Family Wealth Planning is the Web 2.0 Version of Estate Planning

Whereas "estate planning" is about preparing and passing on your financial assets at the end of your life, Family Wealth Planning is about making the right financial and legal decisions for your whole family wealth throughout your lifetime and leaving the world a better place after you are gone.

Family wealth is about far more than just your money. Your family wealth is made up of your financial, intellectual, spiritual and human assets - who you are and what's important to you.

And, I bet if I asked you to choose between the four of those which would be most important for you to leave behind at the end of your life (and you could only choose one group), I bet you'd choose something other than financial.

Why? Because your loved ones can always make more money. But, they cannot replace your values, your stories, your insights and your experiences. Yet, these are so often overlooked and not passed on. Family Wealth Planning is about capturing the assets that are most valuable, and sadly most often lost when someone dies ... the intellectual, spiritual and human assets that make us who we are.

When my dad died, he left behind a bit of money, but the rest of his wealth was lost, uncaptured.

I have no letters from him or recordings talking about his hopes and dreams for my future. My children will never hear his voice or know what was important to him.

I suspect it is the same for your family.

And while there are gobs of websites and businesses springing up to help people capture these assets and pass them on, in my experience we are just too busy and it rarely gets done.

I've found the best way to make sure this happens is to make it part of your legal planning. When you are working with a lawyer on your family's "estate" planning, if your lawyer is only preparing a plan to pass on your financial assets, he or she is only doing 1/4 of the job.

What you want is a lawyer who will help you capture the whole Family Wealth that is most often lost and most difficult to plan for ... your intellectual, spiritual and human assets or who you are and what's important to you.

Through a simple Family Wealth Legacy Interview process at the end of your planning together, your Personal Family Lawyer will help you capture the most valuable family wealth you have and pass that on for successive generations by building a legacy library that will be far more valuable than any dollars you could ever leave behind.

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