MikeA legal AI workspace for estate planning firms
Estate planning firms use Mike to read client questionnaires, asset records and existing wills and trusts, draft new documents from the firm's own templates, and summarize plans for clients. Every statement Mike writes links to the page it came from, so an attorney can check it before a document goes out.
Updated
Attorney: Compare the Whitcombes' existing will with their new questionnaire and list anything that conflicts. Then add a successor trustee change to the draft trust.
Mike: Two items conflict with the new plan. The existing will names Mr. Whitcombe's brother as executor [1], but the questionnaire asks for their daughter [2]. The brokerage account still names the spouse as sole beneficiary instead of the trust [3]. I updated the successor trustee in the draft and listed the account change for the funding checklist.
- [1] Existing will, Article 4, p. 3
- [2] Client questionnaire, Part C, p. 5
- [3] Brokerage statement, beneficiary page, p. 8
Mike created Whitcombe trust draft.docx.
Example matter. Names and documents are fictional.
Most of the work is turning a client's life into accurate paper: who the family is, what is owned and how it is titled, what the old documents say, and what the client now wants. Mike reads the existing file, lines up the facts, and flags conflicts such as an account titled differently from the plan.
Cuanto Labs loads your wills, trusts, powers of attorney and cover letters into Mike and connects it to the folders where client files sit. Family and asset details from a planning questionnaire stay within your firm's own installation.
What Mike does for your practice
- Intake and fact summaries
- Mike reads the client questionnaire, family information and asset list, and produces a clear summary of family, property and goals, with open questions for the attorney to resolve in the planning meeting. Each fact links to the page it came from.
- Draft wills and trusts from your templates
- Tell Mike the plan and it fills your firm's will, revocable trust, power of attorney and health care directive templates with the client's facts, producing Word documents. Revisions to a draft come back as tracked changes the attorney can accept or reject.
- Review of existing documents
- Upload a client's old will, trust and beneficiary forms, and Mike summarizes the dispositions, fiduciaries and powers in a table, and points out terms that conflict with each other or with what the client now says they want.
- Asset and titling schedules
- Use Tabular Review to pull account owners, titles, beneficiaries and values from statements and deeds into one sortable table. Attorneys use it to see which assets pass under the plan and which pass by title or designation.
- Plain-language plan summaries
- Mike drafts a letter that explains the plan to the client in plain English, from the signed documents, for an attorney to review and sign. Clients get a summary they can keep alongside the originals.
- Planning research
- Mike searches case law through CourtListener on questions a plan raises, such as capacity, undue influence or the treatment of a particular trust provision, reads the opinions, and checks each case citation against CourtListener.
How we set it up for your firm
- Clause library for drafting
- We load your wills, revocable trusts, powers of attorney and directives with the optional clauses your attorneys choose between, so a draft starts from your own wording.
- Planning questionnaire workflow
- We set up a saved workflow that turns a completed questionnaire into the summary and open-question list your attorneys expect in the first meeting.
- Titling review columns
- We build a Tabular Review template with account owner, title, beneficiary, value and date, so asset records line up against the plan.
- Post-signing funding checklist
- We save your funding instructions as a workflow that lists, for each asset, the retitling or beneficiary change still to be made after signing.
- Plan summary letters
- We load examples of the plain-language summaries your attorneys send, so Mike drafts explanatory letters in your tone.
Questions attorneys ask
Does Mike draft a will or trust on its own?
Mike drafts from your firm's templates and the facts you give it, and the result is a Word document for an attorney to review and edit. The choices in a plan, the advice to the client and the execution of the documents remain with the attorney. Mike speeds up assembling the draft, not deciding what it should say.
Can it check whether assets are titled to match the plan?
Yes, as far as the documents in the file show it. Mike reads statements, deeds and beneficiary forms, pulls the owner and beneficiary into a table, and flags assets whose titling does not match the plan. It can only work from the documents it has, so missing statements are listed as open items.
Can Mike spot conflicts between an old will and the client's new wishes?
Upload the old will, trust and beneficiary forms with the client's new instructions, and Mike lists dispositions, fiduciaries and powers side by side with page links, marking terms that now conflict. For example, it can point out a specific gift to a person the client no longer wants to benefit. The attorney decides how to resolve each conflict.
Can Mike write the explanation letter clients take home?
It drafts a plain-language letter describing who receives what, who serves as fiduciary and what the client should do next. The attorney edits and signs it. Mike writes from the documents you point it to, so name the signed versions and keep earlier drafts out of the letter's source list.
Can it keep our forms consistent as they change?
Your templates live in the installation, so when an attorney updates a form, the next draft uses the new version. Saved workflows capture how your firm handles recurring steps, such as the funding checklist after signing. Updating a template is a normal edit, and we show your team how to do it during training.
Does Mike check case citations in planning research?
For case law, yes: Mike searches through CourtListener and checks each case citation against CourtListener before it appears. Execution formalities and statutes for your state come from the sources your firm connects during setup, and the attorney confirms them against the current text before relying on them.
Related
Bring Mike to your firm.
Book a 30-minute call. Tell us about your practice and the systems your documents live in, and we'll come back with a setup plan for your firm.
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