Nobody enjoys this conversation. You are asking your parents to talk about money, illness, and dying, and somewhere in the back of your mind you are worried it will sound like you are asking about your inheritance.
It is worth having anyway. Families who sort this out early get to make decisions together, calmly, with options on the table. Families who wait find out how few options are left. Here are six steps that make the whole thing easier.
1. Start earlier than feels necessary
The best time to have this conversation is while your parents are healthy and nothing is urgent. That is exactly when it feels least necessary, which is why it keeps getting postponed.
Health is what makes planning possible. Once someone is no longer able to make their own decisions, they can no longer sign the documents that would have let you help them. At that point the only route left is guardianship or conservatorship, which means going to court, in public, to ask a judge for permission to act for your own parent.
A gentler way in than "we need to talk about your will" is usually something like: "I want to make sure I would know what you wanted. Can we go through it sometime?" We wrote more on how to raise this without overstepping.
2. Get everything in one place
Estate planning runs on information, and most of it is scattered. Before anyone talks to an attorney, help your parents gather what they have into a single folder or binder.
What to look for: bank and investment accounts, retirement accounts, life insurance policies, the deed to the house, vehicle titles, any business ownership documents, recent tax returns, and any existing will, trust, or power of attorney.
Two things usually come out of this exercise. You find accounts nobody remembered. And you find beneficiary designations from a previous decade still naming someone who should not be there anymore.
3. Make sure there is a will
A will says who gets what, and if there are still minor children or dependents involved, it names their guardians. Without one, Michigan law decides, and Michigan law does not know anything about your family.
A will is the floor, not the ceiling. It is worth knowing what it does not do: a will still goes through probate court, which is public, slow, and expensive. Which brings us to the next step.
4. Talk about a trust
A living trust, also called a revocable trust, lets your parents keep full control of their assets while they are alive and hands those assets to the people they choose without probate. For most Michigan families with a home, this is the single most useful tool available.
If protecting assets from long-term care costs is a concern, and for most families it should be, the conversation goes further. A living trust does not shield assets from nursing home costs. A Medicaid Asset Protection Trust (MAPT) does, but only if it is set up at least five years before benefits are needed. Michigan values a month of nursing home care at $12,216.30 under its 2026 Medicaid formula, so this is not a hypothetical risk.
Whatever they choose has to be funded. A trust only controls what is actually titled into it, and a trust nobody funded sends the family straight back to probate.
Not sure what your parents already have?
Bring us what you found and we will tell you what is missing. Adult children call us on their parents' behalf all the time. No cost, no paperwork, no pressure.
5. Do not skip the incapacity documents
This is the step families regret missing, and it has nothing to do with who inherits what.
A healthcare power of attorney lets someone make medical decisions for your parent if they cannot. A durable financial power of attorney lets someone pay their bills and manage their accounts. A living will records what kind of care they do and do not want at the end of life.
Without these, a hospital can decline to discuss your parent's condition with you and a bank can decline to let you move a dollar, even as their child, even in an emergency. And these documents only work if they are signed while your parent still has capacity. There is no way to add them later.
One more thing worth checking if long-term care is on the horizon: not every power of attorney is written broadly enough to do the things Medicaid planning requires. A generic form off the internet often is not.
6. Bring in an attorney who works with Michigan families
Estate planning is state-specific, and Michigan has tools other states do not. The Lady Bird Deed is the clearest example: it passes the family home without probate while keeping it protected during your parent's lifetime. Most generic online plans will never mention it.
When you look for a firm, ask one question: do you handle the funding? Plenty of attorneys will draft the documents and hand your parents a to-do list. That list is where plans go to die.
We do the funding ourselves. We go to the bank, file the deed, and update the beneficiary designations. Since 2012 we have protected more than $2 billion in assets for over 2,400 Michigan families, and we do not give anyone homework.
What this actually buys your family
Not just an inheritance. It buys you the ability to help when helping matters, and it takes the worst decisions of your life out of a hospital hallway and into a room where everyone had time to think.
Your parents get peace of mind. You get to be their kid during the hard part instead of their administrator.
One note. This guide is general information about Michigan estate planning, not legal advice for your family, and the 2026 figure above changes most years. What your parents need depends on their circumstances, which is exactly what a free call is for.
