Why Most People Die Unprepared and How to Fix That with Domenic Scarpato

Matt: 00:00:31

Welcome to the Live well podcast, where we explore how to navigate life's biggest changes, overcome challenges, and build a future that aligns with your values and your goals. Hi, I'm Matt Wilson, financial advisor, coach, and business owner of my practice here at Cornerstone Wealth Services in South Bend, Indiana.

And I'm so glad that you're here. Today's episode is called why Most People Die Unprepared and How to Fix that Today.

It's not the most comfortable topic, but it's one of the most important, I believe. And over two thirds of Americans don't have a will.

And that means that most people die without a clear plan, leaving loved ones to deal with the stress, the court costs, and confusion that could have been avoided when we record this podcast here. It is National Make a Will Month, and for so many people, that is something that's been on the to do list for just way too long.

But what if you could finally cross it off without the overwhelm, the awkward meetings, or maybe the huge bill? I want to make this the moment where you finally get it done. No overwhelm, no legal maze, just peace of mind.

And today, I want to make estate planning easy. Yes, you heard that right. Easy. So I'm excited to announce that I partnered with Trust and Will, a modern estate planning platform.

And today we're joined by Dominic Scarpato from their team to walk you through why this matters, what you actually need to know, and how we're making this available, complementary to our clients and to the community. I've had so many conversations with families who say we meant to get our estate plan done. We just never did.

But by then, somebody's passed and then it's too late. So this episode is for anyone who's procrastinated, because the longer you wait, the harder it's going to get. So let's fix that today.

Dominic, I'm thrilled to welcome you to the show and to the podcast here.

You're part of the team at Trust and Will, a company that's transforming how families approach estate planning with simplicity, clarity, and legal peace of mind. So why don't you take a moment here just to introduce yourself, and then we've got some questions to walk through.

And again, I'm so thankful that you've joined us today and let you introduce yourself.

Domenic: 00:03:02

Hey, Matt, thanks so much for having me on the podcast. Super excited to be here. Just a quick introduction on myself. My name is Dominic Scarpatto.

I'm an account executive here at Trust and Will, and my primary focus is on helping advisors like Matt here sort of roll out estate planning with their clients and ensure that their estates are protected and that their legacies are, you know, in line with their wishes. So happy to sort of dive into the details, into the questions. So, Matt, if you want to maybe fire off a couple of questions, let's.

Let's dive right into it.

Matt: 00:03:32

ly different. I mean, this is: 2025

But I'm not really scared for that because I think so many people have so many unique situations and emotions are a big part of it. But let me just start here by asking you, why do you think so many people avoid estate planning?

Domenic: 00:03:58

For sure, I think that's a great question to start off with.

Many people sort of procrastinate estate planning because they think it's too complicated, it's too expensive, or they don't have enough assets to justify creating an estate plan. There's a very natural aversion to discussing death as well.

Most people, especially those who skew a little bit younger, think that they're invincible, that nothing is ever going to happen to them. And unfortunately, that's just not the case.

We released a: 2025

I think, I think some further numbers that sort of, you know, paint the picture of why that number is so low from that study are, you know, we sort of asked respondents to that study, hey, what are the top three reasons why you don't have an estate plan? The top three reasons are, one, they don't think it's necessary. They don't believe they don't have enough assets to actually warrant an estate plan.

Two is procrastination. People say, hey, I just haven't gotten around to it yet. I don't feel a sense of urgency to actually get it done. And three is just lack of knowledge.

People just don't know where to start. They don't know, do I go to an attorney? Which type of attorney do I go to? What is this process going to look like?

And so there's a lot of uncertainty for what that process is actually going to look like for an end client.

Matt: 00:05:26

Yeah, you mentioned couple of things that I was going to ask you about, like what are the biggest myths and misconceptions that you hear? What do you hear most often and You. You kind of alluded to that a little bit. Is there anything else that you'd like to add?

