Navaid Aziz – How to Create an Islamic Will – A Step-by-Step Guide
AI: Summary ©
The importance of having a plan and the taxation of the death of a deceased person is emphasized in this segment. The speakers emphasize the need for legal privacy, spending money, and creating a vehicle for life. They also emphasize the importance of creating a legal name for a deceased person and managing cash flow. The speakers emphasize the need for trust and transparency in the mortgage industry and mention upcoming events and data releases.
AI: Summary ©
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Snellman or him in 100 EDA number one staring a hole is so thorough. When I was a biller ensuring and phocoena women see it yeah Maria Maria de la de la la
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la la la la la sharika was shadow Ana Mohammed Abu Hora solo sallallahu alayhi wa ala he was off me he was selling them at the Sleeman Kathira about your brothers and sisters Salam alaykum warahmatullahi wabarakatu.
Just as a reminder, for those of you that are joining us in sha Allah, please scan the QR code to get access to the documents we will be using. The will has two sets of documents, a PDF and
an editable document. So Inshallah, if you're not able to make edits right now, when you go home, you'll be able to make those edits Bayonetta heeta, either.
With regards to an outline for what we'll be covering tonight,
I'm going to share a practical experience of 2023. And then we're going to move on to speaking about the importance of having a plan and what taxation may or may not look like. And then last but not least, we'll have Faraz, who is going to be joining us shortly who will be speaking about the legal aspects of it. And then we'll actually do a walkthrough of the wheel itself. So during the walkthrough of the wheel, it will be important that you have a copy of the wheel with you before he died.
So with that being said, as some of you may or may not be aware, but my mother and Allah subhanaw taala have mercy upon her and forgive her. I mean, she passed away in March earlier this year, just before the month of Ramadan. And I had dealt with the passing away of my father Rahim. Hola in Quebec. So I thought it will be a very similar process. But in fact, it was very, very different. So there's a couple of things I want to highlight and to explain being in a heat IRA.
Prior to my mother's passing, we were fortunate enough at Hamdulillah. To have an educational, I guess, insight, where we created three documents for her. Number one was her power of attorney. Number two was her personal directive. And then number three was the Islamic world itself. With regards to the personal directive, this will take care of any medical decisions that need to be made, if she is not able to do them herself. So for example, if psychologically she's unable to decipher and make a decision, or she's in a coma, then in that sort of situation, I will be able to make those decisions for oftentimes, people think you just got the document and you're said and
done. But it's not that simple. As a part of this document, you want to ask the person, you know, if you're in a in a commentator state, do you want to be resuscitated? If you happen to pass away or not? What is the Islamic ruling on that? How long do you want to prolong being in that state? So those sorts of sensitive questions you want to have with the individual at hand, as well as get the Islamic ruling on those scenarios. Number two is the power of attorney, the power of attorney is to deal with any financial decisions that needs to be made while the person is still alive. So this can be dealing with bank accounts, paying of bills, investing accounts, and even buying and selling of
real estate with this is only while the person is still alive. And then last but not least, it is the Islamic will. And this is what you deal with after a person passes away. All of their wishes for after their passing are documented in the will and I just won't we will be spending quite a bit of time discussing inshallah. Tada. So that being said, let me catch you up to the day that she passed away, Rahim Allah, I get to the hospital with her. She's extremely ill at this point. And he didn't care that I was directly related to her, or that I was, you know, responsible for for the past four years. What they cared about was my name on the personal directive. And as long as my name was on
the personal directive, they were willing to engage with me and speak with me, but if it wasn't, they would not speak to me or engage with me, and it shows you the value of that document. She passed away shortly thereafter, I will say within 20 minutes to half an hour of us arriving to the hospital.
She passed away at that time.
And then from that point on, we had to create a death certificate, which is very, very important that you get that piece of paper that at least in the preliminary stages, if you need to do any work, that preliminary paper will allow you to do any work. And then a couple of days later, after the burial has taken place, you can actually apply for the death certificate. And that is what you'll need to do all of the legal work to do all of the financial work, everyone will ask for a copy of that death certificate. So make sure you get that process as soon as possible. For the actual janazah itself hamdulillah being engaged in a community, I knew what to do. And basically it
came down to contacting one of two people either so hello, smile, or Naja had hash. And you want to make sure that you have some sort of communication with them, whoever you decide to take care of your funeral experience, as he will be talking about has some sort of contact with them. Because they are the ones that will coordinate the pickup from the hospital, to the masjid where the body will be washed, to where the janazah will be prayed coordinating the janazah, the timing of it, and then the transportation to the cemetery and transportation to the cemetery. The Muslim cemetery for us is actually not in Calgary, it's in Cochrane, it's in Cochrane. So it's quite a distance away.
The expense costs for the funeral in March was just a little bit around $6,000. So under the law, I can't remember the exact number, but it was around the 6000 figure mark, approximately 6500. So that's how much you can anticipate. And more as things are getting more expensive. Bismillahi Tada.
So then the janazah takes place, everything is done and Hamdulillah. And I'll highlight this,
it is imperative and I use this term, not from a religious sense that as far as or wajib. But from a cultural social perspective, it is imperative that you teach how your children to lead a Janessa big because we want the individual that is closest to the deceased, deleted the Janessa, the most sincere dua the more prolonged the DUA, the more effective the dua for the closest relative, and Hamdulillah. It is the from the father of Allah subhanaw taala, that I was able to lead the janazah of my mother and my father, and I'm hoping for the brothers that are here in this room, you learn how to do it, develop the confidence. So that insha Allah when your parents and when your close
relatives pass away, you have the ability to do that, as well. The Imams will always be there. But take this initiative upon yourself to learn how to do that, as well. So after the janazah takes place, everything is settled and done. Now I have to deal with the legal side of her assets, which Alhamdulillah she had a condominium, we had to sell that condominium, I spoke to a real estate agent, the real estate agent said that you will need to get probate done first, to show that you are actually capable of selling this house. So probate means you have to submit your will to the court, and then the court you can come up and show the seats for you.
