Estate planning is the unusual legal purchase that nobody tests while the buyer can still do anything about it. A will is not read until the person who signed it has died; a power of attorney is not used until its author cannot review the work. That is the whole problem with choosing an estate planning attorney, and it should shape how you choose. Below: what actually matters, the questions to ask, and what a sound process looks like from the inside.
If you hire a lawyer for a closing, you know within weeks whether it went well. If you hire one to administer an estate, the bank either accepts the paperwork or it does not. Estate planning is different in a way that people rarely think through: the work product sits in a drawer for twenty years, and by the time anyone finds out whether it was any good, the person who paid for it is beyond helping.
We see the consequences constantly. Not dramatic malpractice, usually. Ordinary, quiet failures: a trust that was signed and never funded, an agent named who died a decade ago, a will that says "equally to my children" and never addresses what happens if one of them dies first. The families holding those documents had no idea. How could they? They were reassured when they signed, and nothing since then told them otherwise.
So the question is not really "who is the best lawyer." It is who is most likely to produce work that still functions when I am not around to fix it. That points to different things than you might expect.
What Actually Matters
How much of their practice is this. Pennsylvania does not certify estate planning specialists, so there is no license to look for. The useful question is plain: what portion of your practice is estate work, and roughly how many plans like mine do you handle in a year? An attorney who does this weekly has seen the failure modes. One who does it occasionally between other matters has not, through no fault of their own.
Whether they ask about your life before recommending anything. A good first meeting is mostly the attorney listening. Who is in the family, who does not get along, who has a disability or a creditor problem or a second marriage, what you own and how it is titled. A recommendation that arrives before those questions is a product being sold, not a plan being designed. The most common error we see is not bad drafting. It is a competent document that does not match the family it was written for.
Whether they will say no. Most families do not need a complicated plan. When an attorney tells you that a will and powers of attorney will do the job, and explains why the more elaborate option would not help you, that is information you can trust precisely because it costs them money to say it. Be wary of an approach where everyone who walks in needs the same structure.
Local practice. Estate work is state law and county procedure. Pennsylvania has its own inheritance tax, its own rules on powers of attorney, its own quirks about what passes outside a will. A plan drafted against another state's assumptions can look perfect and still fail here.
The Questions Worth Asking
Ask these at the first meeting. The answers are more revealing than any credential:
- Who drafts the documents, and who will be in the room when I sign? It is normal for staff to prepare drafts. It is worth knowing whether an attorney reviews them and attends the signing, because execution errors are among the most common and most preventable problems we find.
- What does the fee cover, and what falls outside it? Specifically: are deed transfers included? Beneficiary designation changes? A second signing if something is wrong?
- If my plan includes a trust, who funds it, and how will I know it worked? An unfunded trust does very little, and funding is the step most often left half-finished. Someone has to retitle the accounts and the real estate. Find out whether that someone is the firm or you.
- Where will my originals be kept, and how would my family find them? Documents nobody can locate are a real and recurring problem.
- What happens to my file if you retire or the firm closes? Attorneys retire. Firms dissolve. The question is whether there is a plan, and asking it is not rude.
- How will I know when my plan needs attention? There is a reasonable range of answers here, from an annual review program to "call us when your life changes." What you want is a clear answer rather than a vague one. We wrote separately about whether an annual maintenance fee is worth paying.
- Can I see a sample of what I will receive? Not a personalized draft, just the shape of the thing. A firm proud of its work will show you.
What a Sound Process Looks Like
Every firm works differently, and there is no single correct sequence. But most plans that hold up share a similar shape:
- A real conversation first. Family, assets, titling, worries. An hour or more, before anything is recommended.
- A recommendation you understand. If you cannot explain your own plan in a sentence or two, it has not been explained to you well enough. "Everything to my wife, then split between the kids, with my brother in charge if she cannot serve" is a person who understands their plan.
- Drafts you get to read before the signing. Not handed to you the moment you sit down to sign them.
- A signing done properly. Pennsylvania's execution requirements vary by document type. Witnesses and notarization are not a formality; they are the difference between a document that works and one that gets challenged.
- Funding and follow-through. If the plan involves a trust, deeds, or beneficiary changes, those steps get done and confirmed, not left on a to-do list.
- A clear handoff. You leave knowing what you have, where the originals are, and who to call.
Credentials: What Helps, What Does Not
Membership in organizations like the National Academy of Elder Law Attorneys, its Pennsylvania chapter, or a regional estate planning council shows sustained investment in the field, including continuing education that goes beyond the minimum. It is a reasonable positive signal.
Peer-reviewed ratings carry some weight. Directory listings an attorney can purchase carry less, and they look identical on a website, which is why we wrote a separate piece on reading a law firm's website.
What matters more than any of it: the attorney's answers to the seven questions above, and whether you understood them.
Signs Worth a Second Thought
None of these means an attorney is bad. Each is worth a follow-up question:
- A recommendation before a real intake. Particularly if the same structure is recommended to everyone.
- Urgency that comes from the firm rather than your circumstances. A seminar deadline is not a legal deadline.
- Vagueness about cost after you have described your situation fully.
- No attorney at the signing.
- Nobody explains funding when the plan includes a trust.
- Discomfort at being asked these questions. The reaction tells you something.
If You Already Have a Plan
Most people reading this are not starting from zero. They have documents from years ago and a quiet uncertainty about whether they still work.
That is worth resolving, and it does not require hiring anyone. A review by an attorney who did not draft the plan will tell you whether it still matches your family, whether the trust was funded, whether the agents you named are still the right people and still alive, and whether anything in the intervening years has quietly broken it.
We do that at no charge, and about half the time the honest answer is that the plan is fine and the family can stop worrying about it. That is a perfectly good outcome for an afternoon.
Bring what you have. We will tell you what works, what does not, and what it would cost to fix, before you decide anything.
This article provides general information about Pennsylvania estate planning and is not legal advice for your specific situation. Every family's circumstances differ. Consult an attorney before making decisions about your estate plan.
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