sold, figure out where your investments are, figure out if you had life insurance, get your kids so their life's not interrupted any more than it absolutely has to be when something like that happens. It's tough and I think once you start We all hit a certain age where we start talking about it and thinking about it, but it's hard to do.

It's not something you naturally want to engage in. Yeah. Well, it's dark. I mean, think about it. I mean, you're talking about.

The what-ifs, and if you're not here, but it also provides, if you do the planning, it's that roadmap that people can follow. And the next, you know, there's two more coming up that I think I almost talked about. One of them, the next one is. Too young, that mindset that I'm too young, I'm still young. And you wouldn't think that would follow you.

You know, I'm getting close to 50, and I still feel like I'm too young. I'm not young enough to get out there on the basketball court and then play a couple times a week. Hey. I feel like I'm too young, you know. I got my whole life ahead of me.

That's, you know, my parents are in their 70s and they feel that way. You know, like, oh. But I think that mindset's with a lot of people. You know, we're too young to really. have to have to worry about it.

But like you know um you know, things bad things happen. And um You know, you have to be even an ounce of preparation, you know. Goes a long way. Yeah, it's unfortunate, man. And it comes back.

This kind of ties back into the morbid nature of the conversation, but. Young people die every day, and it's not good. We don't like it, it's terrible. you know, there's there's there's tragedies. And uh It's very unfortunate, but it's that's the reality, man.

And Nobody n tomorrow isn't promised for anybody. And it's hard. as a reality as that is the face sometimes, ignoring it doesn't change the equation.

So that was that that kind of tied into that and then the um The next one kinda takes it a a step further. Let me get it back in front of me. I keep moving it around. Hmm Where's my list? Oh, there it is.

Feeling overwhelmed, and that's where I was getting. I was talking earlier, you know, feeling overwhelmed when you start trying to do it. Especially the people that try to do it on their own, you know, or just are using templates and hoping things are right and not really consulting with an attorney. Right. And you start talking about powers of attorneys and healthcare power of attorneys, you start looking at trust and revocable versus irrevocable and who the backup's going to be.

Like a lot of times, It can be overwhelming. And a lot of times, when people get overwhelmed, in any. In any arena in life, you just kind of shut down and you put it to the back and you focus on something you can get done. I know I do that. Right, you know, I'm trying to be productive as something overwhelms me, I put it over here on the shelf, and it does.

I don't, in my mind, it doesn't have to be done right now. I try to be productive and go with what. Um feeling overwhelmed is uh is a big one that kinda freezes some people in their tracks. Yeah, a and and again, I I come back to 'cause We sit down with folks every day. We talk to these folks about this, and you can sense that.

Right? Like, it's. It's not hard to sense when you're sitting with someone and you can just kind of tell the wheels are spinning. and and they get that analysis paralysis going on where it's like There's so much to digest. And it's like you don't even know where to start, but but A lot of times I like to tell folks to kind of ground them.

and get them back on the right track. Again, these are The reality is, these are things that are difficult to think about. But but you gotta sort 'em out and Don't let the details freeze you in place and keep you from doing anything. Uh Something is better than nothing, right? Like, so if you can't, if you.

You don't have to get overly complex and overly complicated. If it comes down to it, you just need to put something something to paper. Um We can help you work through a lot of these more complex situations and kind of simplify things to make it. more easy to digest.

So you can kind of beat that feeling of just getting stuck and being overwhelmed. That's another t-shirt you were talking, and I stopped listening to you after a certain point, but you were talking and uh I'm sure it was good information, but you said it was some of the best. You missed it, Josh. It was awesome.

Something is better than nothing. Hold on. From the top.

Something you said something is better than nothing. That could be another firm T-shirt. That's very true, man.

Something is better. Hey, this DJ is selling tapes, like for legitimate tapes. Of his, of him. You can go on his website and order a like a cassette tape. A cassette tape.

Which I kind of want to do. I have a tape plate. But wait, this is his, like, is this he's recording himself or is this he's selling like old tapes of music? I can't tell. Morgan made me turn the volume off when we got started, so I can't tell.

We'll have to check back on that. You know, we're just worried about the quality of air that we have. Yeah. Always having himself a beer. Good for him.

