725: Building Your Succession Plan with Sativa Boatman
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What would happen to your pet care business if you suddenly could not run it? Attorney and business owner Sativa Boatman joins Collin to explain why wills, trusts, powers of attorney, and succession planning matter long before retirement. They discuss the risks of allowing a business to pass through probate and the operational gap that can leave employees, clients, and family members without anyone authorized to act. Sativa encourages owners to recognize their businesses as valuable assets and clearly communicate whether those businesses should continue, be sold, or be responsibly closed. This conversation offers a practical starting point for protecting what you have built while giving the people around you greater clarity and peace.
Main topics:
Avoiding Probate for Businesses
Trusts and Ownership Transfers
Planning for Owner Incapacity
Choosing a Business Successor
Treating Business as Assets
Main takeaway: “You do not want your business to be run through probate court if you die.”
That statement may feel uncomfortable, but avoiding the conversation does not protect the business you have worked so hard to build. Without the proper legal structure, there may be no one immediately authorized to sign payroll, access critical accounts, manage contracts, or make decisions for your company. Your employees, clients, family, and community could all be affected while the courts determine who has the authority to act.
Planning does not mean that you expect the worst to happen tomorrow. It means recognizing that your business is an asset worthy of protection. A thoughtful succession plan can provide clear instructions for whether the business should continue, be sold, or be responsibly closed. In this episode, Sativa Boatman helps us begin asking the difficult—but necessary—questions that create clarity and peace for everyone involved.
About our guest: Sativa Boatman is an attorney and business owner with Assertion Law Firm LLC, a Missouri transactional law firm serving families and businesses throughout the state. Her practice includes estate planning, elder law, probate and trust administration, business matters, and real estate. She focuses on helping clients understand complicated legal decisions and create plans tailored to their assets, families, businesses, and long-term goals. Through her work, Sativa seeks to educate and empower clients so they can move forward with greater confidence and peace of mind. (Assertion Law Firm LLC)
Links:
Assertion Law Firm provides legal services involving estate planning, probate and trust administration, real estate, and business law throughout Missouri. The firm’s business-law services include entity setup, contracts, business purchases, succession planning, and business transitions. (Assertion Law Firm LLC)
Phone: 888-887-4170
Give us a call!(636) 364-8260
Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed by our guests are their own and do not necessarily reflect those of Pet Sitter Confessional, its hosts, or sponsors. We interview individuals based on their experience and expertise within the pet care industry. Any statements made outside of this platform, or unrelated to the topic discussed, are solely the responsibility of the guest.
A VERY ROUGH TRANSCRIPT OF THE EPISODE
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Collin 0:02
Welcome to Pet Sitter Confessional, an open and honest discussion about life as a pet sitter. Today, we're brought to you by our friends at Time to Pet and Tiny Paws Bookkeeping. How do we plan for the future in our business, and how do we make sure that a large asset to us, our family, and our community is protected, whether we are in the business or whether we are not. And what does that process look like? To answer these questions, I am really excited to have Sativa Boatman, owner of Assertion Law Firm, on the show to talk about legacy planning, business planning, and trusts, and everything in between. And right at the top here, I'll go ahead and say it. I'm sure you will say it too, Sativa. This is a very broad conversation, and local laws and regulations are different depending on where you live and where you are operating your business. So make sure that you are checking with a local attorney to talk about the specifics and how you want these implemented in your business. Did I did I say that and get that out of the way? Everything correctly, Sativa. Okay. Well, for those who aren't familiar with you, I'd love for you to share about about who you are and what you do over with Assertion Law Firm.
Sativa Boatman 1:11
Sure. I've been practicing law now for we'll just call it a long time, but started out just really working with more of the business owner side, and then got really heavy into estate planning and even some elder law stuff through the years. And but I appreciate being on today because I think it's business owners who aren't thinking about their planning-it's fine. Somebody 70 years old comes in; they know they need to be thinking about their planning. But we really need to all be thinking about our planning because we don't know when our time is. So it's-it's just not a conversation we want to be having, and we're trying to run our businesses and do everything else we need to be doing. Thinking about marketing, you know, I own my own business too. I get it, but we really do want to be considerate of what if we become incapacitated or pass away before we've retired and sold the business, or you know, some people work well into their retirement as well. If you're the owner, because you're still that investor, and maybe you have employees. So while we own a business, which we don't know how long that's going to be, we need to be conscious and aware of it. So I'm very thankful that you're having me talk to people today about it because it's an undercover topic for younger people, meaning pre-retirement, basically.
Collin 2:50
I've heard the statement: everybody will transition out of their business at some point, and we have to we have to be planning for for that eventuality. And it's right. I, you know, as a business owner, it's not my favorite topic. It's not. I don't. You don't like thinking about the end because I'm so busy in the here and now. I've got so much to do. That's so long. That's so far out of fear that I can't even dream about. Maybe I just started my business. What are you saying? Talk about how I'm exiting or talking about how I'm protecting. That doesn't even make sense, but a lot of us have that conception of like I'm just trying to think of like terms that people know. Like will will is a term that a lot of people know. From your perspective, Sativa, how effective is a will in the business, and how does that relate to other things like trust and agreements.
