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1
Where is your estate primarily located?
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Select the state where you reside and hold most of your assets.
2
Do you have core documents?
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If you are 18 or older, the
following documents are essential — not just for end-of-life, but for
any moment when you can't speak for yourself. Please indicate whether
each is in place.
A Will
General Durable Power of Attorney
Health Care Power of Attorney
HIPAA Authorization
Living Will and Care Directives
3
Dependents, Children & Trust Planning
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Do you have children or others who depend on you?
Do you have legal documents in
place — including guardianship designations — for who will care for your
children if you become incapacitated or pass away?
Do you have a Revocable Trust in place?
Are your trustees current and up-to-date?
Are assets titled into the trust as planned?
Do you have a pour-over will to capture any assets not yet in the trust?
4
Probate & Privacy
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Probate is the court-supervised
process of validating your will and distributing your assets after you
pass. It can be time-consuming, costly, and — because court records are
public — it makes the details of your estate available to anyone. A
well-structured plan can allow your assets to pass directly to your
loved ones, privately and without court involvement.
Would you prefer your assets to
transfer privately, without court involvement — avoiding probate and
keeping your estate out of the public record?
5
The "First 48 Hours" Test
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Check each item that you — or a trusted person in an emergency — could immediately locate and access right now.
Bank account numbers and contact information
Investment account logins
Life insurance policies
Password manager or master access to digital accounts
Contact information for short-term and long-term guardians (if you have children)
Plans for the care of pets
6
Emergency Document Access
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If you were in an accident today and taken to an emergency room, would your emergency contacts and medical team have immediate access to the following?
Durable Power of Attorney
Health Care Power of Attorney
HIPAA Authorization
Living Will and Care Directives
7
International Travel & Work
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Do you travel or work internationally?
Do you have health insurance that covers you outside the United States?
Do you have medical evacuation insurance?
Are you enrolled in the Smart Traveler Enrollment Program (STEP) through the U.S. State Department?
STEP allows the U.S. Embassy to contact you in an emergency and helps your family locate you abroad.
Is your Durable Power of Attorney current and easily located while you are traveling?
Is your Health Care Power of Attorney current and easily located while you are traveling?
Are your HIPAA Authorizations current and easily located while you are traveling?
Is your Living Will and Care Directive current and readily available while you are traveling?
8
Business Ownership & Succession
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Do you own a business or hold an ownership interest in a privately held company?
Buy-Sell Agreement
Governs what happens to your ownership interest if you die, become incapacitated, or a co-owner wants to exit.
Key Person Insurance
Life or disability insurance protecting the business and your family if a key person is lost.
Business Interest Integrated with Estate Plan
Is your business interest held through a trust or LLC in a way that avoids probate and ensures a smooth transition?
Intellectual Property Rights
Are your IP rights — trademarks, copyrights, trade secrets, or proprietary processes — clearly owned, documented, and protected?
9
Founder, Equity & Exit Planning
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Do you hold equity in a startup or
private company (founder shares, options, RSUs, or an early investment)
or do you expect a future liquidity event?
This section is for founders,
early employees, and investors. For a potential future sale of equity — a
sale, acquisition, or IPO — planning is generally most useful when it
begins well before any transaction.
Do you anticipate a potential
liquidity event — a sale, acquisition, IPO, or secondary — within
roughly the next one to five years?
Planning windows tend to be widest before a transaction and narrow once one is underway.
Could any of your shares qualify as Qualified Small Business Stock (QSBS) under IRC §1202?
Section 1202 can allow eligible
founders, employees, and investors to exclude a portion of the gain on a
future sale from federal capital gains tax. Eligibility depends on
facts set when the stock was issued.
Have you explored whether
non-grantor trusts could expand the §1202 gain you may be able to
exclude (sometimes called “stacking”)?
A properly designed non-grantor trust is generally treated as its own taxpayer, with its own exclusion.
Have you considered moving
appreciating equity into an irrevocable or spousal-access trust to help
reduce future estate and income tax while keeping a measure of household
access?
Structures such as a Spousal
Lifetime Access Non-Grantor Trust (SLANT) are designed to combine asset
protection with estate- and income-tax planning.
Is the intellectual property behind
your company's value (patents, trademarks, source code, trade secrets)
fully assigned to and owned by the company, with nothing left personally
held or owed by former contractors?
Clear IP ownership is generally easier to confirm before a sale process than during one.
If something happened to you before
an exit, is it clear who would manage and vote your equity — and who
would ultimately benefit from a future sale?
A liquidity event can take years
to arrive. Planning ensures your interest is governed and directed the
way you intend in the meantime.
10
Estate Size
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Include real property, retirement
accounts, life insurance proceeds, business interests, and other assets
in your estimate. Most people underestimate by forgetting life insurance
and retirement balances. A rough figure is all you need here.
Approximately how large is your estate?
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Your Estate Plan Summary
Prepared by Vickery Law PLLC's self-assessment tool · For informational purposes only. This summary highlights general areas you may wish to review. It does not evaluate whether your existing documents are valid, current, or adequate.
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Readiness
Ready to talk through these areas? Vickery Law PLLC is licensed in Maryland, the District of Columbia, and Washington State, and works with families to put the right documents and structures in place, from foundational documents to more complex trust planning.
Once you download or leave this page, your responses are permanently cleared. This summary does not constitute legal advice and does not create an attorney-client relationship. Estate planning laws vary by jurisdiction, and this tool is not jurisdiction-specific legal advice.