I tell you, man, you're really selling me on this guy, honestly. I'll send you the link. I you know, Josh is kind of like he's kinda like the fish in the in and you know, the the cat in the goldfish tank. It's like he's just sitting there and the goldfish is swimming there and just teasing him. For me to get work done, you know, like the way I see it in my head is there's this front part of the brain.

That can just get distracted. And I really have to have music going or something to distract the front part of the brain so the back part of the brain can do. Real work. That's a very scientific theory, man. And you're really...

you know, you're really throwing a lot of really cool ideas out. And I want to commend you, man. You're really carrying the show today.

So as as we go to break and we're going to continue the uh the top reasons people delay estate planning, uh Josh, if they come in for one of our complimentary consults, should they bring something that's distracting? Uh that they you know I'm gonna get the turnt turntables going. That's That's awesome. Mixing, scratching, and estate planning. Judica County Radio, Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer are your host managing partners, Whitaker and Hamer law firm, and they're practicing attorneys here in North Carolina.

Office is located in Raleigh, Garner, Clayton, Cleveland, Goldsboro, Fuqua Verina, Gastonia, and in Moorhead City. And complimentary consults are available on estate planning. All you got to do is call 919-77270000. That's 919-7727000. Or you could also visit wh.lawyer.

That's wh. We'll get back to it. Again, we've talked about the top reasons, started off, the top reasons people delay estate planning. It's such a dark subject. Maybe they feel like they're too young.

Maybe they're feeling overwhelmed.

So we've gotten through three of these. We've got more to go.

So stay tuned. You're listening to Judica County Radio. We're back after this. Welcome back into Judica County Radio, hosted by Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer, managing partners, Whitaker and Hamer Law Firm. They're practicing attorneys here in our great state of North Carolina.

They've got offices located across the state, Raleigh, right here, Capital City. You got Garner, Cleveland, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fucuid Verina, Gastonia, and down on the coast at Moorhead City. I'm Morgan Patrick. Pleasure to jump on with the attorneys. Also, want to remind you: we are in the middle of the top reasons people are delaying estate planning, but we're also giving you an opportunity to sit down with Whitaker and Hamer, a complimentary consult on estate planning.

Simply call 919-772-7000. That's 919-777. 7727000. Just say, I'd like one of those complimentary consults. You're leaving the checkbook at home.

And again, there's no obligation to become a client and see if you are ready to get the ball rolling on estate planning. Also, you can visit the website wh.lawyers.

So, too dark of a subject. Maybe I'm too young, feeling overwhelmed. Those are the first three reasons we've gotten to, Josh. What else you got?

So that was all. We at the last segment we kind of discussed emotional and psychological barriers. And so now we're going to go into a new category. perceived financial and complexity Barriers, right?

So, this is another category of reasons why people delay estate planning. Um And uh I like this first one because I think this happens a lot. Belief that estate planning is for the wealthy. Yeah, that's a good one, man. And we can talk more about why that's a good one in more detail if you if you Tune out.

I see I literally see you watching. I see you watching the DJ guy right now, man. And I can tell that that's where your focus is. Have you ever been anywhere where there was a DJ where you weren't like happy there was a DJ? Like, hey, this place has a DJ.

That's a good point. Are you saying happy or unhappy? Happy. Nah, it makes you happy, man. I mean,.

I feel like when you see the DJ, you're like, eh, DJ. But if they are terrible, if they're playing. Horrible things, then I mean, I could see it take there, okay. All right.

When you see the DJ, yes, you're happy, man. But there have been times. As the DJ has continued and the choices they've made, I've gotten less happy than I was when I saw there was a DJ.

So when we go down to the lake at our lake, there's like this. There's like this little park. It kind of juts out into the middle of the lake.

So, if you have a house around the edge of the lake, there's this little place. And sometimes, like on holidays, big holidays, like July 4th and whatever, they'll have bands or whatever, and they'll have a DJ. They have this DJ there every year. He gets so drunk.

Okay. So very drunk. DJ drinks a lot. And he forgets. He forgets that he's already played a song, right?

He'll play it again, and then he'll start singing along with it. Yeah. Not very well.

