Banfield Couling Law & Mediation

Estate Planning & Probate Attorney in Brighton, Michigan

Major changes in a family often create reasons to revisit an estate plan. A marriage or divorce, the birth of a child, a move to Michigan, the start of a business, or a second marriage can all affect whether older planning documents still reflect a person's wishes. From her Brighton office, attorney Andrea Banfield helps clients address these changes through estate planning, probate and related legal services.

Banfield Couling Law & Mediation assists clients with wills, trusts, powers of attorney and healthcare directives, as well as estate administration, probate litigation, guardianships and conservatorships. Andrea Banfield's broader practice also includes family law and mediation, giving her experience with legal issues that can arise during significant transitions in a family's structure.

Keeping an Estate Plan Current as Life Changes

Creating a will is not necessarily a one-time event. A document prepared years ago may no longer make sense after changes in relationships, property ownership or family responsibilities.

Andrea Banfield assists clients with wills and trusts and encourages people to consider their estate plans after events such as marriage, becoming a parent, starting a business, moving to Michigan, divorce or remarriage. These transitions can raise practical questions about who should receive property, who should be responsible for carrying out a person's wishes and whether an existing plan still reflects the family as it exists today.

For parents, estate planning can also provide an opportunity to address what should happen if they are no longer available to care for their children. For people entering a new marriage or rebuilding their lives after divorce, reviewing existing documents can help identify provisions created under circumstances that have since changed.

Preparing for a Medical or Financial Emergency

Estate planning also involves decisions that may become important long before someone dies. An unexpected accident or serious illness can leave a person temporarily or permanently unable to handle financial matters or communicate healthcare decisions.

Powers of attorney and healthcare directives allow people to make some of those decisions in advance. Rather than leaving relatives uncertain about who should act or what a loved one would have wanted, these documents can establish authority and provide guidance before an emergency occurs.

This planning can be particularly important for families in which one person normally handles most financial responsibilities or for adults who want to decide for themselves who should make important decisions if they become incapacitated.

Guardianships and Conservatorships for Family Members Who Need Help

Sometimes advance planning is not in place when a person loses the ability to manage personal or financial affairs. Other situations may involve a minor or an adult child who needs someone legally authorized to act on their behalf.

Andrea handles guardianship and conservatorship matters involving minors, adult children, aging parents and other incapacitated individuals.

These proceedings can arise during difficult periods for families. An aging parent may no longer be capable of making important personal decisions. A relative may be unable to manage money or property safely. Parents of an adult child with continuing needs may have questions about the legal authority required to assist them.

Guardianships and conservatorships provide different forms of court-supervised authority, and the appropriate proceeding depends on the person's circumstances and the type of assistance required.

Handling an Estate After a Death

The death of a family member can leave relatives responsible for legal and financial tasks at the same time they are dealing with grief. Banfield Couling Law & Mediation provides estate administration services to help address the legal process involved in settling a person's affairs.

Estate administration may require determining what property is part of the estate, addressing the responsibilities of the person placed in charge and ultimately distributing property according to the applicable estate plan and legal process.

Having legal guidance can be especially useful when the person responsible for an estate has never served in that role before and is unsure what needs to happen next.

Probate Disputes and Mediation

Families do not always agree about what should happen during probate. Questions about an estate, the actions of the people involved or other probate issues can turn an already stressful process into a dispute.

Andrea's practice includes probate litigation as well as mediation. Banfield Couling Law & Mediation specifically offers mediation for probate matters, providing another potential way to address disagreements when family members or other interested parties are in conflict.

Mediation gives the participants an opportunity to work toward an agreed resolution rather than leaving every disputed issue for a court to decide. When a probate matter cannot be resolved that way, Andrea also handles contested probate proceedings through her litigation practice.

Estate Planning After Divorce or Remarriage

Andrea Banfield's extensive family law practice gives Banfield Couling Law & Mediation a particularly relevant perspective on the relationship between changes in family structure and estate planning.

Divorce is one of the life events the firm identifies as a reason to review an estate plan. Remarriage can create another reason for review, particularly when older documents were prepared during a previous stage of a person's life.

Someone who has recently divorced may still have planning documents that were created years earlier. A person entering a second marriage may be combining households and family responsibilities that did not exist when an earlier will or trust was prepared. Reviewing an estate plan after these transitions can help ensure that the documents in place continue to reflect the individual's current circumstances and intentions.

A Brighton Attorney with Livingston County Roots

Andrea Banfield has longstanding ties to the Brighton community and Livingston County. She attended Brighton schools and later returned to Livingston County to raise her family.

Her legal practice combines estate planning and probate work with family law and mediation, areas that frequently involve families during periods of significant change. For estate clients, that includes planning ahead with wills, trusts and incapacity documents, addressing guardianship or conservatorship concerns, administering an estate after a death, and handling probate matters when disputes arise.

Practice Areas

• Estate Planning

• Wills

• Trusts

• Powers of Attorney

• Healthcare Directives

• Estate Administration

• Probate Litigation

• Probate Mediation

• Guardianships

• Conservatorships