When Melissa and her husband Jake moved into their first home in San Antonio, they were thirty-two, busy, and completely healthy. They had a toddler named Cora and a second baby on the way. A will felt like something their parents needed — not them.
Then Jake’s college friend died suddenly in a car accident at thirty-five, leaving behind a wife and two kids and no will at all.
It shook them. They called me the following week.
What I explained to Melissa is what I tell every young parent who sits across from me: a will isn’t a document about dying. It’s a document about your kids.
Without a will, the state steps in and makes decisions you should be making. Who raises Cora if something happens to both of you? A judge decides — working through a list set by law, not by what you’d actually want. Your sister who lives down the street and knows Cora’s favorite bedtime story? She has no legal priority unless you say so in writing.
Melissa hadn’t thought about it that way. Most people haven’t.
There’s also the question of money. If Cora inherited assets without a plan in place, those funds could end up sitting in a court-managed account until she turns eighteen — then handed to her all at once, with no strings attached. A will lets you structure things differently.
After we finished, Melissa told me she felt like she could finally exhale. ‘I didn’t realize how much I was carrying around,’ she said.
You probably have more to protect than you think. And the people you love deserve to have those protections written down.
If you’ve been putting it off, this is your nudge. It doesn’t take long, and it makes a world of difference.