Start with a conversation
We learn about your family, assets, responsibilities and wishes, and help you understand which decisions need to be made.
Plan ahead
One coordinated plan for everything that matters.
Deed helps you put the right legal, financial and practical plans in place - from your will and executor to guardianship, important documents and final wishes.
How Deed helps
You do not have to arrive knowing what to ask.
We gather the information, explain the decisions that need to be made and connect you with our attorneys, while coordinating any other specialists your plan may require.
Deed coordinates the process from the first conversation to a complete, organised plan, giving you one clear point of contact throughout.
The process
From conversation to complete plan.
We guide the process in a sensible order and bring in the right expertise at the right time.
Bring everything together
Deed helps you gather and organise the information and documents our attorneys will need.
Coordinate specialist support
Our attorneys guide the legal planning, while Deed coordinates financial, tax or other specialist input where needed.
Build one complete plan
Your legal, financial and practical wishes are considered together, so important details do not sit in separate places.
Keep it organised
We help ensure the final plan and important information are safely recorded and can be reviewed when life changes.
Your complete plan
What we can help you consider.
Our attorneys will advise on what is appropriate for your circumstances. Deed makes sure the right questions are asked and the different parts of your plan work together.
Your will
Who should receive your property, money and personal belongings.
Executor
Who will administer your estate, with an alternative considered where appropriate.
Children and guardians
Who you would like to care for minor children.
Testamentary trusts
How an inheritance may be protected for children or vulnerable beneficiaries.
Assets and liabilities
Property, accounts, investments, businesses, debts and assets outside South Africa.
Estate costs
Whether enough accessible funds will be available for debts, tax, fees and expenses.
Tax planning
Potential estate-duty and capital-gains-tax considerations, with specialist advice when required.
Policies and nominations
Whether life policies, pensions and investment beneficiaries support the overall plan.
Marriage and relationships
How your marriage regime, antenuptial contract or partnership affects the plan.
Business succession
What should happen to a business, shares, partnership interest or loan account.
Digital life
How online accounts, cloud storage, social media and subscriptions should be handled.
Final wishes
Medical, funeral, burial or cremation preferences and other practical wishes.
Your executor only becomes involved after your death. While you are alive, a power of attorney may allow someone to act for you, but an ordinary South African power of attorney generally ends if you lose legal capacity and always ends when you die. Our attorneys can advise you on the right arrangements for your circumstances.
After your death
Understanding the executor’s role.
Our attorneys will also explain what the executor is responsible for, including reporting the estate to the Master of the High Court, identifying and valuing assets, settling debts and tax, preparing the liquidation and distribution account, and distributing the remaining estate to beneficiaries.
Knowing how this process works helps you choose the right executor and prepare the information they will eventually need.
Ready to begin?