So it's like Top Player. He's playing the hits, though, man. That guy sounds awesome. He's playing the hits. Yeah, he's playing the good songs.

I mean, there's only so many songs in the world, man, that are good.

So. He's just giving you a good, steady diet of the good stuff. New people could be coming in that didn't hear that song. He knows. I feel like that guy's got a finger on the pulse of the late crowd and he knows.

So if you if you are Everybody's definition of wealthy is different. It depends on where you come from, what you're accustomed to.

So I think when we throw around a word like wealthy, That has different context. I've heard the term ultra wealthy and how they shy away from this. You know, people feel like they need to be ultra wealthy. Like, you know, everybody's got some form of value, but they almo it's almost like they feel, well, if I don't have like lots and lots and lots and lots, I don't need that. Yeah.

You you You know, and I don't like throwing around that term, but Everybody needs to get their affairs in some order. And even just talking, and you know, these are free consults. You know, we've had shows where we talk about how attorneys charge, how attorneys make money, you know, what they charge for a personal injury case, what they charge for breach of contract litigation. It's all different. For estate planning, It's for at least for our firm, at least for Whitaker and Hamer, we're going to talk to you for free.

And that means us giving you our advice, like taking a look at what you own, what you don't own, where you want it to go, and giving you some advice. And again, You can walk away from us and never engage us to prepare estate planning docs or get a trust done. But we're going to talk to you about it for free. And I've met very few people. That don't benefit from some sort of conversation on estate planning.

You know, I had met with people who don't really have any heirs. And maybe they don't own a lot of things. And sure, that estate plan will be simpler. then like Morgan said, the ultra wealthy might have a way more complicated A state plan. We might have to think about taxes.

We might have to think about You know, the liquidity of assets, you know, or these assets that can be. Liquidated, or is an heir going to have to come in and run the family business or know how to do something or have this skill set? Sure, the more you have. the more we have to talk about, but everybody has things to talk about. Um And so, yeah, the belief that estate planning is for the wealthy, there's different levels of estate planning.

And everybody needs.

some level. of estate planning. And you might not need what Bill Gates needs. Right. Um But you You need to have your affairs in order, make sure people can...

You know, you have your POAs in place and and people know what you want to happen if you get to that point where you no longer can can make those decisions. And and touching along those same lines, Josh, you know, you talked about the fact that we're going to talk to you for free. Which is a g A great price. If I say so myself. But You know, there's Bad.

Oh. There's no sales pitch aspect to that, right? Like, we're not trying to sell you anything. And if you come in and we sit down. And we look at your situation.

There is a chance that we could determine. Like, there's nothing we need to prepare for you, there's nothing that we need to do for you, but we can still give you practical advice. that can even with very little assets can make the process easier for whoever you leave behind and that's going to cost you nothing.

So having the conversation for the incredible value of zero dollars. You get to look at Josh Whitaker's face for no money. We can talk about DJs. Yeah. I mean,.

What could be better than that?

Well, it's it's knowledge, uh and you feel empowered when you leave the consult because obviously you're you're walking out with more information, more education on a subject you probably lack in that area. Knowledge and power, and that's another Whitaker and Hamer t-shirt that we're wearing. It's in the I you know, I ta I ti I tell my I tell my kids this, but I talk to a lot of people, and the firm spends a lot of time doing estate planning, but I talk to people about a lot of different areas of law. I've been doing this for a good long time at this point, and I do a lot of years. I do, I do.

I do a lot of consults with people, and people come in, and I talk with a lot of people who are. Scared. Because they don't know What they can do. They don't know what the opposing party can do to them. And, you know, I talk to a lot of people who are kind of.

Terrified of the litigation process, of estate planning, you know, whatever it is, and then just telling them, like, Hey, this is the worst thing that can happen. This is the best thing that can happen. This is what will probably happen. You know, being able to alleviate. Because we all have in different areas.

We all have unfounded fears, right? Um and and to be able to alleviate those concerns. Is easy. That's what I, you know. But anyway, so that's.

Belief that planning is for the wealthy. We dispelled that. That is an erroneous belief. And, you know, again, along those same lines, I have a lot of folks that come in. And you know, they assume that Oh boy.