You will have to submit your will to the court. And then they will go through the will verify the will and make sure everything is in order. And then they will give you permission to sell the assets at that time. In order to do this you will need a lawyer and this is the very lawyer that are used for us Baba, and we'll give him we will be sharing his contact information at the end inshallah. So we got the probate around the the month, the end of May around the end of May. So imagine from March 15 Is the death probate took place at the end of May. So only after the end of May was able to contact a real estate agent to get the property sold. Now, during that time, it's just a waiting
game, which means any expenses that need to be paid on the real estate property, like gas like electricity, if there are condo fees, you have to keep paying that you have to keep paying that as the executor. You want to keep track of all of the expenses that you're paying, so that they are actually deducted from the estate at the end Hamdulillah. Eventually the property gets sold. And this is where I was clueless I didn't know what to do. But I showed up at the bank. I'm like, Okay, here's the cheque, can I have this amount transferred to my account, so that I can share the wealth with my sister, the bank said sorry, we cannot do that. You have to create an account for the
estate. And no one told me that Subhanallah so make sure that you create an account for the estate through which the check will go into that account. And then from that account, you have to make an accounting list of all of the expenses and how this money is going to be
redistributed. And then once the bank approves of that, the executor of the will can withdraw that money and give it to the inheritors, give it to the inheritors. So from the end of May, all the way till July, that's how long it took. That's how long it took. So this is a practical experience of what happened to me in 2023. So make sure you take note of that practical experience, and make sure you have all of those things that you will need that power of attorney, the personal directive, and today Alhamdulillah we'll be covering the Islamic world for those of you that are just joining us, please make sure you scan the QR code and have that ready to go. With that being said we're not
going to be speaking about the financial planning side and I'm going to be handing it over to my good friend hash in sha Allah
you don't
feel like a celebrity here. Bear with me
how's it now?
No, I didn't put in the middle on your shirt. Oh, middle of my shirt. Oh, man.
How's that? humbler? Assalamualaikum warahmatullah mcarthurglen. When it comes to that, I think you may actually have to split it down as well. Yeah, we'll keep moving it up. Or just
crank the volume. Okay, perfect.
I don't have the voice. And what was behind the screen
on my own microphone is cranked up so this is a little bit different.
Anyways, so
many of you might have might know me. Many of you actually have friends and clients and this audience here. And my name is Hashmatullah us. I'm an executive financial consultant, as well as a division director with IG wealth management. I've been in this role with this company for about 18 years now. hamdulillah started very, very young. And I have certain designations when there's a CFP CFP stands for Certified Financial Planner. And that's the P enjoy my industry for what I do. What did I do wealth management as a lot advisors across Canada, they do different things, but the select few of us will qualify to be on the securities platforms, which means we have the capacity to give
you advice, not only like funds, but also stocks and ETF and SMEs and things like that. And we're fully licensed in different provinces I can see on the screen here. The reason I'm here is a one, I want to tell you what happens when you pass away Subhan Allah
when when a when a husband passes away, I'm going to pick the guy first because we tend to die first. When a husband passes away everything that he owns, whatever kind of wealth that he owns, will go to the spouse living spouse, or the wife tax free. There's no problems, no issues. And when if the wife passes away, everything that she owns will go to the husband tax free, no possible issues. Right? Upon the passing of the last person upon the law, when the last person passes away, you can expect to lose somewhere between 30 to 50% of your wealth to Revenue Canada before your children get it. You can everything. I think they're gonna give you the handheld mic. Okay, perfect.
Is over
saw like, Oh, that's much better. Wow. 100 What is happening?
I need to
Alright, let me repeat that again.
One point out what a husband passed away everything that he owns will go to the wife tax free. No problem, no issues. And when the wife passes away, everything that she owns will go to the husband tax free, no problems on issues upon the passing of the last person, depending on what kind of wealth that is remaining. Expect to lose somewhere between 30 to 50% of it to Revenue Canada before your children get it.
Your children, your parents, your sisters, your brothers are not your first beneficiary. Revenue Canada is right. So we are talking about at this point, the will and I'm going to tell you that analogy of where we are on this journey, right? The journey if I if I helped me visualize illiteracy we're all in Calgary right now. And we're trying to travel to Toronto. That's our destination.
We know this is a very big country. It's a lot of distance to cover. Right? And we know that to try
All of this distance we can't walk.
Right? And therefore, you know, we need to create a vehicle. The question is, what kind of vehicle? Right? What kind of engine? What type? What kind of tires? windshield? How many seats are going to be in this vehicle? Who else is traveling with you? And where are you going to be making your stops.
And the analogy of this, this journey is life essentially. Right? And we know for a fact, none of us here today
will be able to travel in a straight line from here to Toronto, without directions, right. And life is just like that majority of us traveled through life 510 15 2040 years without any type of driving.
Right? Majority of the people that I deal with, and Subhanallah, we just had a case yesterday, they seek me out much later in life, they usually come to me when they're in their mid 50s 60s 70s.
Couple of reasons, they may seek me out because they're looking for advice. And number two, that's where the wealth is. So I'm kind of hanging out in that part of the world in terms of age. And number three, they have a major problem.
Because for 20 3040 years of their life, they've been creating this problem. And now they have to face it, which means looking to lose 400 500 600 $801.23 million in terms of taxes to Revenue Canada,
money not going to their children. And what children is referring to is if this is the desert, the journey that we try and travel from Calgary to Toronto, we're talking today about you getting to Toronto, living there for a while dying, and then leaving a set of instructions on what happens to your vehicle. Today, we're just talking about that set of instruction, which is you will, but not a lot of time, and effort and energy has been spent aboard this travel plan. Where are the stops? What happens with the children? When are they going to get off? When are you going to go for hygiene? Homura? How are you want to buy your home? In all these different planning?
If you think about the fact that you know, sometimes you have individuals with 800 or $900 million in Joseph investments, it's a big number.
And they come to us and say, Hey, listen, I've been I've been working for 40 years of my life, and I have this million dollars. Now I'm ready to retire. I can tell you right now that 95% of the time, it doesn't work.
For 95%, the people they can't have what they want.
And it's all because for the lack of planning, right? They never sat down and figure out what that journey and destinations are going to look like. Are they doing proper planning? Right? So when we talk about profit planning, we're looking at things differently, right? You'll have to look at things such as your retirement.
It is good that we all work in and we're going to be able to accumulate some wealth over time. The question, is it optimized? What kind of wealth do you have? Is it going to be sufficient?