Sativa Boatman 3:42
Yeah, so wills are a very misunderstood thing for sure. What a will is, which its real name is a last will and testament, but what that document is is it is the document you're gonna want to have if something goes to probate, because if you're going to probate, it's kind of a little bit more chaotic if you don't have a will that names who's in charge and who's getting your stuff, right? So there are rules and statutes on what happens when you don't have a will, because people don't. But it's just a better way to go into probate court, having a will, and I typically tell people then it's cheaper and easier if you have a will to do the probate. But the goal should be to avoid probate, so your will should always be the plan B or the backup plan to your normal top plan, which should be to avoid probate, particularly with a business. You do not want your business to be run through probate court if you die. Like that is not the ideal way to do it. So a will is something we all need as the backup plan to our primary plan in case something goes awry with our primary. Plan a will shouldn't be how you're planning to have everything go. Meaning you're then planning to go to probate. That that is not what you want to do. So the will is absolutely something we all need, but it's our backup plan or our plan B. Right? It's not our primary plan.
Collin 5:21
Well, I love that. Of you said specifically for the business, why is going to probate with a business so bad?
Sativa Boatman 5:30
Until you have the personal representative appointed or executor appointed, no one can do anything with your business. So, who can sign for payroll? Who can continue the business and make those decisions legally until a probate is opened and someone's appointed to be in charge of it? No one. You don't want that gap period to exist. You just don't. It's not ideal to have that gap period exist because it's a big business killer. Honestly,
Collin 6:07
that who has access to the business? Who can we think about? We think business owners tend to think, "Hey, does the work get done? But I think we tend to define the work that gets done in the business as in like the service we provide. For us, it's can the dog walks continue? I can train so many people to walk dogs. That's not a problem. It was only until later where we realized of, well, who can like sign documents for the business and and who can like do other stuff with the business that all of a sudden that became I don't want to say terrifying to think about, but it was a little overwhelming to to try and wrap our heads around.
Sativa Boatman 6:44
How long do the dog walkers continue to show up if they don't know who's going to pay them and when the paycheck is coming?
Speaker 1 6:52
Yeah.
Sativa Boatman 6:54
So it's really like if you don't have a good plan for this, You lose those employees that then you needed to have to continue the business for your family or whoever you're leaving it to. So you really just don't want the probate court scenario to happen because you cannot probate for the first 30 days after death, and you also cannot probate until there's a death certificate, and that can take two weeks, three weeks, or also you can't file for probate for that 30 days. So I mean, you just don't want probate and a will to be the plan. It's just not what you want.
Collin 7:40
So what is a better plan from your perspective? We got Will's the backup. How do I actually start like structuring this? You know, give us some terms and stuff to talk about.
Sativa Boatman 7:50
I would say for most businesses, a trust is the way to go because, and the reason why is what's nice about a trust is immediately it's created, right? So, in you're the trustee of your trust while you're alive. The second you're deceased, a trustee steps in right away. So if your business goes to your trust or is already owned in your trust or whatever, you've got an immediate person. We have no court action. There's no waiting periods. That trustee is immediately jumping into action. If you are not a business that maybe is to a point or a person that's not to a point where you feel like a trust is right for you, we can also leave your business almost like how you have a TOD on a car title, there's a document that we can create as lawyers that is basically a beneficiary transfer instrument where you're saying if I, as the owner, die, then my interest in this LLC. Most of you guys are probably LLCs, but but it could be corporate stock, right? So, but but this stock interest or this LLC membership interest, I want it to transfer to this human being or these couple of human beings, and that is an automatic thing that then happens, and that document makes that sip. But then you know they step in. If you have though other assets or multiple businesses or things like that, you can actually in your trust say this business is this is what I want to have happen. But my home, I want this to happen, and my you know farmland, I want this to happen. Like you can have multiple assets doing different things, and your business only being one of those assets that you have. Then you're probably more of a trust candidate, right? Or if you have littles, say you're a solo, you know, entrepreneur. And you've got this business, but you want to leave it to a five-year-old and a two-year-old. You you can't really do that. They do not have the capacity to do that. So, do you want to then have it go into trust and have someone manage this business for them until they take it over, or maybe manage it until it can be sold, and then the money be kept in the trust for the littles. So that is sort of our consideration on: do we leave something post death to a trust, or do we just leave it to humans? Is who ultimately do we want to have receive it or receive the money from it if it's we're wanting it to be sold? The other thought is powers of attorney, so we may want to talk a little bit more about that. But what if you're not deceased? What if you're just temporary, permanently incapacitated? Who is signing on that business for you, and that's something that people don't think about as part of their legacy too. But if you have a stroke and you can't sign your name for six months while you're rehabbing, who's signing payroll records? Who is signing contracts? Who's doing that? Could really put your business into jeopardy. And those general durable powers of attorney, and making sure we're not getting generic ones that don't address the fact you own a business. Like we want that section on I'm giving this agent the right to sign on behalf of my business interests specifically during the time I'm incapacitated, or just immediately can help do that because I travel a lot, you know. Or I mean, you know what I'm saying. You might want a spouse to be able to sign for you all the time because you're running around traveling all the time in the business, and they're the paperwork, you know, partner. Yeah. Right. So I mean, that's a real thing.