Domenic: 00:05:39

For sure.

Domenic: 00:05:39

The biggest misconception is that estate planning is only for the wealthy. You know, most people think that a will is the only document that you need and that only wealthy people need one, which is just not the case.

People are, I think, generally unaware of what happens to their assets if they die without a plan. And even if you're not wealthy, those implications will still affect you and your family if you die intested.

Matt: 00:06:04

Yeah. And so that was kind of my next question. And that is, what happens to someone? Or what happens if someone passes without a will or a plan in place?

Domenic: 00:06:14

For sure.

Domenic: 00:06:15

So within the estate planning industry, if you pass away without a will or an estate plan, we call that passing away intestate. If that does occur, state laws will then determine how your assets are distributed. This is problematic for a few reasons.

Primarily because this can lead to family disputes, family stress, lengthy court battles, and ultimately, outcomes that do not align with your wishes.

Matt: 00:06:44

I have seen it. I tell you, it's not pretty.

Domenic: 00:06:48

You're preaching to the choir, my friend.

Matt: 00:06:50

Yeah. I tell you what, I think that's. That's a huge thing, is people just think that it's going to get taken care of. I.

And correct me if I'm wrong, this is from caring.com but two out of three Americans do not have an estate plan. That is the vast majority of people. And then only 20% of millennials have a will.

And then the other thing that was astonishing to me was the majority of people who do have wills haven't updated them in over five years. Is that all true?

Domenic: 00:07:22

That is all true, unfortunately. I mean, we see scenarios all the time where people come to us with estate plans that are 10, 15, 20 years out of date.

And 99 times out of 100, if you have an estate plan that's 20 years out of date, it's most likely not an effective estate plan anymore.

If you've moved, if you've had children, even if you need to do something, as, you know, update a beneficiary, that estate plan is no longer going to execute the wishes that you deem appropriate for your estate and your family.

Matt: 00:07:53

Check your beneficiaries. I had. I was over somebody's house once as an advisor. We were doing kind of a discovery, and my process is to discover everything we can.

Then we design a plan, we get feedback, we talk through it, and then we deploy the pieces.

Well, I was in the discovery phase, and I Sat down and we talked about life insurance and the beneficiaries came up and his ex wife was his beneficiary of all of his 401k of his life insurance. And needless to say, I had to leave the house while they sorted it out. So let me ask you this Dominic, for Trust and Will, how does it actually work?

What makes it easier and more accessible than maybe traditional planning?

Domenic: 00:08:46

For sure.

Domenic: 00:08:46

So Trust and Will is an online platform that simplifies the estate planning process. We provide attorney approved, legally valid documents that be that can be created from the comfort of your own home.

It makes it much more affordable and less time consuming than going through a traditional attorney process.

When you go the traditional attorney route, it can usually take you anywhere from four to eight weeks to even schedule a meeting with a local attorney.

From there you're going to go to that local attorney, you're going to spend 2, 3, 4 hours in their office and you're going to pay them to create those documents.

Very few attorneys are actually guiding you through the process of making sure your documents are executed, notarized, maintained, which to your point earlier, can lead to plans that are out of date, you know, missing, you know, specific designations or wishes and ultimately leading to an estate plan being executed in a way that's not in line with your client's wishes.

Matt: 00:09:47

Yeah, and I do want to point out that with the documents that you may form or finalize, we also in our office have a notary. So if you need those documents notarized and finalized, then we do provide that.

How long does it take for somebody to go from hey, I need to do this to having a completed will or estate plan?

Domenic: 00:10:10

So it's a very short amount of time. Our platform is designed to be very user friendly and very guided. Most people can typically complete their estate plan within about 30 to 40 minutes.

Matt: 00:10:21

And then what do you recommend as far as the process and gathering information? Do you think it's might take them a little bit of time and how long is too long to finalize it, do you think?

Domenic: 00:10:33

For sure.