We talk about trust a lot, the benefit of trust, and I can't tell you how many times I've sat down with folks. And we start talking, and I give them their options. And they're like, well, we don't have a need for a trust. We don't have enough money. We don't have enough assets.

That's just a it's a misconception. They they're The benefit of that For you, even with not a ton of assets, you could get immense benefit from it. And I just want to put that on everybody's radar, you know? Don't don't underestimate your wealth. And I I think your value is in who you are as a person anyways, Josh.

That's what I've always said, you know. I don't judge people based on their wealth. You might. I don't, man. I don't.

I don't. You and your and your lake people on your peninsula listening to your private DJ. You know, I don't know. Who's too drunk to stand up? Yeah, he's too drunk to stand up, but not too drunk to play the music.

Which is the most over and over and over again.

Sounds like that guy's about to get replaced by some dude on YouTube who sells cassette tapes. Or maybe Josh.

Sounds like Josh is kind of like that. He's got a closet DJ guy. He wants to do it. He wants to pop six of those coffee pouches in. If your DJ does not have a mixtape to sell you.

I'd question the authority. Are they even a real DJ? All right, I got a question for you, Josh. Since you're on this DJ mode, if you were the DJ at the park, at the lake. It's early on, so you're not inebriated.

What are you leading off with? What's your first song? It's a fine question.

So, you know, if you're somewhere there at the lake, you're playing to a big crowd, you got a lot of people that like different things. He's thought about this, Joe. He's really thought about this. I'm curious to see whether he eases them in or whether he just hits the ground running. Yeah.

I think you start off with something nice and clean. Slip. Maybe like. paperboy, diddy, get the crowd going, you know, something Something from the 90s.

So you're going to ease them in. Yeah. Yeah, you're going to ease him in, but not too much. I'm not coming out full blast at you. I'm going to ease you in nice and mellow.

Okay. Maybe some hall of notes. Like, really get you eased in there. You got to look out on the crowds, man. You got to check the demographics.

You got to see what you're working with, man. Yeah, you got to see that. Good DJ is adaptable. You got old people, you got young people, you got to see what's going on. You got to bounce the lake, man.

Intersend, man. Yeah. Yeah, I like that. I can get behind that. And.

From what I've heard about this lake, I think that would play all right. I think that would be a good idea. Here's the next thing. And I think we've done a good job. of trying to eliminate this.

perception of high cost. Yeah. Yeah, well, we really tried. for one. You can't really beat the price for the console, man.

I mean, I don't know if there's attorneys out there paying people to come in to sit down.

Well, you come in, you get a cup of coffee. You get a cup of coffee from the Kerrig. Yep, yep. On us. That's value.

And it's good coffee, man. Look how Josh, who's usually very downtrodden is feeling today. He might even give you one of the coffee pouches for money. I might, if you mention 'em. You turn them on the radio.

It'd be like a Japanese restaurant. You sit back, you open your mouth. And if he can throw it in your mouth, you get to keep it. Yeah, Josh comes out, starts banging things around, flipping things around. Yeah, that's good.

I like that. You got your papers and you're flopping them. I like that. Let's burn something. Let's throw a fire on it.

There will be a fire.

So that's one of the questions we got a lot of times. We have people who have that, you know, this is going to be. Thousands upon thousands upon thousands of dollars. And so, what we did as a law firm, because our goal really is to You know, help as many people as possible with their legal issues. That's kind of how our firm is set up.

And so we put together. Packages, you know, and if you fit into one of these packages, we will tell you what the fee is going to be. Day one. right.

So we try to make it very simple. We have we have the couple of things, and if you need these things, this is what it'll cost. Complexity can drive the price up a little bit if there's if you're doing something that's that's complex. But You'll know exactly what we're going to charge and how it'll be paid. After your console, that's part of our advice.

Like, here's what we would do, this is exactly what it's going to cost. You can pay this much now, this much before you sign. And so we try to destroy. That perception of high cost when you talk to us. And I know we're coming up on a break, but I think we could talk some more about.

the philosophy for our fee structure when we come back and shed some more light.