And I can tell you 95% of time, it's not sufficient. You think you can have it but you can't. And it's because we miss simple things like inflation. Somebody today will tell me how she forgave me $3,000 a month for the rest of my life. I will live like a king. I have no problems with that. But you have to remember the fact that if you retire at 60, you're expected to live to be 90. You know, we may say we all want to die seven, you know you're not going to die suddenly, living formula things are different here. So if you couldn't retire 60 die in 90, that is 30 years of $3,000 a month coming in. But the problem is not even that. The problem is $3,000 a month in 2023 is a very
different number than tweet 1000 calls a month in 2040.
Those are not the same thing.
Right? So we're referring to here is inflation, right? That is a silent killer. You have no idea how much resources are needed to be able to keep up with inflation. I remember for a fact, and I'll be mindful of time here. When we first came to Canada. This is going back about 20 years ago now. Somehow I was in charge of the code freeze. I don't know why I haven't done it since then. But I was in charge of groceries. So I had to go to superstore and buy groceries for the full full full family.
And it was like $50 like $75 whole week done 100 You guys want to talk them alright 2000s 2001 2003 in that area. 5060 bucks.
Everybody's spent for the whole week, I tried doing that.
I think bread is like 20 days, I don't know what's going on with it. But so that's one thing so you can get a property. The second thing is we're talking about sharing your state. If you plan properly, you do not need to lose 3040 50% of your wealth to Revenue Canada, you can plan around it, you just have to be careful what kind of wealth you accumulate, how you spend it, and how does it get passed on to your next generation. Managing Cash Flow is very, very important as a problem. I mean, generally speaking, our our people are very mindful of cash flow, but sometimes we're not. Right. So if I ask the person to give me how much money they're making, so we look at the pay stubs,
we know how much money you're making, how much money's been deposit into your bank account. And we usually ask them how much money they're spending, like we get the spending. And usually missing between 20
to one person was $110,000. So we can find 20 grand a year just been spent on random things that sort of the average. But there was one individual who cannot count for 100,000, or zero missed, missing getting go.
I couldn't find it, it just been spent somewhere. Right. So there's a lot of leakage in our cash flow. Preparing for unexpected is very important. And then of course, planning your major expenditure. The biggest dream the British school most of us have in this room is to buy our home. The question is, how do we buy our home Holloway? And we've done webinars and things on that. So having that plan that how do I go from 2023 to 20, on Epic number 2030. And being positioned to pay cash for my house, you can do it as long as possible. And of course you own a business, we can maximize that business asset as well. So the reason I'm here is I want to make sure that you plan on
the journey, right, we're talking about, you're going to destination you passing away in trying to figure out to have the vehicle, but you have to create a vehicle. Nobody has a yet to run into a person in 18 years of my career, who actually has a financial plan. It hasn't happened. I don't know. Maybe one day we'll do that. Nobody has it. We just do random things, and hoping that one day we show up at the gates of heaven at age 60. And then we've been trying to build his dream home. And it's not what we want it. Right. So we have to do the due diligence and from our perspective on my different timeshare
lines. Yeah, I'm almost done from the left. So what exactly what I'm what am I talking about? So financial planning is a step by step process for achieving one's life's goal. A financial plan serves as a roadmap, right? You need to be very specific. What do I need to do? When do I need to do it? And you need to use science and math and AI to be able to create these plans, right? You can just be a spreadsheet or me saving $500 a month and go from there. One thing I often get
asked people how much you're saving, right? A lot of us save on a regular basis. I ask them how much you're saving. And I get a Rumbler like I'm saving 10% or 15% or 20%. And I always ask the question, How did you come up with this number?
Like, why is it why is it 10%? Who told you? Is it 10%? one data point are you using to come up with this number, right? Why isn't it like my number is 35%. Like that's how much I save. But I know my plan. I know what I need to do when I need to do it specifically. So in shall hold on, I'll go from there. Now life changes, we know that this was called a living plan, because what you assume in 2023, you might not be accurate in 2040 or 2030 or 2025. Even right. So life changes. So therefore we have to be accommodated that. But that's what is referring to. So essentially what it does, and it looks at your income looks your expenses and your investments and figures out how do you plan
that journey from Calgary to Toronto? And do you have the proper vehicle to carry everybody else that's that's there traveling with you.
A couple more slides from me. And then I'm tensional teller. So the way we do it, the way it's done with us is we try to figure out where you are financially. Right? What is your goals? What are your dreams? What stops do you need to make? How old are children when they're gonna go to school? isn't enough money for them? Do you buy your house? How much are you saving at work? How much you saving outside of work? And specifically when What do you want when you want it? Are you going for Hydreigon for hunger? If you're buying a car and how are we going to fund that? Then we try to figure out where you are financially. What do you own? What are your What are you making? What are
you spending, those are two data points. So we know what the worry are and we destination is we help you develop on our natural physical plan. It's done by computer software that does that for us. But once you build a plan they get implemented. And the key point that most people miss so people are able to kind of figure out where they are what they want to be able to design social replying, but in the end, we'll implement it as well. But what gets missed is you got to go back. You got to go back and adjusted, adjusted with the times and what's happening
proactively adjusting and is very, very important as well.
And then
in terms of the the death and taxation, things like that. So currently, you know, you may not have a lot of wealth left behind, so maybe not going to lose that much of your network. But our job is to make sure you have wealth, and then you pass it on to the next generation, the most tax efficient way possible, there are things that you can do way ahead of time is just usually, it comes much later. And by that time, when I get involved, it's just too late. There's not much I can do because you've been creating a problem for 30 or 40 years of your life. And it's very, very hard to unwrap those tax issues.
Probate fee is not a big deal, especially non existent here in Alberta, but many provinces based on how much money leaving behind they will take a cut as a one and a half percent of your off your state. So there are people in Toronto paying 15 3060 grand just to the provincial government because of probate.