Domenic: 00:10:33

So in terms of gathering asset information, that's something that the advisors that we work with will typically help guide clients through. So they'll put together a list of their current assets, they'll run through a checklist and make sure, hey, are we missing anything?

Even something as small as maybe a family heirloom, a nice piece of furniture, even these nice pair of Ray Ban sunglasses that I have sitting on my desk here. They were a nice gift from my brother in law who's an eye doctor.

So this would technically be counted as an asset within my estate plan if I wanted to maybe pass these back to him. God forbid I passed away. But I'd say that's a relatively quick process of gathering that asset information, maybe 15 minutes.

And then once you actually jump into the software process with trust and will, that software workflow is typically about 30 to 40 minutes.

Matt: 00:11:22

Awesome. Let me ask you this. What legal safeguards are in place to make sure that the documents actually hold up in court?

Domenic: 00:11:29

For sure?

Domenic: 00:11:30

So our documents are designed by a team of legal experts to be legally valid in all 50 states. We also provide clear instructions on how to properly execute your documents to ensure that they're legally binding.

Again, we see situations all the time where people go to an attorney, they pay them to create the documents, and then the client never ends up actually executing them because the attorney didn't hold them accountable, didn't give them clear instruction. It's a very, very common scenario that we see with people who have gone to local attorneys.

Matt: 00:12:02

What kind of documents can you create? Is it just wills or trusts too?

Domenic: 00:12:09

So we offer a pretty wide range of documents that suit different needs.

So those include wills, trusts, healthcare directives, as well as other essential estate planning documents tailored for, you know, state specific laws and regulations.

Matt: 00:12:24

Very cool. So what about changes? Is it easy to make changes?

Domenic: 00:12:29

It is. So we recognize that, you know, people's needs change, their situations change over time.

Which is why it's very important that the platform is flexible enough to, you know, manage those changes, those amendments. So you can easily make changes and updates to your documents through our online platform.

All you need to do is go into your login, submit the changes that you would like to make, and we'll then reissue you updated documents. Let's say again, maybe you move to a different state, we'll be able to make that update online for you.

We usually recommend that you update or at least check your estate plan once a year. The estate planning industry generally recommends three to four years.

But when you get into that three, four, five year time horizon, and it becomes easy to sort of fall out of the habit of actually talking about it every year, reviewing your plan and really making it a point to make sure that everything is up to date.

Matt: 00:13:26

Yeah, that's an excellent point. I have what I call a two year rule. One year, you kind of have an idea where you're going to be. Two years, you have absolutely none.

There's no way to know where you're going to be in two years. And People laugh at that, but it is so, so true. So I appreciate you bringing that up for sure.

Domenic: 00:13:44

A lot.

Domenic: 00:13:45

Two years.

Matt: 00:13:48

Exactly. What if. I think you already kind of alluded to this a little bit, but you know, if somebody already has a will, can they still benefit?

What are some things that trust and will can provide for those. Those folks?

Domenic: 00:14:01

For sure.

Domenic: 00:14:01

So even if somebody still already has an existing will, we can certainly manage that will through our platform. That way their advisor has more context into the process. Process.

Even if they need to make a change or an amendment to an existing will, we'll be able to run that process directly through them through the online.

Matt: 00:14:17

Sounds great. Here's a question that I unfortunately have had to talk through when it's maybe too late, but how do you avoid probate?

Domenic: 00:14:27

For sure.

Domenic: 00:14:28

So probate can definitely be a pretty lengthy and difficult process. The most typical way to avoid probate is through a trust based plan. Trusts are great for sort of bypassing that probate process.

For anyone who is not familiar with probate, probate is the process of sort of settling in a state if it's not, you know, housed within a trust based plan. This is problematic for a couple of different reasons. Primarily because it can cause again, a lot of family strife, a lot of family stress.

It's also very, very time consuming. I'm going to use California as an example because the probate process in California is notoriously difficult.