Well, let's do that. Let's take a short break, come back on the other side, and we'll talk about that fee structure when it comes down to after the complimentary consult, what it's going to possibly cost with those different packages that are available to you. But again, that perception of the price, and that's what kind of holds people back from estate planning. Don't be that person. You need to get on top of your planning.

The opportunity to do that, complimentary, no obligation, is call the firm 919-77270000. That's 919-7727000. Again, complimentary consult, you're not paying for it, and there's no obligation to become a client, but you'll get a good feel on where you are as far as estate planning. 919-7727000. You can also visit the website, w.lawyer.

We've got more Judica County coming up. After this. We are back on Judica County Radio. Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer are your hosts. They're the managing partners at Whitaker and Hamer Law Firm.

They're practicing attorneys here in North Carolina, and they placed offices across the state for your convenience here in Raleigh, Capital City, also Garner, Cleveland, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuque Verina, down near Charlotte, Gastonia, and obviously on the coast, they have Moorhead City. I'm Morgan Patrick. Pleasure to jump on, talk about all the different aspects of the legal aspect of your life, I should say. But we're hitting estate planning, and we have complimentary consults during the course of this show. Simply call 919-77270000.

That's 919-7727000. You can also visit wh.lawyer. And again, these are complimentary. You're not paying for it. There's no obligation to become a client, but you'll get on track with your estate planning.

919-77270000. We've been fixated on Josh's fixation with a YouTube DJ that he watches. He's. He went off. There's a new DJ on now.

So there's a lot of people out there just kind of taping themselves DJing and putting it on YouTube.

So my question to you, Josh, is if you had a DJ name, what would it be? Hmm. I like Joshie Josh. I like that. Joshie Josh is good.

That's good. That's good. DJ Whitnasty. I like that one. I like that one.

I like that one. And he's just shirtless the whole time. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Shaking it. Yeah.

I love that. That's kind of scary. This guy's got a shirt on, and it's Jordan Garden Kobe Bryant. I like that shirt. That's a pretty sweet shirt.

The real question is: is he selling cassette tapes? Not yet. He's not a real DJ, by your own idea. I don't think he's gotten that far yet. But yeah, he wouldn't be.

If he doesn't come up with a quick, he wouldn't be. Can you tell what he's playing? What kind of jam he's doing? I got it muted.

Okay. All right.

Anywho, so when we went into the break, we were talking about perception of high cost and how You know, it's it's you know, our fee structure is meant to make Estate planning. Affordable to everyone. That's kind of our goal. Yeah, and that's the goal. And beyond that, you know, when we came up with, when we designed from the ground up our estate planning process, one of the things.

That we really wanted to avoid is yes you know You hear from a lot of folks, there's a lot of hesitancy dealing with attorneys because of just the unknown of the costs. A lot of folks get worried about you know, hiring somebody on an hourly basis and then being surprised by the number of hours that end up being spent and the cost. And so with what we've we've done is we've taken that guesswork out.

So From the start of the process, you're going to sit down with us for free. And before you pay a dollar, you're going to know exactly what it's going to cost you. Full transparency, no surprises. This is what the fee structure looks like. This is what you're going to pay, when you're going to pay it.

This price doesn't change. And There's gonna be no surprises, man. No surprises other than if your attorney Starts doing a DJ session in your console. That might be the only surprise. But fee-wise, No surprises whatsoever.

The other item in our list here, and this perceived financial and complexity barrier. I like this one. Lack of knowledge on how to start the process. Um I think a lot of people I think a lot of people, you know. you know, if you don't know a lawyer Right, if you don't know a lawyer, you haven't had to use a lawyer for anything before, for a lot of folks.

You know, like a real estate closing when you buy your house and preparing your estate plan, that's the two most popular times. You know, your average person needs an attorney. I think a lot of people just aren't used to engaging an attorney. They're not used to talking to an attorney. They don't have a good friend who's an attorney they can bounce things off of.

And that's why we try to make it. you know, as as easy as as we as we can, you know, um Because I think some people just don't know how to get the process started. to be honest, they don't think about it. You know, until you absolutely have to. Yeah, and that and that's another barrier, right?

Like, it's another thing that gives people pause.