And then, and then you're doing a proper instead analysis, you can figure that out, it's very easy to figure out how much we're going to leave behind and how much that's gonna get taxed and what your tax bill is going to be in the future. So that's it for me for my site. In the website that we just linked here on the QR code is here as well. We have included the actual will kit from ISC, you have the PDF and the Word document but with it there's a whole bunch of other documents that you can download their free of charge, we call it Estate Planning Guide and know the thing to call the things to know about probate fee again not applicable in Alberta. What else can correct me and if
you have somebody else that with disability and leaving an inheritance, talk to them and how you do it properly. So there's a lot of information on this one advice that I'll give you my site and just start planning figure out who you are what do you want when you want it and how you're going to get there and and start with inshallah Xochimilco.
I forgot to introduce for us
for us you want to choose
okay, I've come to know we have for us with us. He, me and for us have worked together on the for with many webinars. He is a he works with Stuart Sharma, harsanyi, here in downtown Calgary, and he was called to the bar in 2014. For us his experience and appearing before all levels of the courts, including the Immigration and Refugee Board, the Federal Court of Canada, and regularly attends provincial courts and the king's bench to deal with family law matters now from the king's bench.
So remember, the firm was actually very active in the community, I often see him in the Northwest somewhere. And, and He is a gem to work with and a very, very generous person in terms of his time. Every time we have asked him to help us out with these webinars and seminars he's always available. So it's my absolute pleasure to introduce you to for Ross and he's gonna take it through what is a willing mentor? Things like that
just clip this on somewhere
good, yes. Perfect. Perfect. So I'm welcome everybody, thank
thank you all for coming out. Thank you Shekinah via then has for having me out again to help share some thoughts and information to the community. So harsh was mentioning the importance of a will. So in essence, what a will does is it gives you a good allows you to give instructions about how you want your assets to be managed after you're gone. Because at this point, you're no longer able to give instructions on that issue.
Now, this can be it can be complex at times when there's tax planning issues, which is why it's really important to contact or have an accountant, have a financial adviser have some have people that are helped plan for when this inevitability will arise for each of us. So that way you're dealing with things in as tax efficient manner as possible. That now briefly note a brief correction on the slide. It says it's read by Provincial Court, but it's actually kings bench in circuit court that would deal with the will most I would say a fair amount of wills will have to go through court to get probate I would say very few wills where there's no real assets to transfer
over titles to switch that wouldn't need probate. So it is important to have a will ready. And that's something where you would discuss with your accountant with your financial planner, what your assets are, how you'd like them dealt with. And then you also speak to your mom about what you plan to do with your, with your estate and how you want to divide it, what the furious exterior says about which which person you leave behind gets, how much if you choose to leave a discretionary portion behind to a charitable cause of the community. So these are all things to think about beforehand. Because as we'll touch after, if you pass away without a will, you have essentially you
have very little control in the matter.
So there are two other documents that often go with a will one is called the personal directive. One is called The Power of Attorney. A personal directive is
more about the human element, I mean, it'll go into things about
what your healthcare needs would be who you can associate with sort of more of a,
almost like a parental sort of role that someone would have over you. And this would be while you were still alive. But you lacked the capacity to make decisions or do anything for yourself as an adult. That could be because you're unconscious, that could be because you've lost capacity for some kind of mental health issue, that for any reason, if you're not able to make decisions for yourself, or look after yourself, you can create a personal directive, the personal directive will then give instructions, well, firstly, I will appoint somebody to make these decisions for you. And then you can give instructions to that person in that personal directive as well about how you would like
things to be managed, how you'd like things like end of life and end of life care to be managed. So a personal directive is a common thing that people do when they do their will. And the other one is a power of attorney. So this is similar to a personal directive, but this is really transactional. So this is would be for more things like taxes for banking, business dealings, managing investments, so that this is much more transactional, versus more of a social and medical thing, which would be your personal director. So those are two things that people typically do when they make their will. These two documents are functional, while you're alive, but lack capacity, and then they become
ineffective. They're they're nullified when you pass and then everything goes to what your Will says. And if you don't do these, I mean, we will discuss what happens if you don't have a will. But also if you don't have a personal directive or a power of attorney,
then your family members and yourself really, you could be in a bit of trouble about how your assets how your day to day decisions will be managed. And then your family member who would be trained to take care of you would have to make an application to court for an adult guardianship and trusteeship applicational orders already over you. That'll take time, they'll need a Capacity Assessment Report to do this.
doing one of these things is really simple. And it saves yourself and your family a lot of trouble. So we always recommend everybody, take the step talk to somebody, get this made, whether you do it on your own with a lawyer just it's something to discuss and plan for.
So what happens now if you die without a will in Canada, so if you die without a will in Canada, you are what they call intestate, which means at this point, we don't have instructions from you about what you would like to do with your assets, how you would want your affairs managed, how you plan to leave things for your family members.
So with this, you don't get the benefit of planning for tax ramifications, you don't get the benefit of managing who so if you want to leave any money to the community to a mosque, it really just leaves a lot of ambiguity. And it also takes away for the most part, any control that you would otherwise have gets left for your family members to deal with after a court will divide things or sometimes not even divide just give things to the person in an order of succession that the law has. Right so there's a slide here which goes through what would happen if you die without a well?
No generally what will happen
If you have no children, and you have a spouse, or what they call an adult interdependent partner, then everything goes to them. If you have them if you have a spouse or a partner and children still goes every.
Quotations but the general order of preference, we'll call it or succession is spouse, then children. And then if there's no children, and those children don't have children, then we get to parents. And then from there we will go, grandparents, siblings, aunts, uncles,
you it'll, it'll spread out. But the reason why this is important to consider and share with you the comment more on this than I is surely, the Shaurya will say that you have to give certain percentages to certain family members based on your family composition. So that's why it's important to plan for this in advance. So now a will is something that you'll make.
But there are instances where you want to change it.
So that can be if someone that's listed union, well is no longer with us. When you appoint someone to look after your well, they're called the personal representative, they used to be called an executor. It's the same term effectively, but they are the ones that look after what you're doing the death of a trustee. So again, that's somebody that will help manage the estate for you, the birth of a child, marriage, birth or grandchild, divorce, anything where your family composition is changing. That's something for real especially that becomes relevant, because when there's a fat change in family members, there'd be a change in percentages, perhaps, right, and depending on the
family members, which change and there definitely be a change of the percentages. Or if things change for you financially, or you list a certain asset that you want distributed a certain way, and you don't have that asset anymore, or the value and it's changed significantly and the percentages get thrown off. So there's a number of different times where you'll want to come back in, make changes. And if you have an existing will, you'll likely not, it won't be that complicated to then make that change.