You're looking at anywhere from a 12 to 24 month probate process which elongates family stress. You're also going to lose 3, 4, 5, 6% of the value of that estate to probate fees, which is not ideal.

Matt: 00:15:27

Yeah, I've seen in my experience, I've seen 5% get eroded. I've seen 50%.

Domenic: 00:15:35

Yep. They can be way higher than 5. Yep.

Matt: 00:15:39

It's incredible. So I appreciate that, you know, this is something that comes up sometimes too.

But let me ask you, can this help with blended families, small business owners, or maybe special needs children?

Domenic: 00:15:52

So to give you a little bit of a sense for who trustimal is a good fit for and who are not a good fit for trustable is great for that mass affluent segment of the market. Relatively straightforward situation, you know, nothing overly complex. No real need to go and spend 2, 3, 4, $5,000 with an attorney.

Some common situations that we do not handle are anyone with a taxable estate is still better off being served by a local attorney. To your point, anyone with a special needs beneficiary or overly complex family situation is generally better off being served by a local attorney.

Trustimal is great for, you know, complementing your attorney relationships, but we definitely don't aim to be a full replacement for all attorneys across the board by any means.

Matt: 00:16:38

Yeah, I appreciate that and I'm thankful that we, we covered that. But there are ways for folks to get connected with local attorneys for those situations through trust and will, correct?

Domenic: 00:16:50

Absolutely, yes. So we've built out a very robust network of referral attorneys.

So if somebody does have a one off situation where maybe to your point, it's an overly complex family situation, maybe someone is married three times, they have children across all three marriages, maybe they want different distribution decisions for those children. We could absolutely make a referral to one of the attorneys in our network who could handle that specific situation for you clients.

Matt: 00:17:17

Correct. And, and I think we can help facilitate that. Yeah, I appreciate you, you sharing that.

And you know, I, I have seen situations where people are concerned and they just don't know what they should put in.

And I say, well, the fact is that you could make it very clear for them so that they don't really have to fight and it doesn't have to be drawn out and you can take a lot of the guesswork away way. And so anyway, I just think that's very helpful information about the platform and another reason to just get it done.

So let me ask you this for maybe some of our listeners, some might be familiar with the word trust, but can you just explain a little bit of the difference between what a will provides and what maybe a trust provides for?

Domenic: 00:18:04

Sure.

Domenic: 00:18:04

So to give you a little bit of sense for, hey, what are the actual differences between a trust and a will? A will is a document that outlines your wishes for the distribution of your assets after you die, and it goes into effect upon your death.

On the other hand, a trust can be effective immediately and allows for the management of your assets during your lifetime as well as after your death. A key difference here is that assets in a will typically go through probate, while assets in a trust can bypass it.

Many people use both a will and a trust to create a comprehensive estate plan.

A will can do things like name guardians for children, while trust can provide more control over the asset distribution and again avoid that lengthy probate process.

Matt: 00:18:52

Yeah, and again, back to your earlier point, you know, having a will to name guardian, guardianship, do you really want the courts to do that?

Domenic: 00:19:02

Yeah, I mean, I always tell people, look like even if you don't create an estate plan for yourself, you have one. The state has One for you if you don't create one yourself. And most people's decisions are not going to align with their.

Their state regulations, unfortunately.

Matt: 00:19:17

Excellent point. Absolutely. You know, I appreciate all that helpful information. What's something that people almost always forget? Is there anything.

Domenic: 00:19:26

Yeah, I mean, in terms of what people forget, a lot of the times people will forget sort of more personal items within their estate plan.

Like if you have a family heirloom that has sentimental value, a lot of the times people can forget to sort of put something like that within their estate plan.

You know, people might think that, oh, my estate plan is only going to include my house or my brokerage account, but it really includes sort of everything that, that touches your life, even from. Even down to the basics of something as simple as, like I mentioned earlier, this pair of Ray Ban glasses.

