A finished FIN-440 Topic 1 estate plan objectives memo example, ranking a composite couple's five wishes, locating the conflict between two of them and mapping how each asset would pass today. Searches like "fin 440 topic 1 assignment example", "fin440 topic 1 sample" and "fin-440 topic 1 example" land here.
What a finished FIN-440 Topic 1 estate plan objectives memo looks like
The finished memo records the couple's five wishes in their own words: the survivor keeps the house and a secure income, the two children inherit equally, the cabin stays in the family, the daughter's share is shielded from a strained marriage, and a trusted person decides for either spouse who cannot. An inventory with illustrative values follows: the jointly owned home at 600,000, retirement accounts of 1,100,000 naming each other, a 400,000 brokerage account in his name, a 300,000 term policy on his life and the 200,000 cabin in hers. Tracing how each asset passes today shows the will reaching only the brokerage account if he dies first. The memo then ranks the wishes, marks the cabin and equal shares as the pair in tension, and stops short of choosing any instrument.
How a FIN-440 Topic 1 example is structured
Purpose, facts, tension and ranking give the memo its four parts. A short opening states that the plan's job is set by the family's wishes and that no instrument appears until those are fixed. The wishes section records each of the five as the couple phrased it, then restates it as a testable objective, such as the survivor needing a stated income for life. An inventory lists every asset with its titling and named beneficiary, since those two facts decide where most property goes. A transfer map shows what would happen at either spouse's death under current arrangements. The tension section works the cabin problem: the son spends every summer there while the daughter lives overseas, so equal shares and keeping it in the family pull apart. The ranking puts incapacity and the survivor's security first, with reasons. The memo closes on three decisions the couple still owes the planner.
Wishes restated as testable objectives
Each wish is rewritten so that a later plan can be checked against it, turning a secure income into a stated annual amount the survivor needs.
Titling and beneficiaries inventoried first
Every asset appears with its owner of record and named beneficiary, because those entries, not the will, decide most of what happens at a death.
A transfer map under current arrangements
Tracing both orders of death shows the will reaching only the 400,000 brokerage account if he dies first and only the cabin if she does.
Two wishes that cannot both win
Keeping the cabin in the family and dividing everything equally collide when only one child will use it, and the memo states that collision plainly.
A ranking with reasons attached
Incapacity decisions and the survivor's security rank first because failure there harms a living person, while the fate of the cabin ranks below them.
Where marks go in FIN-440 Topic 1
Memos that open with a recommended trust lose the most here, since an instrument chosen before the purposes are fixed tends to answer a question the couple never asked. Listing wishes without restating them as objectives leaves nothing to test a later plan against. Skipping titling and beneficiary designations is the gap that follows students through the course: the will looks central on paper while retirement accounts, a policy and a jointly held home move outside it. Papers that treat the five wishes as compatible miss the cabin conflict the case plants. A ranking offered without reasons reads as the writer's preference rather than the family's. Presenting estate tax as the driver, for a couple the case places below the federal exemption, fixes on the wrong problem, and printing that exemption as a set dollar figure dates the memo.
Get a FIN-440 Topic 1 example written to your instructions
Send the FIN-440 Topic 1 instructions and the rubric from your classroom, along with the client or family case your section assigns. We write a custom example to them, with wishes restated as objectives, every asset traced by titling and beneficiary, conflicts named and a ranked purpose set before any instrument, in 24 to 48 hours. The first one is free.
FIN-440 Topic 1 questions, answered
Why inventory titling before stating any plan?
Because most property does not pass under a will. A jointly owned home goes to the surviving owner, and retirement accounts and life insurance go to whoever the beneficiary forms name. In the example that leaves the will governing a single brokerage account at the first death. Objectives written without that map assume a control over the estate that the documents do not actually have.
Is estate tax the main concern for this couple?
Not on the case's facts. The case places their estate below the federal exemption, a figure set by statute that has changed many times and may change again, so the memo names no amount. Some states levy their own estate or inheritance taxes with different thresholds, which the memo flags as a question to confirm. The pressing issues for this couple are incapacity, the survivor's security and the cabin.
Can the memo be used as my own family's plan?
No. The couple, their assets and their wishes exist only for this FIN-440 exercise, and real planning depends on actual documents, state law and family facts. Wills, trusts and beneficiary forms should be prepared and reviewed by a licensed attorney, with tax and financial questions taken to qualified advisers. The memo shows the objectives-first order the course grades, as coursework and not legal, tax or financial advice.