National Regifting Day: What Parts of Your Estate Plan Can You “Exchange”?

Every holiday season, there’s at least one gift that quietly ends up in the closet… or the re-gift pile.

Maybe it’s the sweater that itches, the kitchen gadget you’ll never use, or the office White Elephant disaster that keeps resurfacing. National Regifting Day (the Thursday before Christmas) is a lighthearted reminder that sometimes it’s okay to pass things along — as long as you follow a few rules and no one gets hurt.

Estate planning works the same way:
Some “gifts” in your plan can be changed, updated, or redirected while you’re alive. Others are much harder — or nearly impossible — to undo.

Let’s talk about which is which.

The “Regiftable” Parts: What You Can Still Change

These are the flexible parts of your plan while you’re alive and have capacity — meaning you understand what you’re doing and can make decisions for yourself.

Think of these as the gifts that still have the receipt in the bag:

• Your Will
  You can:
  • Add or remove beneficiaries
  • Change who gets what and how they receive it
  • Update guardians for minor children
• Beneficiary Designations
  On life insurance, retirement accounts, and payable-on-death accounts, you can change your beneficiaries at any time. Just make sure these changes line up with your overall plan — sometimes naming your trust as a beneficiary makes the most sense.
• Revocable Living Trusts
  As long as you’re alive and have capacity, you can usually update the terms of your revocable trust, including:
  • Trustees
  • Beneficiaries
  • How and when distributions will be made
• Powers of Attorney & Health Care Directives
  You can change who you’ve appointed or revoke these documents entirely while you still have capacity. If there’s a progressive illness, we may want to review them more frequently.
• Lifetime Gifts & Charitable Plans (Flexible Versions)
  Gifts made through revocable trusts or donor-advised funds usually remain changeable while you’re alive and well.

Shorter “Return Window”: Changes That Are Harder to Make

Some choices are not completely set in stone but are much harder to change and may require court involvement or special procedures.