Estate Planning Made Clear - with Janelle Creme

If you couldn’t speak tomorrow, who would decide what happens—to your care, your kids, and your money? We sat down with estate planning attorney Janelle Creme to make sense of wills, trusts, and the documents that actually keep your family out of court and in control. This conversation moves past buzzwords and into practical steps you can take to protect your wishes, avoid probate, and reduce conflict during the hardest moments.

We break down the real difference between a will and a properly funded revocable trust, why a pour-over will still matters, and how to title your home so you preserve homestead benefits while keeping probate at bay. Janelle walks through the essential toolkit: durable financial powers of attorney, medical powers of attorney, advanced directives, HIPAA releases, and guardian nominations for minor children. We also tackle hot-button issues like keeping inheritances separate from community property, using independent or corporate trustees for accountability, and setting terms that protect children from a spouse’s influence or from their own future mistakes.

Beyond the legal mechanics, we talk about values, clarity, and compassion—how a few thoughtful choices today can spare your family confusion tomorrow. You’ll hear simple examples, common pitfalls (like unfunded trusts or outdated wills), and why coordinating with banks and advisors ensures your documents actually work when needed. If you’ve wondered whether a will is “enough,” or how to handle funeral preferences and end-of-life decisions without burdening loved ones, this guide will help you move forward with confidence and calm.

Janelle Creme 
Phone: 469-714-2280
Email: janelle@prosperattorney.com
Website: prosperattorney.com

To learn more about Stansell Wealth Planning visit:
https://www.StansellWealth.com
Stansell Wealth Planning
5550 Granite Pkwy, STE 270
Plano, TX 75024
469-606-2040

Transcript

Speaker 0:16

Hi, everyone. Welcome back to the Stansell Wealth Podcast, empowering you with information and encouragement for your finances. Special guest today, estate planning attorney extraordinaire, Janelle Creme. Janelle, welcome.

Speaker 1 0:32

Hi, thank you for having me.

Faith And Values In Planning

Speaker 0:34

Yes, so we've been Janelle and I have been working together three or four years. Uh, fun fact, we started officing together late 2024 when I moved from my previous firm. So if you work uh with Janelle and myself, you can come see us in the same building and meet with her and come say hi to me and come meet with me and come say hi to her and all the same thing. Same thing. So I will uh let me introduce you, Janelle. Um, so Janelle is a licensed attorney in Texas, Florida, and Tennessee as well. She offices here in Plano in the same suite as Cody and his team, and works closely with families in these states to ensure that your estate plan reflects your long-term goals. She will guide you through this process with the attention and compassion your family deserves. Whether you need a will, a trust, or help setting up an LLC, they're here to help you move forward with clarity and confidence. Fair to say, so we're a faith-based firm. Um, not sure if you have that on your website. I know you you share the same faith, but would you say the same thing?

Speaker 1 1:46

But uh, I went to college, I went to Catholic law school, so it's kind of there.

Speaker 1:53

Yeah, yeah. It's always a hard thing. Um, you know, you don't want to use it as a cell ploy, you know, like Jesus in the background on our website, you know, you don't want that, but like just kind of let people know what you're kind of all about and where you're coming from.

Speaker 1 2:05

It generally comes up in planning because we're usually planning for end of life.

What An Estate Plan Really Covers

Speaker 2:10

So that's a great point and a great segue. First question. So, what is an estate plan and why do we need one?

Speaker 1 2:18

Well, an estate plan, the short version, and you can ask more questions on that. It's really planning for um and state, it's how you prepare for and state your wishes for both death and incapacity. It includes planning for minors, like if you have minor children or minor grandchildren that you have custody of, and then planning for your assets, um, and then also medical emergencies. If you don't have one, families left in the lurch, they're scrambling, trying to figure things out. Um, it's a stressful time, gotta make major decisions in that way. If you don't have things in place, sometimes the government chooses for you. So that's kind of the short version of what is an estate plan. It's not planning for death, it's also planning for incapacity, essentially.

Speaker 3:12

Yes, and that's a good way. Would would it be fair to say if you had to boil it down to one sentence? It's empowering yourself and your family to make those incapacitated or death decisions rather than a probate judge or someone else.

Speaker 1 3:28

Is that generally a probate judge, really? Because if it's not the judge they're appointing, the judges appointing someone. Because even if it's incapacity, it's still probate court deciding.

Will Versus Trust Explained

Speaker 3:40

Interesting. Okay. Uh what is so I run into clients all the time. I'll ask them, hey, do you have your estate plan in order? Um, and they'll say, Yeah, we have a will, you know, we got one 13 years ago. And it's like, okay, um, let's talk about that, you know, because there's definitely other aspects to an estate plan. Uh, but first, what's the what's the difference between a will and a trust or a will and your entire estate plan?

