When you are creating an estate plan, one step that you take is to choose an estate administrator or an estate executor. This person is crucial to the process, so you want to think carefully about who will do the best job.

Essentially, when you pass away, the estate executor is the one who ensures that all of your wishes are actually honored. Below are some of the duties that they will need to carry out.

Reading the will

To start with, the executor just has to have access to the will so they can read it and learn what you would like them to do. At the most basic level, the will is going to instruct them on how to distribute the assets.

Taking inventory

Next, the executor will have to take inventory of all the assets that are contained within the estate. Ideally, this inventory will match up with everything that is listed in the will, but there's no guarantee that this will happen. It can be difficult for the executor to find all of the assets, or they may discover assets that aren't mentioned in the will at all. Try to avoid this when writing your will.

Distributing assets

Naturally, the next step is simply to distribute those assets to the heirs. But one thing that is important to note is that the executor has to pay any bills or taxes first. These bills have to be paid out of the assets that are owned by that estate. So, even if the will says that 100% of the assets should go to a specific person, the executor may need to take financial assets to pay off credit card bills, property taxes, mortgage payments and much more. Distribution of the remaining assets can only happen when this is done.

These are not all of the duties that an estate executor has, but they help show you what this person will be responsible for so that you can set up your plan.