Assets on Ice, Cryogenic Estate Planning

Dennis Kowalski is the president of the Cryonics Institute and a paramedic. The husband and father of three recently doled out $140,000 in order to cryogenically preserve his entire family after their deaths. The current process for cryogenic freezing requires the deceased patient’s blood to be entirely substituted with an antifreeze solution. The solution is designed to prevent dangerous ice crystals from forming in the body. After this, the client is placed in a cooling chamber with temperatures around negative 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Because these frozen individuals are legally dead, special planning is required in case their desired outcome, reawakening at some point in the future, is actually accomplished. One means to make sure a frozen individual does not wake up in a Star Trek-esque future with no money to enjoy space travel or exotic worlds is to draft a personal revival trust. With this type of trust vehicle, it is possible for cryonicists to retain their assets by adding themselves to the trust. Another possibility is a cryonics dynasty trust. This unique estate planning tool is specifically designed for those individuals who want to take their money with them as they undergo cryopreservation.

See Inna Fershteyn, Esq., Assets on Ice, Cryogenic Estate Planning, BrooklynTrustandWill, January 22, 2018.

Special thanks to Alexander Evelson for bringing this article to my attention.