COLUMBUS, OHIO, USA - August 31, 2026 - Ask Americans what they hope to leave behind, and the answer may have less to do with the size of an account than with the people gathered around it.
In a 2026 national survey of 5,000 U.S. adults, 41% said memories and relationships would be the most meaningful part of their legacy. Financial assets and property each ranked at 22%, while 23% pointed to values, lessons or principles. (Trust & Will)
The finding complicates a familiar image of estate planning as primarily a financial exercise.
For Samantha Halvorson, CEO and founder of LegacyGuard Estate Planning, it also gets closer to the reason estate planning matters in the first place.
"When people hear the word estate, they immediately think about money, property and documents," Halvorson said. "Those things matter, but they are not usually what families are ultimately trying to protect. They are trying to protect people, relationships and some sense of stability when the person holding everything together is no longer there."
That perspective is personal for Halvorson. The idea behind LegacyGuard grew in part from watching members of her husband's extended family go through probate after a loss. What followed, she has said, was not simply paperwork. It was conflict, arguments and relationships that deteriorated while the family attempted to settle the estate.
It left her with a question that would eventually help shape the company: How much family conflict is really about money, and how much begins with uncertainty?
"When a family is grieving, ambiguity becomes expensive in ways that do not appear on an accounting statement," Halvorson said. "Someone does not know what was intended. Someone remembers a conversation differently. Someone thinks another person has too much control. You combine emotional stress with unclear instructions and suddenly the estate is not the only thing being divided."
The Decisions Families Leave Unsaid
Estate planning documents can establish legal instructions. They cannot, by themselves, guarantee that every family will communicate well.
That distinction is becoming increasingly important.
The same 2026 research found that 27% of Americans had never discussed their end-of-life wishes with loved ones and did not plan to. Among all respondents, 42% said they would not know what to do if a family member passed today. Among respondents without estate-planning documents, that figure increased to 56%. (Trust & Will)
Research cited by The Associated Press has also found that parents and adult children's expectations about inheritance are often misaligned, even in families with otherwise strong relationships. Clear communication can help family members understand not only what someone intends to leave behind, but why certain decisions were made. (AP News)
Halvorson believes that is one reason estate planning should be viewed as more than the production of legal documents.
"The document is the mechanism," she said. "The objective is continuity. Who can act? What happens next? What did you intend? Where does responsibility move? The stronger the plan, the fewer critical questions a family has to answer during the worst possible week to be answering them."
That idea of continuity runs through LegacyGuard's approach to planning.
A revocable living trust, when properly created and funded, can establish instructions for assets placed within it and provide a structure for managing those assets during incapacity and after the person who created the trust passes.
But Halvorson says the value of planning should not be measured only in terms of how efficiently property changes hands.
Families also inherit decisions.
What Happens to a Family When No One Knows the Plan?
The tension is familiar to estate attorneys, financial professionals and families themselves.
Who should be in charge? Was one child promised something years ago? Should siblings receive equal distributions? What happens to the family home? Who knows where important accounts are located? Who can make financial decisions during incapacity? What did a parent actually want?
None of those questions necessarily means a family will fight.
But uncertainty creates room for disagreement.
Among Americans who had created a will or trust in the 2026 Trust & Will survey, 18% cited reducing family conflict as one of the factors that motivated them to plan. Peace of mind ranked first at 39%, followed by protecting loved ones at 32%. (Trust & Will)
Halvorson sees those motivations as closely related.
"Peace of mind is really a reduction in uncertainty," she said. "That is true for the person creating the plan, but it is also true for everyone around them. When the important decisions have already been made and documented, the family has fewer opportunities to fill in the blanks themselves."
For a company with the word "legacy" in its name, that distinction has become increasingly central.
A legacy can include a house, investments or a business. It can also include whether siblings still speak to one another after those assets have been distributed.
"When we built LegacyGuard, I did not want the conversation to begin and end with asset transfer," Halvorson said. "If everything gets distributed correctly but the process destroys the relationships a person spent a lifetime building, I don't think most families would call that a successful outcome."
A Broader Definition of Wealth
The way Americans define legacy may itself be changing.
In the 2026 survey, memories and relationships ranked above financial assets as the most commonly selected answer to what respondents believed would be most meaningful after they were gone. Among parents, 46% selected memories and relationships. (Trust & Will)
For Halvorson, that has implications for an industry historically associated with documents, wealth and asset distribution.
"The financial industry is very good at measuring what can be counted," she said. "Account values can be measured. Property can be appraised. Taxes and expenses can be calculated. Family stability is harder to put into a spreadsheet, but that does not make it less valuable."
Estate planning, she argues, sits at the intersection of both.
There are financial assets to organize. There are legal decisions to document. And there are people who will eventually live with the consequences of both.
That is why Halvorson believes conversations about estate planning should happen while families still have the luxury of discussing them rather than during an emergency.
"Planning ahead is fundamentally an act of leadership inside a family," she said. "You are making difficult decisions while you are still able to make them thoughtfully. You are creating clarity for people who may eventually be asked to act without you. And you are reducing the number of things they will have to argue about, interpret or guess."
For Halvorson, that may be a more meaningful definition of legacy than any number on a balance sheet.
"Most people do not spend their lives building assets for the sake of the assets," she said. "They build homes for families. They build businesses for futures. They save money to create security. The people were always the point."
About Us
LegacyGuard Estate Planning provides a guided approach to revocable living trust planning for individuals, families and business owners. The company focuses on making estate planning easier to understand through consumer education, a simplified planning experience and attorney backed estate planning documents designed for the client's state and individual circumstances.
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Country: United States
Website: https://legacyguardep.com/