The Full Estate Plan Toolkit

Speaker 1 4:10

Great question. The main difference is a will the main difference between a will and properly funded trust um is that a properly funded trust avoids the probate process. You cut the court out of it completely. A will does not. Um, and there are types of will that sets up a trust, but that's still set up by the probate court. So that's that's the main difference. Um, but also a trust includes things like incapacity planning and stuff like that. A will doesn't touch any of that.

Speaker 4:46

Uh my wife and I just got our estate plan done by Janelle finally three months ago or so. And I was even surprised, you know, I've been doing this 13 years. I was even surprised when you say estate plan, I mean like medical directives, HIPAA, obviously power of attorney, guardianship provisions, because we have minor kids. I mean, it's it's not say it again.

Speaker 1 5:12

I said both for yourself and your kids.

Speaker 5:15

Yeah. So walk me through even like I said, I've financial advisor a long time, even those you know, details surprised by, what would surprise the common person that steps in your office?

Why Documents Matter In A Crisis

Speaker 1 5:27

Yeah, so I kind of go through, let me just explain kind of what I include in a full estate plan. If you're gonna do a trust, which I would say 90% of people, at least in the state of Texas, are community proper community property state, a trust is gonna be right for most people that own property or have minor children. So that would be part of it. Um, so you're gonna have a trust that holds all of your assets into it and it allows for minor children or incapacitated people to inherit. That's just the short answer. You still have a will, even if you have a trust. It's just called a pour-over will. That allows for all those things that happen in life. You forget you have a trust, so you forget to title things in the trust, you inherit things that aren't in your trust, all that fun stuff. The make sure things get into your trust even after death. And then if you have minor children, you nominate guardians for your minor children. That can both go in your will. And the state of Texas allows us to put it as a separate form, too. Not every state. Some you still have to do it in your will. Then um, we go into the incapacity planning. So you've got your durable financial power of attorney that allows you to nominate someone to deal with all of your financial stuff, whether you are out of the country, unavailable, just incapacitated, maybe you're in the hospital or something like that, but bills still need to get paid. So who's gonna take care of that? If you're married, your spouse is your usually your primary person, unless they're already incapacitated. And then you gotta pick some other people. If you have a trust, it's gonna be your trustees, probably, and then backups. Then you've got your medical powers of attorney. If you are unable to tell a doctor, nurse, whoever, what your medical decisions are, who's going to tell them for you? That's your medical powers of attorney. And then you've got your advanced directives. If there comes a time where you are incapacitated or for whatever reason can't tell what your wishes are, um, and there are certain based off of the state statutes, levels of do I need to be kept alive by medical means? At what point do you want to be kept alive or allowed to die? And then certain other things along with that, such as do I want maximum pain relief or not? Do I not want to have CPR? Things like that. We've got ones related to dementia as well that are optional. Um, let's see, you've got your hippoporms because if you're incapacitated, you can't sign a hippo form to allow these medical people to make the decisions for you. Um, then we've got guardianship, which we kind of touched on slightly. Um, sometimes your powers of attorney aren't strong enough for you when you're incapacitated, or even slightly before that, because power of attorney agents, they don't take away power from you, but sometimes we need that power taken away. So while now, while you have the capacity, you want to put on paper, if I ever need a guardian over me, because the guardian means I don't get any power anymore. This is the person that I want to have that. So you're nominating, you're telling the judge, this is who's gonna be my guardian. You can even say, I never want these people to be considered of my guardian if you have people like that in your life. Um, and then we do things called a disposition document, and that's where you can tell your family, when I die, I want to be buried, or I want to be cremated, I want you to put my body or my ashes this place. I want this type of service, or I don't want any type of service, anything like that. That's kind of the complete estate plan.

Speaker 9:20

Yeah. And so I hope to listeners or viewers, if you're watching this YouTube, it's kind of the equivalent to, you know, yeah, Cody, I already have my financial plan done. I have a 401k. It's like, well, there's cash, debt, insurance, like there's a gamut of it. It's kind of the same thing. Oh, yeah, I already have my estate plan done because I have a will. And it's like, well, there's really so many other aspects uh crossing your T's and dotting your I's that I just had a client last last week, uh, early 40s. You know, they have minor kids, something you would never think would happen to them. She has a brain bleed, she's on life support right now and never would never imagine it, you know, no life, illness, anything like that. And just how not to scare people, just how life turns into instant. You want those medical directives, you want those wishes written down, very easy for your family and kids and everyone to see, you know, what your wishes are.

Speaker 1 10:21

And if you have those financial powers of attorney, you want to make sure you have them in place with like with your Codys of the world and your banks, because sometimes that agent needs to sign another form to keep it in place to to accept that.

Funding The Trust And Your Home

Speaker 10:36

Yes. Um, walk me through real real quick. Um if I have a trust, do I put my house in the name of the trust?