So, what we've done. Is we've crafted the process to make it easy, right? To kind of ease into it. And we're going to give you a questionnaire that has a lot of very good information for you to kind of prepare you for the process, to give you what you need to think about, what you need to be concerned with, and it's going to take you through. and guide you These are the things that you care about.

These are the things that are important to you. These are the things you need to be batting around in your head. And we're going to give you a lot of that ahead of time so that when we come in and we sit down, we can just jump straight into recommendations for you and to letting you know what you're doing. what we think based on the information you provided. And we'll find out what your goals are.

And we just. We try to take a lot of that the the complexity Out of that front end of the process, so you can again just kind of ease into it, you know, just dip your toe in. I like this, uh, I like, I like this, I like this next one. I'll do it later syndrome. Oh.

Procrastination. Yeah. Since there is no immediate deadline for estate planning, it is easy to put it off in favor of more urgent day-to-day tasks. And that is true. If you do not have a a deadline And most healthy people going about their business, you don't have a deadline to get a state plane done.

It's something you have to just decide you want to get done and do it. And um That's huge. I think I suffer from that syndrome. I'll do it later, Syndrome. Yeah, man, that's a holdover from my college days, and I think it's a common thing.

And Again, you add in all these other factors, right? Like, you add in all the other things we've talked about, and they all, it's kind of a. they exponentially Build. to to increase that do-it-later syndrome feeling but But what I think is a lot of fun. Go ahead.

There's no benefit to waiting on this, right? Like, mortality is real. barring some crazy scientific discoveries, we're all going out at some point. And Sooner than later. Get it done.

I was amazed. in college and law school, how much I could get done. the day of a deadline right how productive how productive i could become the day before something was due you know Amazingly productive. Yeah. Oh, yeah.

And I mean, there's some people, the pressure helps some folks, right? Yeah, it makes you focus. It really does. But again, There's a difference in procrastinating on an assignment that you've got a deadline for and procrastinating on your estate plan where you have no clue. What's going to happen to you, when it's going to happen to you.

So the gamble. It It's not worth it. It's not worth it. I think that's the key word, Joe. You said gamble, because that's what you're doing.

And we like that on the water. You're out on the high wire. You're out on the high wire without any kind of safety net. We we like to gamble legally here within the confines of the law. But that's not the type of gamble.

There's no benefit. Like, it doesn't pay off. There's no, you're not going to win. anything on that gamble. I think this next one, this next one kind of goes into it.

I mean, these all kind of tie back together. They all are cooperating to keep folks from getting their estate plan done. But I think this one is true. Overly. Busy schedules.

Yeah. Literally, like, how do I fit in? Estate planning when I got to pick up the kids, and the kids have this game, and one spouse works here, and one spouse works here. And so we try to make that easy. um you know by by scheduling a a phone or or or a zoom and not requiring you to come into the office for the for the first step where we talk to you about it you you're more than welcome to come into the office but we try to give you some alternatives and and some some time options where we can we can talk to you about estate planning and then then the hope is we get everything done and you have to come to the office one time.

For about 15 minutes to get everything signed once everything's worked out, and so we really tried to make it. We try to make a state planning where it can easily fit into an overly busy schedule because everybody's busy. Everybody's busy, but uh. I can tell you what doesn't care about your schedule, it doesn't care about your kids getting picked up. It doesn't care about consoling your kids after they get beat by Morgan in fantasy football.

Yes. And that's death, man. It's not on your schedule. And we don't again, tomorrow is not promised to anybody.

So You're you're playing you're playing with fire. By letting all of these factors we've talked about stop you. from having a literal zero dollar, zero obligation consultation. to talk these things through. And who I can almost guarantee you that By having the conversation, you're going to feel.

A lot better about it. A lot of these anxieties and a lot of these sticking points are going to go away for you.

So the um So, those were all the reasons why people delay, right? There's a big list of reasons. And so, the last section of this little list I have here is consequences of delaying, right?

So, it listed all the reasons why you might delay and why you should let those stop you. And after the break, we're going to talk about the consequences of delaying estate planning. Want to remind everybody there are complimentary consults on estate planning available to you right now. 919-77270000. Give Whitaker and Hamer a call.