The other thing to think about is when you've made your well you'll name someone as your personal representative, or what used to be called an executor. So this person is the person you are leaving behind to make decisions and run your estate for you and look after it. So it is important to think about who you want to appoint to take care of these things for you. I think it's important to think about.
Here to manage things with your estate, if there's a challenge to the estate, that may be an issue. If that person is able to get a visa to enter Canada, that may be an issue. So there's a number of reasons to think about who you're appointing to look after things for you. And perhaps overseas is not always the best option for somebody that has the appropriate age of health to manage things as well. So choosing I suppose if you're you're elderly and your spouse is barely elderly, you may want to think about the burden you're putting on them to go and sign court forms and documents and file things.
There are other options that are usually available. There are companies that will help you do this for help do this for you. Sorry. So again, there's thought that should be given for how you're appointing a personal representative for your well.
I the last middle briefly comment on is whether or not there's a conflict between what a Sharia law will provide for and what Canadian law will see as appropriate. So there are instances where you can imagine that there could be problems. One of them is that if you have for example, a wife and children, your wife gets one eight, which is 12 and a half percent. That on some level can become problematic if the wife has not left with adequate support and assets to look after herself, if that will get challenged, although courts will generally honor your wishes.
As they will want to make sure that your dependents are looked after properly. So that would basically be your spouse, and children if if they're under 18. Or if they are able to, if they're still in school or unable to withdraw from parents care, then they can be older and then you look at the circumstances, but at that point, generally when they're 22. So there can be issues where the what you're leaving behind may not be entirely consistent with what Canadian law may say. Another issue that could arise is daughters will get half of what sons will get. If there's minors involved, then there could be a situation where the Office of Public Guardian and trustee who will investigate
what's happening for minors may say, Well, we think this is a problem. So there are some thoughts to be given about how you're structuring your assets and how you're structuring your will afterwards and which way how you want to manage that with your family and how you want to try and plan for potential conflicts or problems in between what you're leaving behind as a Sharia instruction on what possible issues could arise when you're dealing with it in court.
Those are those are my thoughts, at least for now. And I'll pass it now to shake my
head.
Thank you so much.
Okay, folks, just again, if you haven't downloaded the document, please download it and have it in front of you. Because we're about to go through it in shall
they, what is the ruling on having a will historically, the scholars have said that it is a highly recommended sunnah to have a will based upon such a hadith and the ayah in the Quran, but from a practical level when we look at the outcome of the Sharia devoid of context, but when you look at fatwa fatwa takes concept context into consideration. So on the level of the hokum Yes, it's on the market, and we can't really change that. And we're not going to argue that, but from practical experience, having dealt with people that have passed away and my own personal experiences, I'm more inclined to say that it is wajib to have a will in a place like Canada, just so that the the
distribution of what Allah subhanaw taala requires from us can take place. So now, what actually happens when you pass away from an Islamic perspective, four things are meant to happen, your burial, funeral janazah expenses are all meant to be deducted first. So we've already approximately that 2023, it's about six and a half $1,000. And it's only going to get more expensive. As time goes on. If you're ever afforded the opportunity to purchase your plot of land in advance, I actually think that would be a good idea to save yourself money at that time, if you're able to purchase your plot of land where you will be buried, take advantage of that. So that is the first thing. The
second thing that will happen, my dear friend, please don't walk in front of the camera next time. Okay, don't walk in front of the camera. The second thing to keep in mind is that all of your debts will be paid off. Meaning that if you have any debts that are there, they should be paid off at that time. And we've spoken about in the in the previous weeks on how debt is discouraged unless you need to be in debt. And if you have the ability to pay the debt off quickly do so and do not prolong it the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, he intentionally did not pay the janazah of certain individuals that had a debt and were able to pay it off. So make sure you don't you are not in that
situation. Number three, the third thing that will happen is your Wuxia will be fulfilled. And we'll speak about that in detail as we come to that section. That is your charitable contribution and you're giving of gifts to people that are not naturally inheriting from you. And then last but not least the murals or the distribution of the inheritance will take place. Now at the end of the world document there is an appendix that starts on page number nine, those are all the possible common scenarios that exist and that is what should be implemented Bismillah he Tada. So now, with that being said, let us start with the actual document itself. So the document starts off with AI and
that is where your match to put your name put your whole entire name as per your legal identification, your driver's license, your passport, whatever name is on those documents. That is the name you want to put over here being the law he Tana residing at your current address wherever you currently live. Over here it says City of Calgary province of Alberta. If you happen to move, make sure you get that updated. That's why the document is there for you to make those edits. And for those of you that are tuning in online, across Canada and North America
Gotta make sure to make that edit as well. And then this is the big thing that I will always tell you. Yes, this is an effort from the Muslim community to make things easy, but it is a starting point. It is not the end point. Everyone has a different financial situation, family situation, individual circumstance. So always make sure you do your due diligence of seeking legal counsel and a proper financial and tax advisor to deal with your situation. Never think that this document is going to solve all of your problems. This is just a starting point for the conversation. So that is page number one. At the bottom of page number one, you will see a portion for signatures, that is
where your signature will take place. And at the end of the document, you will see that we ask that there's three witnesses, we would encourage that also the three witnesses sign each page. On the next page, you will have funeral and burial rights. So part A this is where you hereby nominate and appoint two individuals, their names and their addresses. Always seek their permission and consent first, make sure you tell them in advance, Hey, is it okay? If I appoint you as the person to take care of my funeral and burial rights? Why is this important? Because if you don't appoint someone, no one may know what to do at that time. Number two, the reality is that there's a level of
ignorance that still exists. So sometimes a person doesn't know where the Muslim cemetery is. So they get them buried at any cemetery, the individual doesn't know that you have to perform the hustle and the janazah. So they take it straight from the hospital to a funeral home and from the funeral home to the cemetery, right. So you want to make sure that you talk to someone that actually knows what they're doing, they know who to contact, they know that the which masjid, to get the body delivered to and all those nuanced situations. So have that conversation with someone and make sure they're on the same page as so gives you the opportunity to nominate two people in case one is not
available, then signatures at the bottom. So just keep that in mind, every page will require a signature. And I'm not going to keep mentioning it for the rest your signature and your witnesses, then we have the executor of the will. So now, actually, page five is over
and missing page life.
