Before you hire an estate planning attorney: the questions worth asking first

The questions that matter most

Before you hire an estate planning attorney, ask how much of their practice is wills, trusts and probate, who will actually draft your documents and answer your calls, how the fee works and what it includes, whether they also handle probate, and whether they will help you update beneficiary forms and deeds after signing. Then confirm the attorney is licensed and eligible to practice through the State Bar of Texas directory. The answers tell you whether you are getting counsel or paperwork.

I have practiced law in Texas since 1969 and have concentrated on estate planning and probate for more than 20 years. I welcome these questions from anyone who calls me, and I would want a friend to ask them of any attorney. What follows is general information, not advice about your situation.

Start by checking the license

The State Bar of Texas keeps an online member directory where you can search for licensed Texas lawyers by location and practice area. A profile shows when the attorney was licensed, where they practice and whether they are currently eligible to practice in Texas. It takes two minutes and it is the first thing I would do before any meeting.

While you are there, notice the practice areas the attorney reports. Estate planning is a field where details decide whether a plan works, and you generally want someone who does this work regularly rather than someone who drafts a will a few times a year between other kinds of cases.

In a metro area the size of Dallas, you will find many attorneys who list wills among their services. It is reasonable to speak with two or three before choosing. Most will have a short first conversation about what you need, and comparing how each one listens and explains is often more revealing than comparing fees.

Ask how much of the practice is wills, trusts and probate

A general question like "do you do wills?" will almost always get a yes. A better question is what share of the attorney's work is estate planning and probate, and how long they have focused on it. You are looking for an attorney who can explain, without looking it up, how Texas community property affects a married couple's plan, what independent administration is, and what happens to a minor child's inheritance.

Some attorneys hold board certification in estate planning and probate law, a credential that requires additional experience and examination. It is a useful signal but not a requirement to practice in this area. I am not board certified myself; I have concentrated on estate planning and probate for more than 20 years. Ask any attorney about their focus and experience, and judge the answer by how clearly they explain your situation back to you.

• What share of your practice is estate planning and probate?
• How long have you focused on this work?
• Do you handle probate and estate administration as well as drafting?
• Have you worked with families like mine, such as blended families or business owners?

Find out who will actually do the work

In larger firms, the attorney you meet may not be the person who drafts your documents, and the person who answers your later questions may be a paralegal or an intake coordinator. That model can work well. It is still worth knowing in advance who will be doing what, so you are not surprised later.

I practice alone. The person who answers your questions is the attorney who drafts your documents, and you reach me directly by phone or email. Whatever structure an office uses, ask who your contact will be, how quickly calls are returned, and who reviews the drafts with you.

Ask, too, how the drafts will be explained. You should leave every document review understanding what each page does, in plain English. If an attorney cannot explain a provision simply, or seems impatient with questions, that tells you something about how the relationship will feel when your family needs help later.

Ask what happens after the signing

A plan is not finished when the documents are signed. Retirement accounts and life insurance pass by beneficiary form, not by the will. A living trust only controls the assets actually moved into it. A deed may need to be changed. If nobody handles those steps, a carefully drafted plan can be quietly undone by a form you filled out at a first job years ago.

Ask each attorney what they do after the signing, and what they expect you to do. A good answer is specific: who reviews the beneficiary forms, who prepares any new deed, where the signed originals will be kept, and who your executor should call. Also ask how the attorney handles later changes, because marriages, births, deaths and moves will happen.

• Will you review my beneficiary designations against the plan?
• If I have a trust, who handles moving assets into it?
• Where should the signed originals be kept?
• What should my executor do first, and whom should they call?
• How do we handle updates when my family changes?

Understand the fee before any drafting starts

Ask whether the fee is flat or hourly and exactly what it covers. A good answer lists the documents, the number of review meetings, the signing and any follow-up help. A vague answer is a reason to ask again. In my practice, I discuss the fee at the first conversation, once I understand the family and the property involved.

A useful follow-up is what a later update would cost, because families change. If you want to understand what drives an estate plan's price in the first place, I cover that in what a will or estate plan costs, and what moves the price.

• Is the fee flat or hourly?
• Which documents are included?
• Are revisions and the signing included?
• Is help with beneficiary forms and deeds included?
• What does a future update cost?

Listen to the questions the attorney asks you

The best sign in a first meeting is an attorney who asks a lot of questions about your family before recommending anything. Who are your children, and are any of them from a prior relationship? Does anyone have special needs? Who would you trust to raise your kids, or to manage money? What do you own, how is it titled, and who is named on your retirement accounts and life insurance?

An attorney who recommends a living trust or a specific package before hearing those answers is selling a product, not giving advice. The right documents for a married couple with young children are different from the right documents for a widow with grown children, and very different from those for a blended family. If the recommendation could have been made before you walked in, ask why it fits you.

For married couples, listen for questions about community and separate property. Texas is a community-property state, and what each spouse can leave by will depends on which property is which. An attorney who never asks when assets were acquired, or whether anything was inherited, is skipping a question that shapes the whole plan.

Warning signs worth taking seriously

Most attorneys you meet will be fine. These are the patterns that, in my experience, should make you slow down and ask more questions before signing an engagement letter.

• A recommendation made before the attorney understands your family
• Pressure to buy a trust without an explanation of why a will would not do
• No clear answer about what the fee covers
• No plan for funding a trust or updating beneficiary forms
• Documents you are asked to sign without anyone explaining them
• No experience with probate, so no sense of how the documents will work in court

Why probate experience improves the drafting

This point gets overlooked. An attorney who regularly takes estates through probate knows where documents cause trouble: an executor who cannot act without court approval, a gift to a minor with no trust to hold it, a will that conflicts with a beneficiary form, a missing alternate. Those lessons go straight back into how they write the next will.

TexasLawHelp.org notes that almost all probate cases require a lawyer. If your attorney also handles probate, the same office that wrote your documents can guide your executor when the time comes, which is a real comfort to the family. If they do not, ask who they would send your family to.

What to bring, and what happens when you call me

Bring a picture of your family, a rough list of what you own and how it is titled, and any existing will, trust, divorce decree or marital agreement. If you are weighing whether to draft your own will instead, my guide on writing your own will in Texas explains where homemade wills tend to fail. And if you are thinking mainly about who would make decisions if you were ill, read about powers of attorney and medical directives first.

When you contact me, we talk by phone or at my office on Plano Road in the Lake Highlands area of Dallas. I ask about your family, explain what Texas law would do without a plan, recommend what I think fits and tell you the cost. If you go ahead, we work through drafts until the documents say what you mean. For advice on your own situation, always talk to a licensed Texas attorney who has heard all the facts.

Questions people ask me