West Seattle Wills & Estate Planning Guidance
Planning for the future is one of the most important steps you can take to protect yourself, your family, and your legacy. Our West Seattle estate planning services focus on creating clear, legally sound wills, trusts, and advance planning documents tailored to your needs.
A complete estate plan may include a last will and testament, a healthcare directive, a durable power of attorney, and a financial durable power of attorney or healthcare durable power of attorney. These documents help ensure that your medical and financial wishes are respected if you become incapacitated.
Many clients also benefit from trust-based planning, including revocable living trusts, special needs trusts, credit shelter trusts, and marital trusts. Trusts can provide greater privacy, flexibility, and long-term protection for spouses, children, and other beneficiaries.
If you have minor children, are caring for an elder family member, or want to plan for possible future incapacity, thoughtful estate planning can include guardianship designations, protective trusts, and long-term elder planning strategies.
Get Basic Guidance Before Scheduling a Consultation
To help you get started, we offer an experimental legal guidance chatbot that provides general educational information about wills, trusts, healthcare directives, durable powers of attorney, guardianship planning, and common estate planning questions in Washington.
This tool can help you understand your options before deciding whether to schedule a meeting with Ruth to develop a personalized estate plan.
Disclaimer: The chatbot provides general legal information only and does not create an attorney-client relationship. For personalized advice, please contact our office directly.
About Ruth
Ruth Apahidean is a trusts and estates attorney at the Law Office of Neil R. Sarles. Her practice focuses on elder law, estate planning, and probate. She helps individuals and families plan for the management and transfer of their assets during life and after death.
This includes creating wills, trusts, powers of attorney, and healthcare directives. She assists clients decide how assets should be distributed, who will make financial or medical decisions if the client becomes incapacitated, and how to protect beneficiaries such as minor children or family members with special needs.
Ruth guides individuals and families through the probate process (the court-supervised procedure used to settle a person’s estate after death). Her primary role is to assist the personal representative ensure that the deceased person’s assets are distributed according to a valid will or, if no will exists, in accordance with state law.
She has volunteered at Neighborhood Legal Clinics: Elder Law Clinic, the Washington First Responder Will Clinic, and Tacomaprobono Community Lawyers. Ruth is the Bar Talk Columnist for the King County Bar Association Bar Bulletin and the New Lawyer Liaison for the Washington State Bar Association Senior Lawyers Section.
Learn more about Ruth at https://www.sarles.com/.
Education:
- J.D., University of Washington School of Law
- B.A., History and English, University of Washington, magna cum laude
Bar Admissions:
- U.S. District Courts: Western District of Washington
- All Washington State Courts
Memberships:
- King County Bar Association
Contact Us
If you have any questions, concerns, or want to schedule a meeting, you can reach Ruth directly by email at ruth@sarles.com or using the form below.