For Business Owners

Your business may be one of the most valuable things you own. Your estate plan should say plainly what happens to your ownership.

The Will-Based Estate Plan covers two kinds of business ownership:

• A sole proprietorship. The business assets are your own property and pass under your will like everything else you own.
• A North Carolina LLC you own alone, if its documents say nothing about what happens to your interest when you die. I read the company's documents to check.

What to know about an LLC you own alone

• At your death, your estate receives the money rights in the company, not the right to run it.
• Leaving your interest to someone in your will does not make them an owner who can run the company.
• Under North Carolina law, a company left with no members is dissolved 90 days later unless a new member is admitted in that time.
• This plan does no work to keep the company going or to name who runs it. If you want that, I tell you at the start and point you toward other help.

What the plan does

• Your will says who receives your ownership interest. It does not change the company's own documents.
• Your financial power of attorney can let someone you trust act for you on your business interest while you are living, if you cannot.
• Your executor should be someone able to deal with a business interest, not just a bank account.
• Accounts outside your will. Accounts and policies with named beneficiaries pass outside your will. I review how they are set up so they fit the rest of the plan.

What you get

• A will that addresses your business interest.
• A financial power of attorney that covers your business interest.
• A health-care power of attorney, living will, and HIPAA authorization, if they fit you.
• One round of revisions, signing guidance, and my review of your signed documents.
• Your signed originals by mail, plus electronic copies.

When this plan is not the right fit

I tell you before you sign anything, and point you toward other help, if:

• the business is a corporation or a partnership;
• it is an LLC with other owners, or one formed outside North Carolina;
• it is a professional practice, such as law, medicine, or accounting;
• the company's documents or an agreement say what happens to your interest when you die, let someone buy it, or require approval of who receives it;
• you want work to keep the company running or to name who runs it, or other work on the business itself, such as a succession plan or a buy-sell agreement.

Price

The Will-Based Estate Plan is $1,250 for one adult, the same price whether or not you own a business. Work on the business itself is outside this plan.