Yes, I have written over and over again about the dangers of do it yourself estate planning, and so no, I was not surprised to learn that LegalZoom has been sued in a class action lawsuit in California due to what has been described as a "flawed" estate plan.
According to LegalZoom's website, you can "Save time and money on common legal matters! Created by top attorneys, LegalZoom helps you make reliable legal documents from your home or office. Simply answer a few questions online and your documents will be created within 48 hours. We even review your answers and guarantee your satisfaction."
Is that so? The website ElderLawAnswers.com has an excellent summary of the lawsuit filed by Katherine Webster in Los Angeles Superior Court on May 27: Online Legal Documents Company Sued Over Flawed Estate Plan. The gist of the lawsuit: In July 2007 Ms. Webster was asked by her uncle, Anthony J. Ferrantino, who was suffering from a terminal illness, to help him write a Last Will and Testament and Revocable Living Trust using LegalZoom. But as it turns out, once the LegalZoom documents were created and signed, Mr. Ferrantino's assets could not be funded into the LegalZoom Revocable Living Trust "because the financial institutions that held his money refused to accept the LegalZoom documents as valid. Ms. Webster tried to get help from LegalZoom, with no success. The trust was still not funded when Mr. Ferrantino died in November 2007."
In her lawsuit, Ms. Webster claims that "Nowhere in the [company's] manual do defendants explain that using LegalZoom is not the same as using an attorney," adding that "the customer service representatives are not lawyers and cannot by law provide legal advice."
I've said it before and I'll say it again - do it yourself estate plans don't work! A computer program that produces a generic set of documents cannot possibly address all of the unique family and financial situations of each and every unique user, let alone address each and every quirk in the laws governing wills and trusts in each and every state. Save yourself and your loved ones time and money by going out and hiring yourself a qualified estate planning attorney to help you prepare your estate plan. Otherwise it will be the lawyers hired to fix your do-it-yourself mistakes and companies like LegalZoom that will win.