Yeah,
all this didn't get printed out properly. So
I got it.
There we go page five. So that is the bottom of Page five you see the executor, and guardian. This is where you will be appointing your executor, and Guardian Bismillahi to either
let me see if we can find page for now.
I thought this would have been an order
you have page for them. We're missing page for.
Exactly. Thank you so much. I appreciate that.
Okay, let's build off. My apologies for that. So page four will have your funeral and burial rights. Page five is the executor and guardian. And this is where you actually pointed the executor and Guardian on page six. So again, it will give you space for two individuals in case one is not available. The executor and Guardian we've gone through some of the criterion over here. But here are another couple of things to keep in mind the importance of this person having time to do so I cannot emphasize the amount of time that it will take having to meet with lawyers having to meet with the financial planners having to meet with the accounting for taxation, having to meet with a
real estate agent, and having to do all of these small tasks that need to be done. So this person is someone that should have time to do so. Number two, this person should be trustworthy, literally, they will have all of the power. And if this person is not trustworthy, then things can take place that we don't want you to take place. Number three, make sure that this person actually has a desire to help. Now Islamically you are allowed to pay the executor if you want to want them, you know be compensated for their time, that's a choice that you can make. But make sure that this person is willing to do so as well. So some people may be appointed. They think it's an easy task. As soon as
they see how much is involved. They step back then everything remains in limbo. And you see certain cases that will drag on for years and people aren't getting their inheritance because the executor is taking their sweet time. The executor is someone that should know that this is an Amana that is on their shoulders and on their necks that they have to fulfill with their due diligence in a timely as manner as possible Bismillah heat Tada debts and expenses
it is it will do questions at the end.
I don't have it unfortunately on the computer. My apologies I don't have it on the computer.
But if you just follow along in the document and given the page numbers on top for the debts and expenses along with the assets, it's not a requirement to include it. But I would highly, highly emphasize that you do create a page of all of your assets, where they're located, who has access to them, how do you have access to them, right, you have properties overseas, make a document of it, you have bank accounts overseas, make a document of it. Even in Canada, you have multiple investment accounts, multiple bank accounts, you have businesses, document all of that for the people that you have been dealing with that have access to those accounts, and then can help out in that situation.
Then secondly, is the debts and expenses. So all of the debts that you have, who are those debts, too, when are they due what amount for what is their contact information, make the life of the executor and your family members easier by having all of this stuff ready to go within the hit Tada. Now we get to page number eight. And this is the we'll see a component that I was talking about the hadith of Saudi Arabia class, or the Allahu Tang who were sad wanted to give some of his inheritance to his family members specifically, and the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam kept on going back and forth with him, till he sallallahu alayhi wa sallam said, a solo thought was solo theory, that
even 1/3 that give you can give up to 1/3. But even 1/3 is a lot. So what that means is, people that are inheriting from you, they cannot be included in the swasthya people that are not eligible to inherit from you. They can be included in the hacia, you have a neighbor that you love, a friend that you love, you know, someone in the community that you dearly love, you want to give them a gift after you pass away, this is what you include it, you want to give some sort of sadaqa, you want to do some sort of, you know, charity, legacy project, you can give it from over here. But what I will point out over here are two things, the sadaqa that you gave while you're alive is much much
superior than the soda that you give after he passed away. Number two, is that in the hadith of Saddam, who caused the process and makes it very clear, that it is better for you to leave your family financially affluent, not having to beg not having to, you know, work hard to resolve their financial circumstance is better than for you to give sadaqa and gifts. So if you're at that level hamdulillah where Allah subhanaw taala has blessed you with a lot of money, then by all means, give sadaqa and do all of those things your financial, your family inshallah will be taken care of. But if you're not at that level, give priority to your family. Above all else you want to give sadaqa
give some tough while you are alive. So it has the names are placed with the names and your organization's the percentage amounts, the total should not come out to more than 33%. And you write out the word percentage as well.
Then we move on to page number 10 and 11. And this is where you will put the date and the year. So you sign it off for the day that you complete it with Allah He Tala and then you get to page number 12. Page Number 12, you will have your legal name. If you are a convert to Islam, you put your Muslim name as well, then you have space for three witnesses, three witnesses and their addresses. We highly encourage the witnesses to be Muslim male adult sane, trustworthy witnesses. That is what we encourage people to do. So if you're unable to find three, then you're able to do one male and two females as well. Bismillahi Teina, that is also permissible over here, then you put the number
of pages. So if you've included a list of your assets, a list of your liabilities, include those pages there as well. Then also put who is getting a copy of your will. So I would suggest leave one with your family where they can keep it safe. Leave one with the bank, so they have access to all of your your stuff and how it should be dealt with. And then leave one with the executor as well. And you can make more copies of this and shared with other people, there's no problem. But I would say at least those three to be on the safe side those three to be on the safe side. And then you can also get it notarized. You can also get it notarized. Is it a requirement to get it notarized? No
it's not you get it notarized it will be better. And again, I will emphasize, always do your own due diligence and seek legal counsel and advice. Then starting from page 13, all the way till the end, you have all the different scenarios of how your wealth will be distributed amongst the errors.
On the very last page, there is this note about all other cases as we know, things are drastically changing in our day and age and
terms of people's level of practice of religion, and what that entails if they're still Muslim or not, even with regards to gender and how they identify and things like that, all of those things will need to be taken into consideration from a Canadian legal perspective, right. So now in that sort of situation, what you find in here may not accommodate to that. But there's a space to say that, you know, if there is a scenario that has not been documented over here, please reach out to a particular imam or a particular organization that can give you a fatwa, what to do in that situation for all other cases Bismillah to Allah. So that is just a quick run through of this document. Now,
we it is currently 828. In sha Allah, I'm hoping that we can stop at 850 to have the Adan and the karma right after, right. So initially, Danis was about 837, a Karma at 847. We're going to push the number three minutes just to accommodate everyone's questions, Ben and I hate to Anna, we have a couple of things to be cognizant of when you are making your will whether you use this template or you use something else, make sure it's not something that's too simplified, or something that's too confusing. Again, if you consult a lawyer, they will help you go through that. In most cases, as long as your will is not being challenged, you should be okay. But if the will does get challenged,
that is particularly where it is best if you have legal advice in advance. So if you're anticipating that your family members or your friends are going to challenge your will make sure that you have that legal advice in advance, because that is going to be the case where you will need legal advice the most. But if you feel that you know what your family is going to accept your wishes and there isn't anything going to be contested, then even the simple will something like this, as long as it's witnessed and it can be proven that it is yours. For the most part it will stand. But any legal questions we're going to direct towards for us as well. This is for us is information over here.