Ask for one of the complimentary consults. Get the ball rolling. Don't procrastinate. 919-772-7000. Again, this is complimentary.

You're leaving the checkbook at home and there's no obligation to become a client, but this is a great way to get the ball rolling. 919-77270000. You can also visit the website, wh.lawyer. That's wh.lawyer. We'll wrap up.

Judica County Radio coming up. the other side. We are back for the final segment of Judica County Radio, your host, Josh Whitaker, Joe Hamer, Managing Partners, Whitaker-Hamer Law Firm, practicing attorneys here in North Carolina. The offices are located everywhere: Raleigh, Garner, Cleveland, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay Verina, Gastonia, and down at the coast, Moorhead City. I'm Morgan Patrick, a pleasure.

The attorneys have about four minutes to kind of wrap this puppy up. But, Josh, where are you going? I don't like being constrained by time. Yeah, just ignore it. Yeah, just ignore it, man.

The radio will let us keep going. They're fine with it. All right, consequences of delaying estate planning. Number one, If you do not have an estate plan, your assets will be distributed. By North Carolina state law.

North Carolina state law will decide. Where all of your assets go, you will have no say in the matter, your family will have no say in the matter. Probate. administration. That's frustration.

And that could be a fine result. You could get to the same end result depending on what your lineage looks like and what your situation is. But you lose every, you don't have control, right? Yeah, exactly. It usually does not work out well if you have underage children.

So if you're married and you have underage children, administration. Gives the underage children part of your estate, part of your house, and then it's not super easy. to get everything back. Like more than likely, you'd have probably left everything to your surviving spouse in that situation. And it's hard to get back there after the fact.

So I know that like you said, Joe, if everybody's an adult, The North Carolina state laws may get everything where you want it to go in the first place, just a very inconvenient way to do it. But if you have underage children, for sure it's not going to accomplish what you want to accomplish. That's one of the consequences of dying without an estate plan. Your assets will be administered and distributed by the state. Lots of downsides to that.

Yeah, and on those same lines, you can just piggyback right on top of that. And the process that whoever ends up stepping up and being the administrator of your estate's going to have to go through is going to be immensely more complicated. Substantially more legwork and much more costly. Costly and public administration. Guardianship uncertainty, certainty.

So, when I was talking about having underage children, if you die without an estate plan, you have underage children, they're going to inherit. And some of the assets they inherit, they can't do anything with. Like you can't. Sign a deed and sell a house if you're under 18.

So, a guardian has to be appointed. by the state of North Carolina, which may or may not be your surviving spouse, depending on the circumstances. Um So, really, really just a mess. And then this adds some decisions may be made by strangers, right? You may have a public administrator, you may have a public guardian of your underaged children.

Again, not having an estate plan and dying. Is a fraught with peril. You mentioned no positives to that scenario, Josh. There's zero positives. Lot of negatives.

So our listeners should take the opportunity To get ahead of this and grab one of our complimentary consults and simply call the number 919-772-7000. That's 919-77270000. You can also go to the website, WH.lawyer, get signed up there as well. But there's no obligation, meaning you're not agreeing to become a client. And there's no cost to this initial meeting.

So take advantage of this. Come in and get the ball rolling on estate planning. And also, if maybe you're in the middle of something and you just got some questions, man, grab one of these consults, 919-772-7000. That's 919-77270000, or visit the website wh.lawyer.

Well, another edition of Judica County Radio in the books for Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer. I'm Morgan Patrick. We'll see you on the radio.

next week. Judica County is hosted by attorneys licensed to practice law in North Carolina.

Some of the guests appearing on this podcast may be licensed North Carolina attorneys. Discussion on this podcast is meant to be general in nature, and in no way should the discussion be interpreted as legal advice. Legal advice can only be rendered once an attorney, licensed in the state in which you live, has the opportunity to discuss the facts of your case with you. The attorneys appearing on this podcast are speaking in generalities about the law in North Carolina and how these laws affect the average North Carolinian. If you have any questions about the content of this show, you can direct such inquiry to Joshua Whitaker at jmw at mwhlaw.lawyer.