[FFG]Estate and Farm Succession Planning
www.familyfarmfinances.org
 

Getting Started with Transition Planning

 
Farm families risk losing their farms when estate and farm succession planning is nonexistent or stalled. Where are you in this process?

1. Do you want to see the business continue as a family farm?

2. Is there an ownership plan that is fair to those family members working on the farm?

3. Has the senior generation communicated its intentions for transfer of the farm business, farm land and other property to children and their spouses?

4. Does the next generation know the wishes of the senior generation for when death occurs?

5. Do family members listen to one another?

6. Do you have a signed will, reviewed and updated within the last five years?

7. Is the family informed about and prepared for the impact that taxation may have when senior farm owners die?

8. Could the next generation take over successfully if the senior generation could no longer farm?

9. Could the senior generation afford, financially, to retire?

10. Will the senior generation be willing to relinguish control?

11. Please describe your relationship to the farm by selecting ALL that apply from this list:

Questions adapted with permission from Austin Family Business Program [2009]. To measure your risk level, complete the Farm Succession Risk Management Checklist Online (link provided in Step 1 of How to Talk About Who Gets the Farm Before It's Too Late).