Local to Calgary easily accessible, you can contact him for any personal questions that you may have in case he's not able to answer them here. Also keep in mind sensitivity, that not everything shouldn't be answered in public as well with Allah He to Allah. With that being said, we will now open up the floor for questions for the next 20 minutes. Inshallah.
Anyone that has a question, just raise your hand minshall Ismaila.
The forums with a personal directive and the power of attorney for the personal directive, there is a template available on Alberta Health Health Services. And then for the power of attorney. Are there any templates available? Oh,
there's probably something out there. Yeah. But
I mean, if you were to go and get one done with a lawyer, just a power of attorney, they're very quick. They're really cheap. Yeah, I would. That's what I would suggest as well. So you may have three templates that are available. But the best thing is just to go through a lawyer, it's a very easy and simple process. And that is what I had done for my mother Rahimullah as well. So contact a lawyer but you can also use the free templates that are available. I know for the person director Alberta Health Services has one in Charlotte
Alberta law school, Alberta Law Society, so Alberta law society also has a power of attorney Inshallah, that you can take a look at. But just keep in mind those templates may not necessarily be the best thing for you, depending on your situation, inshallah.
Go ahead.
My question
comes to
attention first and
build up the document what? What's your
take on? It was, you want
to stay?
Excellent. So the brothers question is if a person converts to Islam, and their family says that we don't want their Muslim name on this document, do can they control that? Do they have the right Islamically? They don't have that right. And even from a legal perspective, a lead for us answer that question.
If a person converts to Islam, can their family dictate what name goes on there? Well or not?
Legally? No, I mean, if it's your will, you would put your name on it, but you would want to put your
to make it valid and simple. You would want to put your legal name if you were born with a non Muslim name, and you've later converted and you've adopted a Muslim name, that's great. But for your will, you should put at some point you should have your legal name identified in it. And then you can put an alias or
are also known as or you can explain that you also have a Muslim name, that you want your full legal name as recognized by other government authorities. Otherwise you may get you may run into problems with Canada Revenue Agency or having it enforced where you know, with your bank, for example, if your bank doesn't know you by your Muslim name, then
you definitely want to have your proper full legal name in there, you can add the Muslim name as well. But other family members cannot dictate what you will and won't put into your will. That's entirely up to you. Again, the only the only place where your family members can upset the applecart of what you put in your will, is if there's really an issue independent relief, which again, is your spouse, children that are under 18. If they're over 18, and have some kind of mental or physical
issue that prevents them from being self sufficient, or if they are over 18, but under 22, and in school, other than that, your family members can't really interfere with what will happen with your estate.
So much. Next question.
What if both parents passed away, actually, there was a section in the wills panel, because of the confusion on the pages I didn't get to address, there's actually a section in that document.
So you are meant to apply, appoint a guardian for your children. So what we mentioned over here is someone that you they have easy access to have familiarity with. But the highlight I always give is that even after you pass away, you have responsibility of your children getting Islam and thermia. So what that translates as is sometimes your closest family members aren't the best people to take care of your children. What you want to do is leave them in the care of someone that's willing and accepting the responsibility, and can also give them the Islamic upbringing that they deserve.
No, this is inside the well over here. When you look at the section of guardianship, I'll go back to the exact page. I want to say it's page six. But there seems to be
no, the executor is not always the guardian. So if you look at executor and guardian, from the bottom of page five, there's actually a section that it feels like it's missing over here on page six, at least in my copy. But there's a section for The Guardian that is mentioned to be appointed over there inshallah.
Six, sister in the middle, go ahead.
Excellent, so I'll answer the Islamic side and let us answer the other side. So in terms of distributing your wealth, while you're alive, it is permissible to do so. But it shouldn't be unjust, right? It should permissible to do so. But it shouldn't be unjust. And then any wealth that is still remaining after you pass away has to be distributed according to the laws of Islam, right? So that those were categories. So that's what's meant to happen over there. Even if it's a joint account, you approximate how much wealth belongs to each individual. And then based upon that you distribute that money, inshallah.
The question is about if a person distributes their wealth while they're alive, but then they have a joint bank account after they pass away? Do they still have to go through probate? And you know, the clearance of the accounts and all that stuff? Yes. So
in a legal basis, what you've done during your life you've done during your life, that's not really an issue during your will.
It whether or not you have a bank, so the bank account question you raise is interesting, because there's two types of property ownership. One is tenants in common. One is joint tenants. So with joint tenants, when one person passes, these survive, surviving owner automatically receives the rest. But if it's tenant in common, your portion when you pass gets frozen, and then it's subject to the division that you put forward in your will provider to get approved and there's no challenges to it and that sort of thing. So I mean,
there's probably a circumstance somewhere where it becomes difficult, like if you if a parent has two minor children, and they've given everything in their life right before they passed one and, you know, then the left a very small estate and then then asked for that to be divided, I suppose then, the other child,
likely through the Public Guardian or through their leader Guardian, and if one's appointed a child
Is that I mean, we could, there's way there's situations where that could become problematic. But
just as far as the bank account would go, if it's tenancy in common in a joint bank account, it's frozen joint tenants, it automatically goes to whoever's got it left. But what would you have done with your estate during your life is, is up to you at the time really?
If you that website I have there is an estate planning guide. So if you have bank accounts, or any joint accounts, it includes investment accounts as well. There's a big no no having joined, like children with you and other accounts, that it causes them tax problems cause your tax forms as well. But if you go to that guy, there's a whole section on what I was referring to specifically laid out, and the pros and cons of doing that, that will answer most your questions that Estate Guide.
