In our inaugural blog post, I outlined our purpose as a company. Here are the goals for our ecosystem that will drive the foundation we are building:
Awareness: It all starts here. We don’t know what we don’t know. For example, you can transfer assets outside probate by simply going online or calling your bank to set or modify your beneficiaries - same with a 401k. These free, tangible, and critical pieces of information are buried in blogs for click bait and not given to you in a straightforward manner by lawyers, financial advisors, accountants, etc. They must be more accessible. We cannot educate ourselves until we are aware.
Education: Once we are aware, we can begin our education. Action is impossible without knowledge. Lawyers are mischaracterized - few are out to get you. Many, if not most, are driven by a motivation to help you and your family avoid issues that they have witnessed happen to others. However, to build this trust, we need to educate customers. Many of the LegalTech entrants have cheapened the valuable services that these lawyers provide. Rest will work with lawyers, not against them.
Start the Conversation: Families don’t talk about this stuff, period. Why do we insist on grieving our loved ones and arguing over their legacy generation after generation? It is ok to talk about our own mortality and it can be talked about in a civil manner with the right tools to support the conversations.
Rest is an educational tool that guides customers through this complicated process and connects them to our network of lawyers. We don’t charge customers, nor do we create documents for them. LegalTech has come a long way; however, its adoption is in the early days (early adopters at best). The future of estate planning is no doubt augmented by technology. Lawyers know this too. Why cut them out of the process when they provide valuable knowledge work? Work that arguably can’t be replaced by technology.
Rest is rapidly growing a conglomerate of entrepreneurs, lawyers, and technologists imagining the future of estate planning from the ground up. While we have our own vision for what this will look like, we firmly believe that in order to renovate the customer experience, we need lawyers and future customers to define it with us. So, if you’re a lawyer don’t be threatened by technology, and if you’re a customer, don’t avoid difficult or complicated subjects because it’s easier. Instead, let’s break centuries-old, antiquated taboos together.
We’re really excited about the host of tools and products coming soon (more on that in our next blog post!). We’d love to hear from you at Rest. We can't wait to begin working with you all!
Until next time,
Chris Barbaro (Founder, rest)
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