It is an all too common approach, but it cannot 100% guarantee access to your family. Which is why most estate attorneys are against it. Joint accounts are often frozen due to many issues:

❌ Incorrect Setup—There are three common ways banks can set up joint account access for a family member; however 2, of them definitely will lead to a frozen account on death, and the remaining joint access method still has issues and often leads to your account being frozen at death as well (see issue #2).

❌ Bank Freezes—Due to increased banking regulations and more frequent fraud cases, many banks still freeze accounts and lock out even the properly set-up Joint Account Owners (yes… even your spouse). They will not unlock the account until they get a death certificate, which can often take months.

❌ Limited Available funds—In the rare case that your account was correctly set up with Joint Ownership with rights of survivorship and your bank didn’t freeze your account on death as a widespread risk management protocol, the issue that remains is that what most people set up with Joint Ownership is their checking account which is used to cover regular expenses, not final expenses. This means that at your passing, your designated account doesn’t have the amounts needed to cover your final expenses as hoped because it was dwindled by all of the healthcare costs and other unforeseen expenses typically incurred in your last six months of life.

Letting go of these myths, you realize that the only 100% guaranteed way that your spouse or loved ones can immediately access the money they need to settle your affairs and cover your final expenses as you intended is with The Beneficiary Liquidity Plan.

The best part about it is it doesn’t cost you anything to solve the problem because you are just taking money that is already expected to be left to your beneficiary and moving it from one account that can be frozen to another that can be accessed immediately within 24-48hrs of your passing (Your Beneficiary Liquidity Plan).