Your Toddler Doesn’t Need A Lamborghini: Smarter Ways To Leave Money To Kids

Most parents focus on car seats and cribs, but the real safety net is legal: who can act for you in a crisis, who raises your kids if the unthinkable happens, and how your savings and life insurance actually support your family’s future. We dig into the essential steps every new parent in North Carolina should take, from naming guardians in a will to creating trusts that protect minors from windfalls and missteps.

We start with the basics of incapacity planning—why marriage alone doesn’t grant authority over real estate, retirement accounts, or medical decisions—and how durable financial powers of attorney, health care proxies, HIPAA releases, and advance directives keep life moving when you can’t. Then we unpack intestacy rules that may divert assets to parents instead of your spouse, and how a simple will puts your wishes first. The heart of the conversation centers on minor children: choosing the right guardian, setting clear priorities in the will, and coordinating that choice with the person who will manage the money.

From there, we explore how to design trusts that match real life. Rather than dropping a lump sum at eighteen, structure distributions for health, education, maintenance, and support; stagger access over time; and give your trustee the discretion to pause or accelerate funds based on maturity. We share practical incentive ideas—proof of employment, vocational or college progress, sobriety requirements, or military service—that align money with meaningful milestones. Along the way, we highlight common pitfalls with beneficiary designations and offer guidance on picking fiduciaries who blend heart and expertise.

If you’re expecting or recently welcomed a child, this conversation helps you turn love into a concrete plan that protects your spouse, centers your kids, and preserves your values. Subscribe for more clear, practical guidance on estate planning and elder law, share this with a friend who needs it, and leave a review to tell us what topics you want next.

Episode Transcript

Brenton Begley (00:19):
Hello and welcome to the Elder Law Report.
I'm attorney Brenton Begley,attorney and partner with
McIntyre Elder law.
I'm here with one of ouresteemed associates, Haley
Matson.

Haley Matson (00:29):
Hi, Brendan.

Brenton Begley (00:31):
Is it afternoon?
No, it's before night.
Good morning.

Haley Matson (00:34):
Good morning.

Brenton Begley (00:35):
Today we're going to talk about uh estate
planning for new parents.
So, you know, I get thequestion all the time.
I'm sure you get this questiona lot, Haley.
When should you start planning?
It's kind of a hard questionthat to answer because you know,
really anyone who turns 18 ownsany assets, anything like that,

(01:00):
really should have estateplanning documents in place.
Right.
But most people aren't wantingto hear that really.
They want to hear like whatlife event tells me that I
really should have some type ofestate planning documents in
place.
Is it when I get married?
Is it when I have a kid?
So what do you think?

(01:21):
Do you think that people shouldstart thinking about planning
whenever they have their firstchild?

Haley Matson (01:27):
I think you should start thinking about planning
when you get married.
And I think you shoulddefinitely start actually
planning as soon as you haveyour first child, if not while
you're like in the preparationprocess for getting ready.
Because your estate plan isreally going to lay out kind of
what happens in the event thatthere was ever an accident and
something happened to you andyour spouse.

(01:49):
You're going to be able to pickyour guardian, kind of pick
what kind of trust anyinheritance goes to.
There's a lot of reallyimportant stuff that you're
going to need.

Brenton Begley (01:57):
Right.
Yeah.
And so let's dig into that alittle bit.
When you first get married, oneof the main things that you
really want to make sure of isthat you know your spouse has
power of attorney for you tomake decisions for you.
If you can to something were tohappen to you where you know
you're even temporarilyincapacitated, your spouse
cannot, by virtue of themarriage, make decisions for

(02:18):
you, especially with like realproperty, retirement accounts,
medical decisions.
So it's incredibly important tohave that spouse named so that
they can do that just in case.

Haley Matson (02:27):
Yeah.

Brenton Begley (02:27):
The other thing is that if you still have
parents and no children, whatyou have to understand is by
intestate succession law, if youpass away in North Carolina,
not everything will go to yourspouse.
Okay, so you'll have yourparents entitled to some of
those assets.
So you really want to make surethat you go through the plan if
you do want to leave everythingto the spouse.

(02:49):
Then when you have a child,it's extra important because,
like you said, you mentionedguardian.
What about the guardian in thewill?
Why is that important?

Haley Matson (03:00):
It's important because you're going to lay out
who exactly would be taking careof your child in the event that
something were to happen tolike you and your spouse.
Otherwise, they're going to geta guardian ad lightum or
somebody assigned by the courtto do that rather than being
able to kind of set out thatindividual yourself.

Brenton Begley (03:20):
Right.
So me and my wife, I mean, ifwe travel, we travel everywhere.
And I kind of see that as apoint of vulnerability.
If we're traveling together, weget in a wreck together, we
both pass away together in acommon event or disaster.
We would want to make sure thatany child born of us that we've
gone through and picked who wewant to be the guardian.
And that person, if we namethem in the will, is gonna have

(03:42):
priority over every other soulon planet Earth.
Okay.
Yep.
They're gonna be the ones thatthe court appoints unless for
some reason they can't do it,like they pass away.
They, you know, they're felons,something like that.
But barring that, you know, ifyou name that person in the
will, um, they're gonna havepriority.
And I think that's importantfor a lot of people.

