LIFE & HOME

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Money Matters | FINANCE

We all agree, the last few months have been terrible. I have no interest in recounting the difficulties we have experienced, in one form or another. It is time to move forward.

What a great Spring! I have enjoyed watching young people master the art of online meetings. For example we have been holding Scout meetings online. The imagination and diligence of young people to remain task oriented, while documenting that they completed certain requirements without someone standing over them is fantastic. I am confident we have a great deal to look forward to with this next generation of young people.

Although I look forward to the future, I am concerned about the desire for too much too fast. We are beginning to see many more articles about young adults drawing comparisons to their peers, the envy of one about the income of another, or the unfairness that one still has help from parents while another struggles.

Envy and jealousy have been around forever, and it’s not just about money. It

can be about improving your mind, your body, or even your attitude. In order to improve, you have to surround yourself with supporters, not destructors.

So, as a supporter, how do we prepare for the success of young people that genuinely process faster than we do and will certainly be smarter than we are? Trust and Trusts.

We trust our children to make good decisions and we can teach them and guide them up until they are adults. Then all of the sudden, we know less.

We then move from trust to Trusts. The Trust document is a great way to continue coaching toward success, in spite of a desire not to be coached. You can encourage your beneficiaries to be productive, encourage their thriftiness, even keep them from reaching too far into the account for purchases that may sound great at the time but cannot be supported in the future. A Trust becomes a bit of a crystal ball that promotes good choices based on wisdom, experience, and your personal and normally correct expectations of your beneficiary’s future ability to manage.

There is little more gratifying than a beneficiary acknowledging that their parents knew they couldn’t manage “that”. “That” can be an inheritance, or the pressure of running their parent’s business, the sale of the parents’ home, or even the management and settling of their parents’ estate.

I encouraged my employees to take the time to review their estate plans while they had more downtime than normal. Before we all get back to our previous normal, ridiculously busy lives, I hope you will take a few minutes and make certain you have created a plan that works for your family. ∞

Welcome back! Hope you have a great summer!

Bill Kerst President, Community First Trust Company He has been conducting educational seminars on IRAs, asset management, and trust management for over 15 years. He has served as the moderator for the Income Taxation of Estates and Trusts course offered by the Arkansas Society of CPAs and provided many seminars to civic and church groups in the community. For more information, call 501-520-3660.

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