Collin 12:00
Yeah. You know, hearing you talk about this, Sativa, I think the the word that you used about the business was treating it like an asset, and I think I think that that kind of mindset is it's not common, and I think it takes a little while, especially as new business owners or early business owners, we don't view our business worthy of all this stuff of protecting-we tend to think of the insurance, right? So that if I get sued, I can handle that. But viewing my business as an asset, like it were a savings account or a 401k or a house, man, that is just such a different way of thinking about business. And what I love hearing you talk about this-it's-it's really saying not only like can you, but you should be viewing your business as an asset worth protecting and continuing, and that that that changes how we plan and think of okay, like I mean, just simple thing like signing paperworks on the paycheck. Like I, who okay, you're right. I we need we need to think about that, or or how do we make decisions with this? Does it get sold? Does it do something? Because if I'm making money in a business, which we should be making money in a business, just FYI, like it's okay to do that, people. Like like, can that money go to someone else after I'm dead? Like that, and and but but then like there are instruments legally, what you're talking about, Sativa, to make that happen. I know I had a friend who passed away and made me power, not a power attorney, but I was in their trust, oversaw their trust, and but the thing that yeah estate and but the thing that they didn't have in that was their business. They had this business doing doing work for clients, I couldn't. There was nothing we could do with that. It it had to sit there and go through probate and like it was just this like couldn't contact clients, couldn't access files, couldn't contact paperwork, couldn't do, and it couldn't touch a single bit of that. And it made me. That was one of my first wake up calls. Of oh my goodness, have you heard of Time to Pet? Dan from NYC Pooch has this to say:
Speaker 2 14:05
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Collin 14:26
If you're looking for new vet setting software, give Time to Vet a try. Listeners of our show will save 50% off your first three months by visiting timedpet.com/confessional. So when people talk about putting putting the business in the trust, how how what is that actually mean from a practical perspective? Like, because I know there's not a box that I can take my business and put it in in the trust. Like, it's not a physical thing. So, like, help me wrap my brain around what that what's actually happening there. Yeah,
Sativa Boatman 14:54
it's just on paper, and we can do a couple things. Some businesses. Are perfectly easily in the trust, right? So, say you're doing real estate and you have an apartment complex. It's no big deal if the LLC that owns the apartment complex is just owned in the trust. You're not like on a daily basis doing a bunch of stuff to sell the apartment complex. You're not. So then you're just managing it from the LLC, and it's not a big deal to have it owned in the trust. Most clients, though, that have smaller businesses that things change all the time, they have to assign a bunch of different stuff all the time. We don't own it in the trust. We state that upon death, it's owned in the trust. So that's where that beneficiary transfer instrument says instead of going to humans, it goes to the trust. But immediately upon death, immediately upon death, it hits that trust and that trustee, or we call them successor trustee, because you start as the trustee, but then if you're deceased, then they step in. And where the power of attorney situation comes in is that you're not deceased, and we just need someone to come into that business and sign for us. And so, a a generic old school general durable power of attorney that we would have used for a non business owner is just going to say, "Hey, I become incapacitated. You know, I become elderly. I become incapacitated. Then I want people to step up and be able to do this. Whatever. What we do is we kind of customize what that was and set paragraph in. If I have a business interest in anything, then you can sign on behalf of my business interest, and you can do one that's just for that, you could have one for you know all my other stuff. I want this, but for my business, I want this person. You know, you can have them separate, but most of the time, people are just appointing a spouse or a sibling or a parent or you know what I mean, an adult child. So it's they're just appointing the same person. But if you had a different person, you you can separate that out, but that then either temporarily or permanently allows someone to sign. Another thing that I find interesting is particularly for married clients is they own the business as a married couple, but one of them may have some job outside of the business, and they're not available all the time to sign. So, do we want to have a power of attorney to sign on their behalf because you're the one doing all the paperwork all the time, and you don't need to bother them? Maybe they travel for work; they're in sales or something. You know, like like what does that look like? So, sometimes you have practical concerns, and it's not even a concern of being incapacitated, right? Because I have people all the time be like, "Well, I'm not putting my spouse on that because they travel. That's totally fine. You guys could do that. But what if the spouse wants to be on it because also they put a lot of money down into your business, and they're concerned. Well, what if you leave me and you took my money, but you didn't give me any ownership? Or I mean, there's like real life concerns in other areas of law. Sometimes we have to be protecting ourselves under. Well, we can have something where you can sign on daily operations. You can also become a manager managed LLC instead of a member managed LLC, and have one of you be the managing member and be able to sign on behalf of that, but not take the other person's ownership right. Same with a lot of like parent-child companies. You know what I mean. One person's running the daily show, but we've got equal membership interest or equal ownership in something. So there's a lot of these things outside of just death and incapacity that some documents, like a power of attorney, can be useful for, or restructuring that LLC to make sure we're considering that. So what I have people say to me sometimes is, well, I feel like you know. I mean, what's the value of going to an attorney to do these things?