Speaker 1 10:45

In the state of Texas, I would say yes. Um, you're the main home that you live in, absolutely, you can still get homestead exemptions on it. If your trust is written correctly, which my trusts are written correctly. Most people, if you if you go and work with an attorney, they will be written correctly. Um if you get it online, I don't know if it will be. Um, but yes. And t that keeps it easier, keeps it out of court. Um, if you don't have it in your trust, there's a good chance you're not going to avoid probate. So absolutely, it will not affect your mortgage. It cannot by law.

Protecting Kids And Inheritance

Speaker 11:23

Good. Uh, last question is there an interesting case or client that you've helped recently that you want to share with us?

Speaker 1 11:32

Let's see. Most of my interesting things come honestly in talking about funeral arrangements. Um, and not maybe the funeral so much as what people want done with their bodies. Um we've had people show us the stones of their um deceased loved ones that they've had them made into, which is kind of interesting and surprising. Um, that's always interesting. I've had um some people say they want them made into jewelry, their ashes, and then literally other people say, I don't care what you do, just don't make me into jewelry. So that's always an interesting conversation. So we've learned to keep our mouth shut when we talk about um what you want done with your body.

Speaker 12:24

Yes, I can imagine that you see probably a little bit of everything.

Speaker 1 12:28

Yes. Um, and the honestly, the most interesting thing is how many people want to cut out family members.

Speaker 12:35

So okay. Not to make this go any longer. Um, I get that question a lot from my clients, and I'm glad you brought it up. Of you know, uh we have three kids, two are doing great, no big deal. One of them is maybe married to someone that we don't trust or love. What what how would a trust kind of solve the I want to make sure my kids are taken care of and everything's done appropriately?

Speaker 1 13:04

Great question. Definitely put in a trust then, and then you're going to make sure everything goes to your issue. Um, because that means your children, not their spouses, but their children can get it. But you don't want it to be distributed straight to the children, just give it to them. You want it to stay in the trust because that means then it's controlled by the trust. They can have access to it, but as long as it stays in it, the trust becomes irrevocable upon the death of the people setting it up. What does that matter? It means there's asset protection to your children then, and it stays as separate property if they're married, so that protects their spouses from being able to control it to the extent that they that you can. If you don't name that child as a trustee and somebody else is the trustee, whether it's a loved one or a corporate trustee like a Schwab or another bank or something like that, that's controlling how they get it, they're gonna have access to it, but it's not gonna co-commingle with their marital assets and their spouse isn't gonna spend it all down.

Speaker 14:12

Yeah, I I think that's a big aspect a lot of people either don't think about or they think about and it keeps them up at night that if I pass away, will my money go down to my son's current wife in the state of Texas? And as long as they put that money in a joint account, it's community property, and yeah, they should they share it equally.

Speaker 1 14:34

Right, because once once it's mixed, yeah, because it inheritance is separate property, but a lot of people mix it together and now it's not separate property anymore.

How To Work With Janelle

Speaker 14:43

Exactly. Okay, awesome. Um, so how can we reach out to you, Janelle? What's your phone number? What's your website?

Speaker 1 14:52

My phone number 469-714-2280. Website prosperattorney.com. You can schedule an appointment both ways. If you call my phone number, you will talk to Jessica. She's really great at scheduling you, or you can just go to my website, schedule an appointment there.

Speaker 15:10

And you schedule an appointment. Can we have a phone call?

Speaker 1 15:17

Phone call, Zoom. Um, it can't, it can be in person if you like in person. I will do make it work however you like.

Speaker 15:25

But you said free consultation. Did I hear you correctly? Mm-hmm. Yep. Love that. Okay. Uh anything else you would uh want to add or plug?

Speaker 1 15:34

Or um, I do flat fees. So that's not everyone does that. So you can see my pricing on my website. It's a package price. I'm not gonna give you an hourly rate unless it's probate. No, even that's usually an own flat feat. So I don't like to do hourly rates.

Speaker 15:52

So I I do love upfront transparent pricing. It pricing's on your website. That's just is what it is.

Speaker 1 15:59

It's there. It's there.

Speaker 16:00

Yep. Love it. Okay, Janelle, I'm sure we'll keep doing this uh later this year, but until then, thank you so much for joining us.

Speaker 1 16:08

Yeah, thanks for having me.

Speaker 16:10

All right, see ya.

Speaker 1 16:11

See you.

Speaker 16:12

Thank you for listening to the Stansell Wealth Podcast. This podcast is for informational and educational purposes only. It is general in nature and may not apply to your specific situation. Please consult with a professional before acting on any information shared in this podcast pertaining to financial, investment, legal, or tax advice. The views expressed by Cody and his guests do not necessarily represent those of Charles Schwab, Victory Financial Group, or any other organization.