06/16/2026
Probate can take 12 to 18 months and eat 3% to 8% of your estate in fees. A TOD designation costs $0 and skips the whole thing entirely.
I've sat with families who had no idea their loved one's accounts were stuck in probate. Good people. Organized people.
People who thought they had everything in order. And their family spent over a year fighting through court just to access money that was always meant for them.
A Transfer on Death designation is the simplest fix in personal finance that almost nobody uses.
Here's how it works.
You log into your brokerage or bank account. You add a beneficiary. Done. When you pass away that account transfers directly to that person. No probate. No attorneys. No waiting. No court fees eating into what you built.
At brokerages it's called a TOD. At banks it's called POD, payable on death. Different names, same concept. Available in all 50 states for financial accounts.
Available in 30 or more states for real estate through a TOD deed.
The cost to set it up? Zero.
Now here's what a TOD does NOT do, because I want you to understand the full picture.
It does not avoid estate taxes. And it does not protect your beneficiary from creditors. If the account has debts attached, your beneficiary inherits those too. For larger or more complex estates a trust is still worth having.
But for most people, a TOD on every brokerage and bank account is the single easiest move you can make today to protect your family from a painful, expensive, drawn-out process tomorrow.
Ten minutes. Zero dollars. Log in and do it today.