The brother in the middle who's asking the question on guardianship, I actually opened up the document that's on the icy website. So if you look at the bottom of page three, and the beginning of each bar, that is where you normally the Guardians, so if you that's the page that has guardianship
questions from the other side, who else has a question?
Child or children's
permission.
So you have the grandparent, you have the mother and father, and then you have the children, mother and father have passed away. So
the father has passed away from the paternal side. Okay, so if they have children, then in that sort of situation, the grant though the parents will not inherit the children will get the wealth and divided amongst them Inshallah, because the children will get priority over the parents.
Sorry, so then you would ask me if the grandparents passed away, and your children are alive? So who's?
Yeah.
Okay. Yeah.
Okay,
gotcha. So if the grandparents still being alive, their children will get priority over the grandchildren. So if all the wealth gets distributed according to the laws of Islam, and it's all done with the children, then the grandchildren won't get any. But if there's certain situations where you only have daughters, but you have one male grandson, then that male grandson will still get a portion of it, right. So depending on the scenario, that's how it would play out. But generally speaking, the first generation blocks off generations lower than it, that's generally how it works.
Laws, give them access to the
rich.
This in this is what I was talking about Allah commands is to fear him as much as possible. So as much as it's possible to implement the directive of Allah subhanaw taala, we should do so. But if there's a limitation from a legal side, where you're unable to implement it, then there's excusing pardon at that site, would you still have to make the effort to make sure that the laws of Allah subhanaw taala are implemented? Allah.
I'll add very briefly, that's a good point, actually, because when I was talking about dependent relief, and whether people can challenge if you've left enough for them, if a grandparent has stood in the place of a parent, for a grandchild, that grandchild could then on that basis, actually try to make a claim that their grandparent needs to leave them adequate support. And then on a, on a legal basis, if you've not left a will, if the grandparent does not have a spouse, and then they have children. And let's say they have three children. So two of those children are alive, one of those children is not alive. And the child who is not alive, has a child of his own.
The estate then falls from the grandparent from the grandparent will call it to his children. But then when it gets to his deceased child section, that then falls down to his grandpa. And then if he has multiple grandchildren, and then it gets divided equally amongst his grandchildren for his share. So that's not always going to be in line with what the way she has attended. So provided that there's not an issue somewhere with the dependent relief issue.
There then you can structure your will to generally know you can structure your will to match I shouldn't even say generally provided dependent relief is managed out
And then you can still make, you can still make it work. But based on what the Sherea will say the percentages are, the only thing to be aware of there is, when your composition changes, you may need to make updates
from the sisters, sister in the back
mentioned that 30 to 50% cure rate more in which situation, this would happen? And the other question is that you mentioned that the opposite will happen.
So, the list includes the mortgage and what happens with the mortgage? Excellent, great question. So, the first question is with regards to the CRA may take up to 30 to 50% of the inheritance before it reaches the kids. What in what scenario does that happen?
Yeah, so this is a very, very common scenario for people to actually have wealth. So as you go through life, you accumulate wealth, you accumulate different types of wealth, right. So most commonly, you know, you have things such as RSP accounts, right, you have pension plans or locked in retirement accounts or locked in income funds, you may have secondary property, you may have rental property, you may have a business, what passes down to your beneficiaries completely tax free without any issues or problems as your primary residence, a Tax Free Savings Account. That is it. And then if you have someone a checking accounts savings account, that's about it. But everything
else after that, there's going to be tax consequences to it. So again, most people that have wealth will have accumulated wealth besides just the RSPs. So you know, you have a non registered portfolio that you contributed $200,000 to anonymous worth $800,000. The way it works is that when the last person dies, literally a few minutes before they're dead, every single thing that they own is deemed disposed, sold at the highest tax bracket, not physically sold, but for tax purposes, is sold. So again, real life examples, somebody bought a real estate for $4,000 rental now is worth $800,000, when they die, that's a $400,000 Capital Gain triggered write that in there. So there's going to be
tax on $200,000. If you have an RSP accounted for big a number, a million dollars, you die, that is a million dollars added to your income that day you died that year. So you made a million dollar income there, you made it 200,000 on capital gain there, then all of a sudden you had another a business, I mean, people who are well, like they have businesses, right, a corporation that does deemed dispose as well. So when you die a minute before you die, everything you have is sold depends what kind of water you have, how much of that you have, that there isn't could be a very significant tax consequences to that. Does that make sense?
To answer the question about the mortgage. So when someone passes away and they have a mortgage, then the immediate payment that is due, that is what will be deducted from their will as a debt. And then the mortgage itself should be transferred. Or if it's a joint ownership will automatically be transferred to the spouse or whoever the joint owner is, and then gets transferred to their name and therefore they have no more liability towards it. In the case that there is no joint ownership and they are the sole owner, then they have to go through that whole legal process. And until the legal process of transfer takes place, all the accumulated mortgage payments would have to be deducted
from the estate. Now, the important disclaimer I will give about taking conventional mortgages is that I personally believe that taking a conventional mortgage as a default ruling is not allowed. Right? Try to save up for your money paid in cash, try to use other avenues like your RSP is like the first time homebuyers plan. Like you know, borrowing money from family and friends interest free from your business interest rate, try to do it that way. If that's not an option, do your own due diligence, find a halal financing Corporation and go through that ability to either the only thing I will mention is that there is flexibility in the Sharia that based upon your circumstance and
situation. A conventional mortgage may be allowed based upon the time and place. But that is not a decision we should take upon ourselves to make. This is something we should speak to a local Imam and a local ship about and see if we are eligible for a concession to take a conventional mortgage along with
the folks I'm not going to take any more questions at this time because we won't be able to answer before the call my time I don't want to lay the sign further. With that being said though, are you going to be sticking around after so can you stick around a bit for after so both of these gentlemen will be here after so long to answer your question.
Since in this very area open to both brothers and sisters and I myself will be available and also accessible through email as well you can email me in sha Allah. So we will have the event followed by the environment thereafter. Does everyone have some time to go home we have data share your name and address that will go on to make just a quick a couple of announcements. Number one is that we have the event was sick, I didn't ask
for new Muslims and even interested in Islam. That's happening tomorrow. And then also next week, there will be no next week there will be no Palestine shot.