Sativa Boatman 19:06
The internet can explain to me what an LLC operating agreement is, or the internet can explain to me what a trust is. I think the value of hiring an attorney that understands all of the different nuances of how these documents work, and all this planning works to bring it together. Is that planning stage? Sure, you can read what is an operating agreement, but what do you need to say in that operating agreement for what you need in your life, and how does that need to weigh with your power of attorney? And you're like, but that's estate planning, and this is my business operations. But you're a whole, and your life is a whole. We need to look at you and what you need, and who are the players within your life, and how old are you, and how old are your kids, and you know what I mean? Like what what are your needs, and then look at each of these and structure it out. In such a way that we're capturing today our needs today in the business and who's signing for what, our needs if we're incapacitated, our needs if we pass away, and also structuring things in a way that do we plan to take this? I like that you were pointing out that people don't they they see their business as an income stream, like it replaced their corporate job or something, but they don't realize like they've created an asset. What if we're going to sell that asset one day? How do we need to be looking at structuring that? How do we need to be keeping up our paperwork on that? How do we need to be looking at ourselves in that? You know, as we scale up, and this is hard to imagine when you're a solo, but as you're looking at it, and if you're someone who wants to scale up, how do we get to the point where if you became incapacitated, your business is still operating itself? How are we replacing you as the paperwork person? How are we replacing you as the actual dog walker? I mean, how are we replacing you in the business and still turning a profit. Yeah.
Collin 21:05
Well, and again, that's like the the planning and scaling side. And I what what like what's great about this is we also have to understand that there are legal ramifications that we have to think through as our business operations change and as my role in the business changes. I know a common one, Sativa, is you know someone starts a business and they're single, and then they're running and operating a business, and then they meet someone, they they get married, and they have a significant other, and like, and then there's always this assumption of like, okay, well, I'm married, so my my husband or my wife can take over this business whenever I'm gone too, so that's fine because they there's there's there's these privileges now, and and I'm a fight. Is that the right way of thinking about this and how our business? Oh, for those not looking at this, Sativa's furiously shaking her head. No, I
Sativa Boatman 21:49
am. I am. I am. No, I mean I think that getting married, getting divorced, having children, like all of these, made. I started this with my dad, but now he's 80. Like, but I've left his name on it. But he's not doing anything. Like all of these life change things change how the business paperwork needs to look, right? So, and I find this. I've been practicing law quite a while now, so I've seen so many things. And it's you get married, and your spouse quits their job to come work in your business, and you die, and you didn't change that to go to them. Your spouse isn't 100% the owner of your business when you die if they don't jointly own it, and you've said that you may have had a prior marriage, and now your spouse owns that business. That's their sole income, and they've put everything into 50% with your kids. Also, it has to go to probate for that to even happen, and so then you've got this business killer for a month or two, and so you really have to look at that stuff. What do you want to have happen? Just getting married doesn't make that person in charge if you died or became incapacitated. The other issue is in divorce, and I see this, and it's so weird that people own a business together. They've got the operating agreement with both of them. They'll discuss in the divorce. You're getting the business. They don't change the paperwork, right? I know you think like no, they change everything. People just they they're trying to survive every day working and paying in their you know their bills. They're not worried about what is the documentation in my business look like. Did we change like say you own a corporation? Did we change the stock certificates to pull my now ex spouse off of ownership. You know what I mean. And it's like no. Sometimes they haven't. It's like we thought about the house. We thought about the. Sometimes they don't even think about the house. They still haven't even changed the house ownership. So it's like your business has this internal paperwork that needs to be taken care of. I see it a lot in businesses that we go into with our parents, and then our parents we don't want to take them off of ownership, even though mom or dad's not showing up to the business anymore because it's and we're taking all the income out of it. They don't care that we're taking all the income. They're not working it anyway. Whatever. Then they go to a nursing home. 50% of that business is counted as something they own. Oh. And now you're facing. Oh no, we never took 50% ownership out of this, and that is considered an asset of theirs. And they haven't worked in the business for 10 years, but I didn't want to sound mean and take them off ownership, even though they weren't working the business, or be like, "Hey, let's have you just sign this whole business over to me. They started it, but if they're not working the business and you're not even giving them half the profits anymore, and do you know what I mean? Then it's. Going to count as an asset for them if they need government assistance, or if they, you know, it's a it it's as life changes. We don't think about the ramifications of our plan from 10 years ago no longer being what our holistic plan needs to be today, and I'm using that word, which I know is not usually probably referenced in law. But I'm saying that you, as a human, your personal assets and your business assets, you have to look at all of it in more of a whole approach, and know that that also is ever changing because life is ever changing,
Collin 25:44
and that's that's the hard part of both like knowing where to start with this because things move so fast. Sativa, somebody's listening to this. Like, is there? I think you mentioned this earlier, but like, is there a point that I need to get to before I start thinking about this stuff. Like, if I just started putting out flyers yesterday to start doing dog walks, and I'm just doing this, maybe I got insurance, and I'm I'm getting a client or two. Is this? Do I need to start thinking about trust and probate and a successor, like that kind of thing, right now?
