I contacted an estate planning lawyer and asked him about this. He said he could not be my personal representative. I assumed it was a conflict of interest.
That seems odd. I would have thought an estate planning lawyer's job would include acting as your representative in the matter of designating an heir.
In any case, a friend of mine without kids left all of his worldly goods to two local charities that he was involved with. Perhaps that is something you can look into.
I'd advise against any of the big charities as they spend more money trying to get donations than they do on whatever they're supposed to be supporting.
Guy's wording is awkward. I assume by "be (his) personal representative" he means after he's dead.
An estate planning attorney can help you make a will and set up a trust, etc. But anyone who is going to be an executor (or beneficiary) of a will can't be involved in planning it and vice versa - for obvious conflict of interest reasons:
"I'm the executor of the will. See it says so right here."
"Didn't you help construct the will?"
"Yes, but I pinky swear I didn't underhandedly set it up so I would end up with control of assets."
(post is archived)