what is estate planning we talk a lot about this on the show it's primarily a big part of what i do at my law firm but what actually is estate planning so the most basic way to explain this is that estate planning is essentially a legal way to leave everything in order regarding your affairs that means that you make decisions about who's getting what um whether that's money your house anything that you own who's getting it is it your kids is it your neighbor is it your loved ones or do you want to donate to a charity some people leave their money to charity or to their pets yes that is a thing so essentially estate planning is really just a legal way and the most effective way to really protect your assets in the event of an unexpected event like death also it can also be used for in the event that you can't make decisions for yourself if you became incapacitated um which is not necessarily the same as death but it still is a way to manage that so um estate planning does a couple of things for you it actually can really just protect your assets so that they don't end up in court and a court does not have to get involved with who's getting what you know it it basically leaves instructions to your family and to anyone else that you want to leave your things to again without court supervision this is important because a lot of people have this worry and they worry a lot about what would happen in the event that i'm gone what would happen if my spouse were to leave this earth before me what happens if we were to leave at the same time those are questions that are addressed in estate planning so that's really what it is in a big big scheme of things and it's the most basic way to explain