As we near the end of life many people’s mind’s naturally turn to tidying up their affairs, this often includes things like making sure they have an up to date will and have appointed a Power of Attorney. Perhaps even putting in place some medical care instructions or Funeral plans.

These are all wise things to do, at Maddick Consulting Group we deal with deceased estates quite often and we see some common issues that are not picked up at this stage.

• If you have super towards the end of your life you may want to consider cashing your super completely. Perhaps even leaving this instruction to your Power of Attorney(ies), the reason is if your super is paid to a non dependant (like your adult children) they will generally pay tax on this. Where generally if the super is cashed out as long as you have met a condition of release you will pay not tax and the funds will then form part of your Estate with no tax payable.
• Appointing an inappropriate executor to your estate. Some executors are not appropriate; for example anyone who does not live in Australia will have trouble administering your estate, there could also be some adverse tax consequences for your beneficiaries. Another common issue we see is executors that are not good at administration and paperwork…this role of executor is primarily a role of paper work!

Please note the aim of this article is just to highlight a couple of issues we see regularly in our work, please consider your position and get professional advice before acting.