Sativa Boatman 26:17
I think you need to think about it right now. Where you're not maybe at is you're not quite ready to form an LLC or a corporation. Maybe you're not quite ready to do the trust, but you need to be thinking about it from the beginning. If you're just you know you, and you're walking one dog, but you're you know walking them every day, and you're getting some money in the door. You've got income coming into that checking account that's in your just solo name. You're not quite ready to form a business, create an LLC. You're not quite ready to worry about trust, whatever. But if you die, just even think about if you died tomorrow, we have to probate that checking account. So at the very least, be thinking about it and saying, "I'm going to run up to that bank and put a payable on death on that checking account to my mom, to my dad, to my sister, whatever something, because I, you know, you're probably not getting paid until after you do the walking, and that person, if you're deceased, can't write you a check. You know what I mean. They maybe will write it to the family. You know what I mean, or whatever. But also, you just cleared some check you received yesterday, and now that's got to go through probate. I mean, and this isn't just people who own businesses. I mean, this is literally everyone needs to be having a payable on death on a bank account, a transfer on death on their vehicles. I mean, I cannot tell you. Usually, primary vehicles people think about that, but an extra truck, a boat, a boat motor, a trailer. People just don't think about adding that TOD to those titles. So I end up probating a lot of them per year, and I probate a lot of checking accounts. Like why? You know what I mean. So it's like everyone at every stage needs to be thinking like this. It's just their solution might not be all the way to creating the business entity and creating the trust. But if you're to that stage, you definitely need to think about because here's what happens: you start here, and then you're like, "Oh, you need an LLC. You get an LLC, but you don't think about making sure you're doing the estate planning for if you pass away, are you becoming capacitated, and then you're busy, and then 10 years later you're like, oh shoot, now I've got to think, and it's it's so as the stages change, be like, okay, now I'm ready for this step to be thinking about this. Let's make sure we've got all of our bases covered, even if we aren't doing the most thorough, the most perfect thing, we've at least got the bases covered, and then as we scale up, now we'll make sure it's going to a trust instead of just a person. But let's make sure everything's going to a person straight out of the gate, and let's make sure we've got a power of attorney no matter what. Over the age of 18, you really should. So it's, I mean, I've had clients whose children, like college-age children, have become temporarily incapacitated, and they couldn't pay their bills for them, sell their car for them, do whatever. Because anybody over the age of 18, if there's not a power of attorney and you need to sign in their behalf, it's not like a parent once you turn 18 still has that right. Yeah, it's just weird stuff that none of us think about. Is stuff I really just want people to get the mindset around that we need to be thinking about all of this stuff all. That time and that legal documents, whether we want to think about them or buy them or do them or not, are important. More important than we're realizing.
Collin 30:13
And now a word from our friends at Tiny Paws Bookkeeping. Running a pet care business means your days are full of clients, staff, scheduling, and solving everyone else's problems, but when it comes to your money, are you actually paying yourself first? At Tiny Paws Bookkeeping, they are certified profit-first professionals who help pet sitters, dog walkers, groomers, trainers, and other pet care business owners build bookkeeping systems that support real profit, not just busy bank statements. They help you understand where your money is going. They create healthier cash flow and make profit a regular part of your business, which is something we all want. Visit tinypawsbookkeeping.com to learn how they will help you put profit first. I've I've long said that as a business owner, you you there are two selves. There's the personal and there's the business side. And you said that earlier as well. And I tend to talk about that from the perspective of like time management and busyness and burnout and priorities. And here you are coming in and saying, and also life planning, estate planning, business planning, law, legal. Yes, that you have to think. Is there one that we should start with? Like, I when so if someone's listening to this and they don't have any of this in place, yeah, should they start thinking about from like the personal estate side? Should they try and find someone in business specifically and then bring them together? Like, how how does that where's that good starting point for somebody?