Matt: 00:20:00

Yeah, that's awesome. And I think too, it's very healthy to remind people that, you know, there's things out there like that.

So is there any other word of encouragement that you would give for people who might just feel overwhelmed by the process in general?

Domenic: 00:20:20

Absolutely. So it's. It's perfectly natural to feel overwhelmed with estate planning at first. People are generally uncomfortable talking about death.

They really don't want to talk about it unless it's absolutely necessary. I would encourage people to be more proactive instead of reactive. Unfortunately, death is a certainty for all of us.

And so it's going to be more healthy for yourself, for your family.

If you're proactive about it, you put your decisions in writing, you ensure that you know your estate plan is set, which is going to avoid a lot of family strife down the line, and it's going to be much healthier for everybody and your family in the long run.

Matt: 00:20:57

Yeah, I think that's incredibly good. A good reminder. And we still have local attorneys that we can recommend here in the area.

I've worked with several very closely, and we're more than happy to connect you. And then through the network, we're happy to connect you as well. So I think it's just taking that first step.

So, yeah, let me ask you, what is that first step somebody should take today?

Domenic: 00:21:23

For sure.

Domenic: 00:21:24

So in terms of that first step, I'd say as a first step, have a conversation with your family, maybe find out, hey, did they have an estate plan? What decisions have they made? You're going to become more comfortable with it the more you talk about it.

So I'd say the first step is have a general conversation with your family about what potential wishes you might want to make from there. In terms of actually going through the process of creating your estate plan, you can go directly to Matt through his website.

More additional information can be found on trustworthy. Com. But Matt can sort of get that process started for you in terms of creating the process for creating the documents themselves.

Again, might take you 15 minutes to gather that asset information. Maybe another 30 to 40 minutes to actually run through and create those documents themselves.

We designed it to be as simple, straightforward, user friendly as possible.

Matt: 00:22:11

Yeah. And I would note that we do have some guides to help you with that process.

And so once you enter the process or enter that you that you want to start that we can provide you with those documents to help guide you through that. Correct?

Domenic: 00:22:27

Correct.

Domenic: 00:22:27

Yes.

Matt: 00:22:27

Yeah. Well, I appreciate it, Dominic. This is why I partnered with Trust and Will. We're offering complimentary access to create your estate plan.

Whether it's your first time or you need an update, all you have to do is go to mattwilsonfinancial.com, click contact and we'll get you set up. We've already covered the cost. In most situations you just need to take the step.

So whether you're just getting started or need to update it, update your current planning or your documents, we'll help guide you through it. And I want to mention as well that if you're a business owner, I've got something exciting in the works. Hopefully here.

In early: 2026

It's a flat fee, high impact service to help small business owners master cash flow, understand taxes, legacy planning and long term financial vision.

If you want to be one of the first to be a part of it or you just want to stay in the loop for updates, then just go to Matt WilsonFinancial.com again and just let us know that you're interested. When you reach out.

If this episode stirred something in you, if you know your accounts are scattered, your financial picture feels just unclear or you've outgrown the DIY approach. Let's talk. We offer personalized flat fee financial planning for real life. We don't sell products. We help you build a living plan.

We revisit that plan regularly and we help walk with you through your financial life and life's biggest decisions. Again, reach out to mattwilson financial.com to schedule a call.

Whether it's organizing your investments, planning your retirement or finally getting your estate in order, I'm here to help and I'm here to help you live well. Big thanks to Dominic and trust and will. Remember, most people die unprepared, but you don't have to. And just a quick note.

I'm not an attorney and this isn't legal advice. We always recommend consulting with an estate planning attorney for your specific needs.

And that's why I'm proud to partner with professionals who make the process easier and more effective, like trust and Will. If you have found this episode helpful, please share it with someone you care about. Like subscribe and subscribe.

Leave a review so we can continue bringing you powerful tools to help you live well. I'm Matt Wilson. Take care and we'll see you next.