Estate Attorney: "I'm Giving Away What My Industry Charges Thousands For" | Ep. 445 with Atty. William Funk

William Funk (0:00)

If people don't have a will, invariably the court will screw up the way they want their stuff distributed. One of the most famous cases that somebody didn't create a will was the Rockstar Prince, and it ended up in litigation for 14 years.

Daniel (0:17)

He watched families lose fortunes to courtrooms for 30 years. He charged up to $15,000 to stop it. Then demand exploded 25 times over, so he gave the secrets away in one book. This is William Funk.

You are an attorney. Why would you give this information for free?

William Funk (0:37)

It seemed to me that a lot of these charges for wills are exorbitant. They want to try to control the money after they pass away. You cannot do that with a will, but what you can do that with is a...

Daniel (0:58)

So Bill, you spent 30 years as an attorney. You even wrote a book recently about wills.

Why have you seen it that it's so important that somebody sets up their will?

William Funk (1:10)

Well, because if people don't have a will, invariably the court will screw up the way they want their stuff distributed. And by taking just a few hours, you can draft a simple will that will take care of all the stuff that you've spent a lifetime accumulating and get it distributed the way someone wants to get it distributed.

Daniel (1:37)

What's the worst-case scenario that you've seen around somebody who didn't create a will and it was a disaster?

William Funk (1:44)

Well, one of the most famous cases that somebody that didn't create a will was the Rockstar Prince. And he had obviously a very substantial estate and it ended up in litigation for 14 years.

And I'm quite sure that in the end, it wasn't distributed exactly the way he had wanted to happen. And a similar situation happened with Howard Hughes, who had a gigantic estate and it was in litigation for over 17 years. So you want to avoid that and you want to avoid having to pay the lawyers tons of money to do something that you could do in a relatively short period of time.

Daniel (2:31)

So I think this might be one of the most unsexy topics. I think most people don't like to think about something that's related to when they're dying. So they put it off. I almost would say it's probably likened to life insurance. Nobody wants to talk about something.

But a lot of our viewers, they're entrepreneurs, they're business owners. They might have more than just money at stake. What is something that they need to know?

William Funk (2:56)

Well, Daniel, you hit the nail right on the head. People realize they're not going to live forever.

But they think that talking about it is going to hasten their demise. So consequently, they put it off, and put it off, and put it off. And I think when they read my book, they come to realize that there's no big mystery here. And in a relatively short period of time, without a significant expense, they can have this covered. And if they need to change it a year and a half from now, or five years from now, it's easy to do.

Daniel (3:33)

Let's say I'm gonna start a will today. What are three tips that I need to know that I should put into the will?

William Funk (3:40)

Well, one of the most important things in a will is gonna be the person that the author wants to settle the estate. That's called the executor. And the executor has to be trusted by the author implicitly. Because in most states, they function independently from the court.

So there's nobody sitting on their shoulder checking everything. So it's very important that the executor be a person that the writer of the will trust implicitly. Because they're not supervised. And there's a temptation there for some people to, to take money from the estate. They may or may not be paid depending upon how the will writer would like it. But they have access to everything. They have access to the money, the property, and you don't want any of that to end up in their pocket. So you want to be sure that the executor is someone that you trust completely. The second thing is the execution of the will needs to be done according to the terms that are included in the book. They're not complicated, but they're different in every state. And so you want to follow the rules to make sure that the will is done correctly. And that really means getting the witnesses and having it signed properly.