Sativa Boatman 31:44
I think the best starting point just right out of the gate would be to make sure you have some kind of payable on death, transfer on death structure to everything in your life and your business. That avoids this probate for personal assets or the business. I mean, I think that's number one. If you have some sort of health condition that could make you temporarily or permanently incapacitated, maybe right out of the gate at 18, get your powers of attorney, right? But, but I think powers of attorney would be the second thing that I would, you know, think of, and then from that to becoming a business entity, once you are at a point where you know you have business coming in the door, and also you are, I guess, going to continue, if that makes sense. It's kind of like if you know, okay, I'm going to be a business owner. We might as well go ahead and form, and I'm going to continue this. We might as well go ahead and form your LLC and figure out if you're going to be member managed, manager managed, that type of thing and make sure that that LLC is going to someone when you pass away, right? Versus continuing out there on your own, because if you're going to continue to grow, you want to start separating your personal assets from the business assets, and becoming a real business entity is the way to do that, and everybody's like, "Well, when do you do that? Obviously, it's best before you even start. But sometimes people don't know they're really going to continue.
Collin 33:30
Oh yeah, yeah. We we look up, and it's been five years, and I'm like, "Oh, I guess I'm. I guess this is a thing that I'm doing now. Yeah,
Sativa Boatman 33:37
but as soon as you know it's a thing you're doing. Like, let's become a real business entity, you know. And I think that that's. But but I totally understand if you want to wait and see if whatever you've started is catching on before you do that. But you also, I mean, ideally should do it before you start, but but people don't, and I understand that. But but that then that's also important. But even if you don't know you're going to continue to be in business, you know you're a human and you're going to pass away at some point. So that's the first place that I think we start is just being realistic about that and handling those things in our life. And every time you buy a vehicle, every time you buy a trailer, every time you buy motorcycle, a boat, like any of these things, you're like, oh, got to worry about adding that TOD every time you open a new savings account or something. Oh, got to make sure I've been a fishery on that. Just thinking like that as we're doing things in life, then you're not coming back behind afterward and being like, "Now I have to run all around to these places and and do these things. It's like as I'm moving forward as a human being, I'm thinking about my future at all times, and every decision I'm making, I'm trying to point. For that, or at least being conscious of it, I think is probably my primary, I guess, suggestion to everyone is just always be thinking every time we open a new account, we buy a new asset that has a title.
Collin 35:20
Yeah, it's just becomes top of mind in how we operate, and I think that also changes the way we think about that. I mean, you've you've said multiple times things like make sure this is going to a person, make sure this is going to a person, and and that's staying someone's name specifically, and and that means we have to be thinking about the people that we want to be overseen. I mean, that's a part of. It's one thing to write a name on a document and be like, "Congratulations, you are overseeing my business. It's another, like I, because we have we've had that conversation with people in our lives of like, just so that you are aware, here is the way we want to set this up. Like, is that okay? Are you okay with that? And we had some people who were like, you know what? Yeah, I thank you for the honor. What what do I do? Like, what do I like? What do you? How do you recommend us having that conversation with that person we want to give these things to or oversee? How does that need to be structured? And maybe what do I need to come prepared with to help them be successful in that?
Sativa Boatman 36:25
Yeah, I mean, I think that you want to make sure that they understand that you either want them to just be able to step in so the business doesn't go under and then find a buyer, or do you want them to just step in and then finish it out, like just and get clients off to a competitor you trust, and like like what are you look you know what does that look like, um you know what I mean and do you want them to continue to run it or to hire someone to manage and run it so that income's coming in especially like like if you have a trust that income coming into the trust to be building up to give to your children one day because you're waiting for them to be old enough to then decide if they want to sell the business or run the business, or do you literally just hey, I just want the the clients to be taken care of, I just want you to make payroll and get my employees off to working for either starting their own business or working for a competitor, and get the clients and the employees to where they don't miss a beat or miss a day of the service. You know what is your goal, and just telling them that so that if you literally did unexpectedly pass away in an accident. You know, the next day they're not just kind of in shock of: Am I supposed to keep this business open for 10 years until their child is ready to take this over, or was their expectation? No, I just want the customers to be serviced and the employees to be taken care of, and I just want you to wind it down, or do I want this to be some sort of legacy business that is continuing? And that probably has a lot more to do with the stage your business is in. In that moment, you may have that conversation with someone, just be like, yeah, just cash the checks and get everybody off to where they need to be off to, and wind it down. And then two years later, you're like, well, now I've got five employees and things are coming in, and this is, you know, there's some equity in this. I want you to run it until you can find a buyer, or I want you to hire someone to run, or I've already got an office manager running it. All I need you to do is come in, sign some stuff every week, and just keep it from going under while you're maintaining it for my children's future, or while you're marketing it with a business broker.
