September 15th, 2024 |

• Estate Planning
• General

By Attorney Alan L. Spiegel, Jr.

Reading Time: 2 minutes

Based on hundreds of discussions with current and potential clients, the most common reason that most individuals do not include a charity in their estate plan is because they do not want to invite the complicated process that comes along with making updates to an existing plan.  While almost every client who I actually work with to update their estate plan agrees that the process is clear and simple, it is still a process, and that is enough to discourage many who would otherwise support charitable organizations like EAA.

Fortunately, there is a simple way to support charitable organizations that takes no financial investment, very little time, and provides some significant benefits.  Instead of drafting or revising a will or a trust, a charitable gift at death can be accomplished with a simple update to your beneficiary designations for a life insurance policy, retirement account, bank account or any other financial account.  Adjusting those accounts to include EAA as a beneficiary comes with five primary benefits:

1. It’s Easy. Changing an account to be payable on death to EAA can be done with the completion of a beneficiary form through the financial institution holding the account.  You can give all or any portion of the account to EAA at the time of your death with the completion of the form and without the need for any other documents.
2. It Doesn’t Affect Your Current Finances. A beneficiary designation simply means that the designated beneficiaries receive whatever is left of the account at the time of the owner’s death.  In other words, you use the account for as long as you’re alive, and EAA would only receive what you did not use.
3. It’s Free. Changing beneficiaries on an account does not cost anything.  You can do it in person if the financial institution is local, or you can do it via mail or even over the internet in many instances.
4. It Saves Tax Money and Expands Your Estate. Naming a charity like EAA as the beneficiary on a taxable account (like an IRA or a 401(k)) means that no tax will be paid on the amount the charity receives.  Your kids would likely have had to pay 20%-30% taxes on the asset, so you’re actually able to give more money away by including a charitable beneficiary.
5. It Leaves A Legacy of What Mattered to You. Just like naming EAA in a will or a trust, naming EAA as a beneficiary shows your family, friends and fellow aviation enthusiasts that your passion for aviation was not just skin deep.  You get to leave your legacy and empower future generations of aviators to reach heights we can’t even imagine with the help of your contribution.

For these reasons and more, now is the time to consider updating your beneficiaries to include EAA.  To be sure, there are many benefits to a more comprehensive estate plan with a seasoned estate planning attorney, but beneficiary giving is an extremely doable way to support EAA and general aviation beyond your departure.

Alan L. Spiegel, Jr. is an estate planning attorney at The McLario Firm in Menomonee Falls, Wisconsin.  He has assisted clients with estate planning for more than 20 years.