(04:02):
I think they have that concern.
Like, what happens to me?
What happens if somethinghappens to me, something happens
to my spouse, who's gonna takecare of my minor children?
And then another astute thingthat you had mentioned is trust.
Like, what if I if me and mywife dies?
We have a bunch of money andinsurance policies that you know
we're leaving behind, and ourchild is, I don't know, like
eight years old.

(04:23):
What happens then?

Haley Matson (04:25):
Yeah.
Um, it's you can't giveinheritance outright like that
to a minor beneficiary.
So it's going to have to eitherbe held by the administrator of
your estate if you don't have awill, or you can set it aside
already in a will or a trust anddecide exactly who takes care

(04:45):
of that money for that minorbeneficiary and at what age and
intervals that beneficiary willeventually inherit from you.

Brenton Begley (04:53):
Right.
And that and that's a goodpoint, too, because you know, if
I have a child who's eightyears old now, there's a
practical concern that if Ileave money behind, who's going
to actually be in control ofthat money?
Right.
And how easily are they goingto be able to get a hold of it
and what can they do with it?
I can set all those parametersin an estate cleaning document
beforehand.
So if that ever happens, all ofthat's laid out.

(05:15):
But the other thing is too, islike, you know, if I'm not
around to raise my kid, I mighthave concerns about this choices
that they make, right?
So I might not want to leave achild or a grandchild's assets,
especially significant assets,until they turn a certain age,
right?
If I if I have a life insurancepolicy that leaves $500,000, a

(05:38):
million dollars to a child, andthey can get it when they turn
18, then an 18-year-old withthat much money isn't probably
not going to use it prudently,probably not going to invest it.
They're probably going to blowit.

Haley Matson (05:49):
I know or something.
Something fun.
Yeah.

Brenton Begley (05:52):
Yeah, exactly.
You're going to have a lot offun.
It's not going to be used whatI intended it for.
Um, so I can also set up myestate plan to, like you said,
have it doled out to them atregular intervals or use for
specific things like health,education, fitness, and support
until they reach a certain agewhere they're, you know, able to
really manage money like that.

Haley Matson (06:13):
You can also put it in your trustees' discretion
too.
So if you you can appoint likea really trusted friend or
somebody who's great with moneyto manage that, and you can kind
of put it in their hands if youwant to to decide.
So if you know your child isgrowing up and something happens
to you and your spouse, and asthe child grows up, they just
never become that responsible.

(06:34):
Your trustee will be able tohold that back and use it for
only specific things.
So it gives you a lot ofcustomization.

Brenton Begley (06:42):
Yeah, you know, you've done you know a number of
those, and you've probably donesomething similar, you know, to
what I've done in the past too,is that if you ever have
concerns about a child reachingcertain goals or being a
productive member of society,then you can put in the terms of
your trust or will uhincentives for that child to act

(07:07):
a certain way, right?
So you can require drug teststhat your trustee administers.
I've had that in multiple umtrusts.
You can require that they seekeducation beyond high school,
whether it's vocational, whetherit's you know or military,
right?
That's another one.
Um just so that to get themoney that I'm leaving you, you

(07:30):
have to be on some productivepath in life.

Haley Matson (07:33):
Yeah, I was gonna say one I just did this morning,
gainfully employed.

Brenton Begley (07:37):
Gainfully employed.

Haley Matson (07:39):
Yep, that was that was one of them this morning,
too.
So exactly.
There's a lot of concerns aboutthat out there.
I get it, I get it completely.

Brenton Begley (07:47):
Yeah.
Well, thank you, Haley, forgoing over this.
And I mean, I think theconclusion here is that um you
should really start planning ifyou're married, get some basics
in place.
But once you have that child,that triggers the absolute need
to put a plan in place for youand your spouse.
And uh, I know you help um lotsof couples in the state of

(08:07):
North Carolina put those planstogether from you know, uh a
younger age, someone around yourage, up until, I mean, good
Lord, I don't know what youroldest client could be, but you
know, I mean, we help people ofall age ranges make sure their
assets are protected and theirwishes are carried out during
their life and after they passaway.
So if you have questions abouthow to set up your estate plan,

(08:30):
when to plan, what to do, any ofthat, just give us a call or
visit our website,mcelderderlaw.com, where you can
look at all of the videos andarticles we have about anything
that we do, which is estateplanning and elder law.
And you can also take advantageof a free consultation by
scheduling on the website.
It'll allow you to schedule onany of the the attorneys'

(08:52):
calendars, whether that'sCharlotte, that's Shelby, that's
Hendersonville, take advantageof that free consultation in the
office convenient to you.
And we'll see you.
Thank you, Haley.

Haley Matson (09:02):
Thank you.