Planning ahead for what matters.
A guided intake built with your estate lawyer in mind — complete enough for them to draft your will and Powers of Attorney, and thorough enough to give your family clarity when it matters most.
How this works
- Complete it in one sitting or across many — every answer saves automatically.
- Some sections only appear if they apply to you. The form adapts as you go.
- Your answers save automatically to a private link — the Save button shows it any time. Keep it to resume on any device, or share it with your spouse or partner to complete the questionnaire together.
- When finished, submit securely to your Cherry Hill team for review and coordination with your lawyer.
Your personal information.
Let's start with the basics — enough for your lawyer to identify you properly and keep your file in order.
Other or previous names — maiden name, name changes, nicknames
Property, accounts, or insurance registered under a former name can be hard to trace later. Listing them here keeps everything findable.
If you hold citizenship in more than one country, your estate may have cross-border tax implications worth flagging for your lawyer.
Registered status under the Indian Act can affect how certain assets, including reserve land, are handled in an estate. Your lawyer needs to know.
US citizenship can pass through birth, which may create cross-border tax obligations worth flagging early.
Your spouse or partner.
If you have a spouse or common-law partner, your lawyer will need their details as well.
Children and dependents.
Everyone who depends on you financially — and everyone you'd want your will to account for.
Anyone else who depends on you, financially or otherwise — an elderly parent, an adult child with special needs, a niece you support through school.
Pets are property in Canadian law — they can't inherit, but your will can direct who takes them and set aside money for their care.
Other names they go by — optional
Executors and trustees.
The person who carries out your wishes — and, if there's a trust, the person who manages it over time.
Most people name their spouse as primary executor, and adult children, family members, or close friends as alternates. We recommend at least two — a primary and an alternate — to cover the possibility that one may be unable to act when the time comes. A trust company or professional trustee can also act — worth considering where the estate is complex, or you'd rather not place the burden on family.
Other names they go by — optional
Add Executor 2 — optional co-executor or alternate
Other names they go by — optional
Add Executor 3 — optional second alternate
Other names they go by — optional
Acting as executor is a real commitment. It's worth confirming before the will is signed.
If your will creates a trust — for minor children, a beneficiary with a disability, or for tax reasons — your trustee manages it over time. Most people appoint the same people who act as executor.
Powers of Attorney.
Who manages your financial and legal affairs if you can't manage them yourself.
A Power of Attorney authorizes someone to manage your finances, property, and legal affairs on your behalf. Depending on how it's drafted, it can take effect immediately or only if you lose capacity. In Ontario this instrument is called a Power of Attorney for Property — the concept is the same.
Your spouse is not automatically your Attorney. You need to name one — and we recommend at least one alternate. The word "attorney" here doesn't mean a lawyer; it means the person you're authorizing to act on your behalf.
Other names they go by — optional
Add Attorney 2 — optional co-attorney or alternate
Add Attorney 3 — optional second alternate
While you're incapacitated, the law is strict: your Attorney manages your money for your benefit and can't give any of it away — even continuing your usual patterns — unless you authorize it here. That covers things like birthday gifts to grandchildren, helping a child with a down payment, a loan to family, RESP contributions, and your regular charitable giving. "To self" matters when your Attorney is also your spouse or child: without it, a spouse acting as your Attorney can't direct funds in ways that also benefit them — which gets awkward fast in a shared household. Authorize what you'd want to continue; select "None" where the answer is no.
For each category below, select "None" — or check every situation where you'd like your Attorney(s) to have authority. An answer in every category tells your lawyer nothing was missed.
Representation Agreement.
Who makes health care and personal care decisions for you when you can't make them yourself.
In British Columbia, a Representation Agreement is the legal instrument for appointing someone to make your health and personal care decisions if you lose capacity. In Ontario, the equivalent is a Power of Attorney for Personal Care. The questions below apply to both.
Add Representative 2 — optional co-representative or alternate
Add Representative 3 — optional second alternate
Check each authority you'd like your Representative(s) to have.
Check anything that applies. These guide your Representative(s) and give your family peace of mind.
Estate distribution.
How you want your assets divided among the people and causes you care about.
There are two kinds of distributions. Specific gifts — a defined item or amount going to a defined person or charity. Residual gifts — everything else, after debts, taxes, and specific gifts have been paid. Think through both.
Use a specific gift for anything that must go to a particular person — it's legally binding in the will. Your broader personal effects can go in the flexible memorandum below instead.
Notes — optional
Wine collections, bikes, vehicles, art, tools, jewellery — items with real value that rarely make it into the will itself. Unlike a gift written into the will, the memorandum stays flexible — update it any time, no lawyer required.
After debts, taxes, and the specific gifts above are paid, everything else — the residual estate — is distributed here. We step through the cascade in case someone predeceases you.
Often called the "common family disaster" provision — rare, but your lawyer will draft for it.
A survivorship clause prevents your estate passing through a beneficiary's estate when deaths happen close together — avoiding double probate and unintended outcomes.
Unrecorded loans are one of the most common sources of family conflict in an estate. Your lawyer can include a clause that counts advances against that person's share — or forgives them entirely. Either works; silence doesn't.
These sit alongside the specific gifts above — this subsection just gives charities a dedicated place.
Business interests.
If you own a business or hold shares in one, your estate plan needs to address it specifically.
Funeral and legacy wishes.
Telling your family what you'd want — so they don't have to guess in their hardest moment.
Including these wishes in your will isn't legally required, but it saves your family from having to guess. Whatever you put here will also populate your Family Guidance & Final Instructions document.
Specific place — optional
Register your decision at register.transplant.bc.ca (BC) or beadonor.ca (Ontario).
Where should donations be directed? — optional
Your other advisors.
The professionals who help you with everything else — so we can coordinate, and so your lawyer has the full picture.
We coordinate with your other advisors directly when there's value in doing so — a tax question between your accountant and your estate, a document your lawyer needs, an insurance policy change that matters to your plan. Having their contact information on file lets us act on your behalf without having to ask every time.
No estate lawyer yet? Leave them out — we'll introduce you.
Advisors located outside British Columbia may require a Power of Attorney in their own jurisdiction. We'll flag this if it applies to you.
Assets held outside Cherry Hill.
Your Cherry Hill team maintains a current inventory of what we manage. This section is for everything else.
Your Cherry Hill team maintains a current inventory of the assets you hold with us. We'll provide that summary to your lawyer alongside your completed questionnaire.
This section is for anything held outside Cherry Hill — real estate, other advisors' accounts, private business interests, valuable personal property. Your lawyer needs a complete picture, and we want to make sure nothing falls through the cracks.
Document vault.
Upload the documents your lawyer and your family will need — or tell us where to find them.
Anything relevant that you can find: existing will and any prior wills, Powers of Attorney and Representation Agreements, marriage / cohabitation / separation agreements, life insurance policies, property deeds, shareholder or partnership agreements, prior trust documents, or anything else that might matter.
For originals that live outside the files you've uploaded — where to find them physically. Add each place that matters.
The best-drafted estate plan can still lead to months of searching if nobody knows where the paperwork is. A short conversation with your executor is worth it.
Digital assets.
Where the keys live, and anything digital your estate should treat as an asset.
Two things belong here: where your executor finds your passwords, and any digital holdings with real value — cryptocurrency, domain names, royalty or gaming accounts. The day-to-day instructions — which accounts to close or memorialize, subscriptions to cancel — live in your Family Guidance & Final Instructions, which is built to be updated any time without touching your will. We'll walk through that document with you.
Anything else.
Anything you want your Cherry Hill team — or your lawyer — to know that didn't fit anywhere else.