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hey I'm a state planning attorney Paul Rabelais and in this video we're gonna talk about who you should name as the executor so I've either prepared or overseen the preparation of about probably about 10,000 wills or so over the last three decades in every single will that I've either prepared or oversaw the preparation of there was an executor named some people get hung up on their executor decisions so in this video we're gonna talk about the things that factor into and the things that may keep you from getting hung up on naming an executor all right so the first thing I want to do is I'm going to talk about who typically is named as executor but you may not have typical circumstances so after we talk about what's typical we'll talk about the roles of the executor and and hopefully by the end of this video you'll have a really good idea of who you should name as your executor all right so what's typical well if you're married it's typical that you name your spouse as the executor if you're not married and you have adult children it's typical that you name either one of the children as the executor or two or more children as the co-executors more on that later if you have minor kids and you're married you'll name your spouse as the executor and then you'll name some other perhaps relative mother father sister brother as the alternate executor if you're if you have minor kids and you're not married well again you might name brother mother father sister brother some other trusted a friend or relative as the executor so that's that's what's typical that doesn't cover every circumstance so now let's talk about what the role of the executor is and that might help you make the right decision okay so the role of the executor sometimes when somebody dies sometimes their their accounts are frozen no one can access that so it's the executor role typically to hire a lawyer and we go through a process to get a judge to declare that the will is valid and we get a judge to sign a court order confirming that the executor is now confirmed as the executor courthouse issues these I'll call them court orders and what that does that allows your executor to go if necessary set up an estate account at a bank or a financial institution and it allows your executor to go collect the funds from those accounts that were in your name that are now frozen and kind of pool all those funds together into the estate account to cover your mortgage if there's a mortgage your car know if there's a car know any other expenses that come up while this stuff is going on note that the executor role is really a temporary role from the date that you died or the date they get confirmed as the executor until the the succession or probate matter is complete and the assets are ultimately dispersed you know to the appropriate heirs sometimes the executor will need to sell something that's in your name after you pass away in order to make it easier to settle the estate so sometimes we see the executor selling the home of the person who passed away selling the vehicle of the person who passed away so the executor has that role as well so don't get but I see way too many people get hung up on who they're gonna name as the executor I see a lot of parents sit across from the tape across the table from me and say something like oh we have three children we don't know who to pick we don't want to offend our daughter if we pick our son or we really like our son-in-law he's really on the ball but we don't want to and our two sons by picking our son-in-law so those are just personal decisions you've got to work through for example if you have three children do you name one or DNA two or three of them I will say in general it's easier to get things done if there's one executor but if you must name two or three co-executor x' by all means that's certainly a possibility for you what I find is when parents are getting hung up when they have adult children they don't know who to select of course they'll name each other first I just don't know who to select as the alternate executor you know they might decide to go talk to their children about it and the parents are hung up on it parents go talk to the kids we're trying to get our estate in order we don't know who to pick as the executor we wanted to talk to you usually when those parents come back to me I say hey did you talk to your kids about some of these decisions and and the parents will say yeah they just said how to do whatever you want to do it doesn't matter to us so I think the parents put more thought than necessary and get a little hung up sometimes more than they need to but just kind of force yourself to make a decision and if appropriate talk to those potential heirs and potential executives about it and usually I think you'll find that they're very very supportive of whatever decision you might make and and if you communicate it to them then it's not a surprise later on and usually things go smoother because there is no surprise note that you can always change it you know if if you change your mind or if something happens to one of these executives or alternative executives that you named then you can always you know change your will note that the executor has zero discretion to change how things go you know if if you wrote in your will I leave $10,000 to st. Jude Children's Hospital in Memphis and I leave everything else to my three children equally and you name your song as the executor and you die your son can't go in and say you know I'm gonna bump up that $10,000 bequests to $25,000 and instead of leaving everything else to the three of us equally I think my my sister should get a little more so you know she'll get half and me and my brother will will get 25% each executor can't do anything like that so their role is to just you know make sure that your intent you know gets fulfilled sometimes people get the executor role confused with other roles that you'll be designated as part of your estate planning legal program so sometimes you'll get an executor confused with power of attorney two completely different roles power attorney is who you'd designate to handle things while you're alive but you're unable to handle things for yourself you can't sign your name accident illness injury at some point during the rest of your life time and then that person you designate on your power of attorney will have that ability to be able to do things for you now the the same person may fill both roles but it's two different roles the executor handle handles things the executor has no authority to handle things before you die they handle things from the point that you pass away or at least when they're confirmed until you know the matter is complete and all of the assets have been dispersed to the heirs it's a temporary role and then some people get executor confirm executor mixed up with trustee so when you leave assets to a trust or there are assets in a trust in your name when you die it's that trustee again may be the same person as your executor and your power of attorney but your trustee that could be a role that could last for a while especially if you have minor kids and you pass away and God forbid your children are six well that trust that you leave things to for your young children will likely be in effect for many many years maybe even decades so that trustee will fill that role to manage the trust assets until the trust terminates and assets are distributed to the trust beneficiaries so you got a few different roles there one other role is that Guardian again this is if you have minor kids you'll designate guardians or backup parents do your minor kids that's another a different role from the executor can be all the same people or can be different people so I hope that helps in you making a determination of who your executor and your alternate executor should be sometimes an attorney is named as executor but it's not typical I mean I've been an executor a couple of times over the years I remember one in particular where a divorced father had two daughters and he had his reasons why he just didn't want either or both of his two daughters to be the executor of his will and he had nobody else he was retired he was going off to kind of live out of his RV he had no other family he had no other trusted friends or relatives and so in unusual circumstances we'll see people designate perhaps an attorney or an accountant or some other professional but it's it's not typical alright so hope this helps you make that decision make sure you subscribe to my channel channel here on YouTube and hit the notification bell so you don't miss anything a thumbs up would be awesome comments about you know your experience either as an executor or naming an executor are always welcome y'all have a good day