Collin 38:57
Yeah, yeah. Well, and that's you brought up like the the admin or the manager that you may have in business, and a lot of us think, well, my business can run okay by itself. Like that-that's one I see. A lot of people are like, "Great, I can be an absentee business owner, and ever the business can run by itself. Like, I think again, this is that difference between operational and legality. Of like, operationally, yeah, that's that's true, but if you don't have the legal framework to support that, if you're not there, because we're as young as you're the owner, you're a bottleneck, and and right, and and one of the biggest bottlenecks is whenever you're no longer there. And so, how do we make sure that things keep functioning without our business just becoming this like zombie LLC that just can't do anything and slowly degrades and falls apart and tumbles down over time. That nobody can do it like that. To me, is one of the like with all the passion that Megan and I are pouring into our business. I couldn't imagine a more sad or depressing ending to something that we love so much and help so many people than to have it end like that. Right? It's that that that became. Like it's worth it to go through this process now.
Sativa Boatman 40:03
Yeah, and you just need to tell your successor, you know, who's stepping into your shoes. This is what we want. We want this to continue. We want this to be a legacy that we leave, or we want this to be a legacy we leave, but we're fine if you sell it and put that money in trust for our kiddos, you know. But we want it to be sold as what it is, you know what I mean. We want it to be run until it can get its top dollar, or you find the right buyer who's passionate about it, like we are, and you just talk to them about what you want, because I think that most people who go into business do it because they're enjoying it, but they are enjoying whatever service it is or product it is they're providing, and they would love to see that continue. You know, once you get to a certain point in the beginning, you're like, "Hey, just cash the checks and and get people onto you know the next provider, and then I'm fine. But at a certain point, you've put your heart and soul into it. You want to see it be something for someone else, either a buyer or a family member. But you want it to continue in some way. Right.
Collin 41:21
I'd love for you to maybe walk us through a checklist for a listener who hasn't thought about this at all. Like, what are things that like, or maybe like prompting questions you like to ask people who are sitting in front of you? Of like, hey, like, just this broad sweep of things that we need to be thinking about, so that we can start thinking about what that structure could look like.
Sativa Boatman 41:43
Yeah, I mean, we start with what do you own? Do you own real estate? Do you own a vehicle? Do you own a business? do Do you have a checking account? Do you have a savings account? Do you have an investment? Like, what do you own? Right, and then you really need to take a top-down approach, looking at that and saying, okay, with everything that I own, I need to decide what I want to have happen to it, and then make sure it's either going to a trust or it has payable on death, transfer on death, things. And then everyone, again, I go back to everyone over the age of 18. Do we have our general durable power of attorney, which is the one that would let us be able to sign contracts for you, file lawsuits, defend lawsuits, handle your real estate, handle your investment, and then the healthcare one? What are our end of life decisions, and we want to appoint someone to make those right? So we've got all these kind of things happening, and if I own a business, what does that structure look like? Am I keeping all of my paperwork in alignment for it to be sold? Do I have the paperwork in alignment for my death, for my potential disability? And but you have to really, I think, start with what do I have, and then what do I want, and then we can take each segment, you know, separately. And so it's really an assessment of, and it's like what you said: people not realizing what they have. Like, like I'll have say, go out and I give a presentation on trusts, and there's a bunch of different kinds and stuff. Most people are just doing a traditional revocable trust that they can change over time for for just estate planning, avoiding probate. But there's other kinds too. But so we're talking to people about something like that, and they're like, "Oh, I thought trusts are just for rich people. I don't have an estate, and I'm like, "Oh, you don't have an estate? Do you own a vehicle and a home? Well, no, I have loans on them. Oh, you still own them?
Collin 43:49
Yeah.
Sativa Boatman 43:49
If you have any equity at all, you have an an estate. I mean, you know, if you've got a home and with home values rising, you know what I mean. If your home is worth $400,000, and you only owe 300,000. You're worth $100,000. You don't think about it because you don't have that in the in the bank account, right? So you're like, yeah, I don't have an estate, but it's like that's a sizable estate that you do have that never clicked for you, you know, and so you start talking to people, and they're like, "Well, I don't own a home yet. We're, you know, renting from my parents because they're in real estate or whatever, and we've got little kids, so all of our money is just trying to feed them and whatever. And then I'll say, "Like, well, do you have life insurance? Well, sure. I've got little kids, so I got a half a million dollar life insurance policy. If I died, you know, it would be bad for those kids. Oh, well, you're actually worth a half a million dollars.
Collin 44:53
Yeah,
Sativa Boatman 44:54
not today. It's not in a bank account, and you'll never see it because it only materializes if. Gone, but people just aren't seeing themselves as having an estate, and they maybe do. I mean, so it's it's kind of like repositioning the way we think about ourselves that we're like, I'm just trying to make it every day. Sure, you and everybody else, but you know, you're you're probably worth something, and you haven't really sat down and put that into perspective.
