According to a recent study, 52% of U.S. couples have no estate plan in place. This isn’t surprising since making an estate plan isn’t always viewed as an important financial goal — especially by younger people. Unfortunately, it is a big issue and it could leave many people facing serious regrets.
This guide will explain some of the big problems with having no estate plan and also offers some tips on how you can get started making a plan if you are among the majority without one. Ultimately, for most people, the best thing to do will be to reach out to an estate planning lawyer for help.
The Northern California Center for Estate Planning and Elder Law is here to provide assistance putting a plan in place to secure your future and protect your loved ones. Give us a call at (916) 437-3500 to schedule an appointment to talk with a Sacramento estate planning lawyer and find out how we can assist you in becoming one of the minority of Americans on track for a more secure future thanks to their advanced plan.
Why is it a problem not to have an estate plan?
For the majority of Americans who do not have an estate plan in place, their future medical autonomy and their ability to leave behind a legacy are at serious risk. That’s because default rules will apply to their situation if they become incapacitated or if they pass away.
This could mean the court ends up appointing someone to make medical decisions on their behalf — even if that individual isn’t the person who they would have chosen or who understands their desires and preferences for what extraordinary medical interventions would be appropriate in a time of medical catastrophe. The court could also have to appoint someone to manage their assets, even if again that individual might not have been the one who they would have selected.
It also means that those who die without an estate plan are not going to be able to specify what happens to their assets. Intestacy laws will apply. These differ slightly by state, but usually involve distributing assets to close relatives such as spouses, children, parents, or siblings. Not everyone wants their assets distributed according to these default laws though. Someone without a spouse or children whose assets might go to their parents by default might be estranged from their parents and want the money or property to go to a friend or a charity instead. That wouldn’t happen if they didn’t have an estate plan in place.
Without a plan, you’ll also lose the chance to make strategic moves that could allow assets to transfer more privately, more cost-effectively, and without being subject to estate tax (which is a concern if you have a larger estate). You won’t get to take steps to protect your estate from being diminished if you need long-term care and must spend down your wealth to get it. And if you have minor children, the court may be left appointing a guardian for them and appointing someone to manage the money you have left for them — and they’d be able to access their inherited funds starting at the age of adulthood with no restrictions or guidance on how to spend the money to protect their future financial security or provide for themselves going forward.
These are all very serious downsides of not having an estate plan. You cannot risk these outcomes by waiting to make your plans since you never known when incapacity might happen.
How can you get started with creating your plan?
If you are one of the majority of people without a plan in place, there are a number of tools that you can use to take control over your legacy and ensure you get to make choices about medical care and about who gets your assets when you pass on. These tools can include things like revocable and irrevocable trusts, advance directives to address healthcare issues, designating someone as power of attorney, or using a last will and testament to provide instructions on distribution of assets and guardianship for your children.
The right options for what to include in your estate plan are going to depend on your own personal situation, including your level of wealth, the potential risks that you face (such as a need for nursing home care in the future), the specifics of who you want to inherit (including whether there are any disabled individuals or minor children you want to leave assets to) and your goals for making your plan.
As a result, the best way to get started is to reach out to the Northern California Center for Estate Planning and Elder Law at (916) 437-3500 to schedule an appointment to speak with a Sacramento estate planning lawyer. An experienced and qualified attorney can help you to define your objectives for estate planning, to identify the tools that you need to use to achieve those goals, and to create enforceable estate planning tools that sill secure your future and your legacy that you leave behind.
The majority of Americans with no plan are taking an unacceptable risk and should try to correct it as soon as possible by getting an estate plan in place ASAP. No one is promised an infinite number of tomorrows, and you can’t go back in time and make your plan once something has happened to you and your loved ones are left trying to cope with the fallout.
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