What’s New – September 2024: Vanilla Document Builder™ enhancements, a new Client Portal and more!

Today, we’re excited to announce VAI Automatic Profiles to instantly transform clients’ existing plans into powerful visuals, saving hours of time wasted diagramming plans in powerpoint. You can read more about the announcement on our blog:

Here are several new features for advisors and planners to help clients achieve their estate planning goals, coming in the next few weeks:

• Document creation now included in most subscriptions, joint trusts in several separate property states, and an Advanced Trust Package available with Vanilla Document Builder™
• New Funding Options available in Vanilla Estate Builder™
• A new Client Portal where your clients will be able to view their estate plan, complete tasks, and access beneficiary and fiduciary information

Offer every client an estate plan with Vanilla Document Builder included in most subscriptions

We are excited to offer included estate documents creation (up to the number of clients included with a license) with Vanilla Document Builder to our Advisor Advanced and Planner packages. Now advisors and planners can offer clients an estate plan for no additional cost. Your clients can choose to have their documents shipped to their front door in a beautiful package for an additional cost or easily print them for free at home.

Other Document Builder updates:

• The Basic Trust Package will offer joint revocable trusts in separate property states for your clients based in Missouri, Kansas, and Delaware, with more states coming soon! Clients will be able to choose between individual or joint revocable trusts to suit their planning needs when creating their plan in Vanilla Document Builder.
• Coming later this month, your clients with more advanced planning needs will be able to select our Advanced Trust Package. Like our Basic Trust Package, it will include a Revocable Trust, Certificate of Trust, Health Care Directive (HCAD), and Financial Power of Attorney (FPOA). This package ensures a tax efficient wealth transfer through the AB trust structure of a credit shelter trust and marital share. Along with features like a trust protector and expanded power of appointment, the Advanced Trust Package offers added flexibility and control for a dynamic, tax-efficient estate plan.

Visualize complex distributions with new Funding Options available in Vanilla Estate Builder™

For estate planners it will soon be easy to customize distributions when abstracting a will or revocable trust in Vanilla Estate Builder. You will be able to choose from multiple funding options including specific gifts and include any asset or account from the balance sheet as part of the distribution. Before finalizing your selections, you’ll be able to generate the visualizations and see how they look in the PDF report. With the expanded funding options, you can confidently visualize complicated estates and accommodate the unique planning needs of your clients.

Have richer client planning conversations with a new Client Portal (Limited Beta)

Now you can offer your clients a personalized estate planning experience with a fully customizable Client Portal. Your clients can access helpful estate planning information such as their Plan Snapshot, Family Tree, PDF reports, and onboarding data through collaborative onboarding and planning tools like Estate Health Check, Profile Builder, and Vanilla Document Builder. It’s easy to control what information your client has access to and invite them to complete tasks to help you build out their complete profile.

Vanilla’s Client Portal will first be available through a limited beta. To opt in to the beta, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.

To learn more about these features, contact sales.