Collin 45:30
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And and then I love that next question of what do you want to do with it? Right? Is this something that can end, give away? So like, those are things that I can make now, and it's a beautiful gift that I can do right now that I don't have to force upon my family or the next person who's trying to make that decision. Like there was a time when my grandma was declining in her health, she was just very matter of fact about exactly what would happen, exactly who got what. Do you want like she? I remember very distinctly, just down to the like, she'd invite us over for dinner. After dinner, she'd be like, "Great! Before ice cream, walk around the home and put your name on something, right? And here's a post-it note, and here's a little pen, and it was just like, like preemptively. And so that when she was gone, everybody was on the same page. Everybody knew it was out in the open, and the decision was made beforehand. So in our grief, we were able to celebrate her more than like, oh my gosh, which candlestick do I want and which one's my favorite? Like it was just it just felt so so much peace that she gave us, and it's something that I hold deeply like like so dear and close to me of like that that kind of peace and and calm is something that I I want to give to the people that that have to deal with my stuff and my chaos and my business. Like, what a wonderful thing that we can give when we think about it that way too.
Sativa Boatman 46:53
I think handling things up front is so nice, and the honesty about it too. And and and I will say the honesty, even if it's the honesty is terrible, meaning if you've got a child you're going to disinherit, and I've had people be like, "Let's just put it in the documents. We're never going to say anything. You're creating such a rough situation for the people that aren't being disinherited to have to deal with the disinherited one. Yeah, it's bad to have to talk openly about that now, but wouldn't you want those fights to be now with you, and not the people that you're leaving to deal with it? And the person didn't know. I mean, you want to have all of that. Who's getting what discussions while you're still alive? And that person, if they have a grievance about it, can either change your mind or not. Once you're gone and they can't, you're leaving that as something they're you know pouring out onto other people, and you then want those people to avoid that. So as tough as it is, it's like honesty now is actually the better policy than just you know hiding from everyone what you're gonna do and then letting them all decide when you're gone, and then they're fighting with each other. You know, like deal with it now. Who's getting the farm and why? You know, and have big discussions about it. And then, is there something else you can offset to give the other children or grandchildren, and be like, and this is why. Like, you guys hate farming, and we don't want it sold, and you just want money. So maybe you don't end up with as valuable of an asset, but you're going to end up with something. And so this is our thought on that. You know how does that work? And just be honest and open with everybody because it can take the bite off later. You know too. But you know if you're saying here's what you're going to get, here's whatever, and everybody knows that, like you said too, then during the grieving process, people aren't like trying to figure it out; they already know.
Collin 48:50
Yeah, Sativa, I want to thank you so much for coming on the show and encouraging us to take these simple steps and ask these questions about what we want and viewing our business as an asset that's worth these steps, I know that this is a massive topic, and we just barely scratched the the 30,000 foot view here. So, if people are interested in learning more, asking different questions, or just learning about what possibilities are out there, how can people get in touch with you and follow along with all the stuff that you're doing?
Sativa Boatman 49:19
Sure. So, we have a website. It's assertionlaw.com, and you can also call us, particularly if you're in Missouri. You can call us at 888-887-4170. And really, but I do have some blog articles that somebody can read also on the website. So I think that's a good thing. So Assertion Law Firm, and then AssertionLaw.com is how you can, I guess, look for us and find a little bit more information on that. And if you're outside of the Missouri area, you know, also you can read our information and then just talk to somebody local in your state. Because things are slightly different in states, but generally speaking, from a planning perspective, they're the same.
Collin 50:06
Cool. Well, I will have those links in the show notes and on the website, so people can click and get connected and just ask good questions and get started. Sativa, again, thank you so much for coming on the show today. I've really enjoyed this conversation.
Sativa Boatman 50:18
You're welcome.
Collin 50:19
Short and to the point statement when she said, "You do not want your business to be run through probate court if and when you die. It feels really uncomfortable for us to think about that. However, avoiding the conversation does not protect the business that you have worked so incredibly hard to build. When we don't have the proper legal structures, there may be no one immediately authorized to sign off on payroll, access those critical accounts, manage contracts, or make decisions for your company, your employees, your clients, your family, your community could all be affected while the courts determine who has the authority to do anything. Planning does not mean that you expect the worst to happen immediately tomorrow. All planning does is it means recognizing that your business is an asset worthy of protection, and I promise you, it is. A thoughtful plan can provide clear instructions for whether the business should continue, be sold, or be closed. And that's where we have to start asking the difficult questions, but they are so necessary. These questions create clarity and peace for everyone involved, yourself included. If you don't know, no one else does. So plan, ask questions today. Want to thank our sponsors, Tined Pet and Tiny Boss Bookkeeping, for making this show possible, and we really want to thank you so much for listening. We hope you have a wonderful rest of your day, and we'll be back again soon.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
