Where There’s a Will . . .

After the Twin Towers collapsed in New York, Thomas and Kathleen Snider saw their San Pedro beachfront home in a different light. The Los Angeles Harbor, their neighbor, seemed a vulnerable target for more terrorism, and suddenly, their perception of their life together changed.

Married for 20 years, the Sniders have a 19-year-old daughter who lives with them. They also have four adult children from prior marriages and a combined eight grandchildren but, until Sept. 11, no will or estate plan to express how they want their assets distributed after they die. The attacks prompted the Sniders to contact a lawyer and arrange their wills.

And they have plenty of company. Thousands of Americans are addressing their personal affairs, turning to lawyers who handle wills and estate planning, as well as Internet sites that offer online services. The attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon, followed by the recent anthrax scare, are forcing people to deal with issues they had ignored or put off till later.

“After this thing in New York happened, we started thinking, ‘What if they attack one of these ships in the harbor, or more than one, or one of the fuel transfer stations,”’ said Thomas Snider, 52. “If it happened in New York, it could happen easily here. Maybe because of these events, we could meet with an untimely demise, and we had nothing in place. We have a rather nice home on the beach. We would like to see our one child stay there as long as she needed rather than have the state come in and decide.”

Snider turned to Jeffrey Condon, a Santa Monica estates lawyer and co-author of “Beyond the Grave: The Right Way and the Wrong Way of Leaving Money to Your Children,” for assistance. Condon, who shares his estate-planning practice with his father, Gerald M. Condon, co-author of the book, said their clientele has doubled since Sept. 11.

“It’s brought people closer to their mortality and their perception of their mortality,” the younger Condon said. “People are doing more inheritance planning, insurance planning and those things they put off or never thought of because it’s a new day. People are more aware that they can go at any time.”

Senior citizens are amending their wills; young parents are drawing up wills for the first time, wanting to leave their children’s legal lives in order, should they both die. Single people are wondering if they should do anything at all.

“In a sense, that’s coping with something you can control,” said Fred Zuker, a vice president at University of Dallas and professor of psychology who has conducted national workshops on coping with the national crisis. “So much of this is feeling the loss of control, even though that is just an illusion to begin with. To have that illusion yanked from our hands makes us look for things we can recover to get a sense of control. Taking care of your will is one little piece that you don’t have to worry about.”

The dramatic rise in estate planning marks a sharp contrast in the mentality of the average American who, just months ago, was not thinking much about bequeathing his or her money and other assets, experts say. A survey of 500 men and 500 women across the nation conducted in May by FindLaw, a legal Web site based in Mountain View, Calif., showed that estate planning was not high on the list of priorities of most Americans. About 59% of those polled did not have wills, said FindLaw spokesman Leonard Lee.

“It’s very unfortunate to see an increase in our sales because of these horrific events, but at the same time, we do feel that everyone should have a will,” said Brian Lee, president of L.A.-based LegalZoom.com Inc., which has seen a 50% increase in orders since the attacks. “People are filling out wills to protect themselves and their families because they’re traveling. There are people who mention anthrax, and we’re also getting a lot of traffic from individuals who work in tall buildings who are just scared.”

Lee’s 1-year-old company has been so overwhelmed with new business that he hired two people to help with the overload. People fill out an online questionnaire, and LegalZoom processes it and sends the customer instructions on making it a legal and binding document. The company is preparing free wills and living trusts for the families of those who lost their lives in the attacks and so far has donated $12,000 of its profit to the New York Fire Department Fund.

“This is such a phenomenon; it’s so sad,” said Alfredo Adessi, president of the Fort Lauderdale, Fla.-based Wills.com. “To have business doing so well because of such a huge tragedy is a very confusing situation. This crisis just seems to be going on and on. We had a 150% spike in the first week, and now it’s at 125%. It’s mostly coming from the metropolitan areas all over the country. This is not subsiding. What is more sinister than something being as close as your mailbox that could touch you or hurt you and your family? What is more scary than that?”

Sales of will-making software also have skyrocketed. Purchases of Quicken Lawyer 2002 more than tripled in the week after the Sept. 11 attacks and have remained strong in the intervening weeks, said Ralph Warner, chairman and founder of Nolo, the Berkeley-based publisher that produces the software with San Diego-based Intuit Inc.

“We can’t keep it out there,” Warner said. “The sales don’t show any sign of slowing down.”

Another software product, Personal Recordkeeper, also is experiencing a spurt in sales, he said. The software is used to help people keep track of important papers, medical information and other critical details in the event of an emergency.

At Doyourownwill.com, a Chicago-based site, business also is booming. Traffic on the site as well as purchases have doubled--but 65% of those orders are from people who live east of the Mississippi, said president Brent Pope. The majority of sales are in Massachusetts, Connecticut and New York.

“A lot of people are contemplating things they’ve never thought about before,” Pope said. “Not everyone needs a will. But everyone is definitely thinking about these things now.”

The attacks, in fact, have left thousands of families struggling to find their legal way in the midst of their deepest sorrow. Sandra Dawson, a Torrance marriage and family therapist, learned the value of advanced family planning the hard way. When her twin brother died unexpectedly in 1994, he left behind an estate with assets of $2 million, including a beach house in Southampton, N.Y., all in trust to his boyfriend. Nothing was ever paid to the boyfriend, however, because the brother’s lawyer and executor claimed it all for himself. After years of court battles, a judge ruled that she and her sister settle for 35% of their brother’s trust (his boyfriend had since died), leaving the rest to the lawyer.

“We were the typical family,” Dawson said. “Nobody ever talked about death, wills or who was getting what after someone died. When there is a death, you’re feeling so sad and you’re feeling the loss, which is a time in your life when you really feel like doing nothing. But you can’t. You have to absolutely take action. Now you’re dealing with the grief and deadlines for paying taxes and for probate, and this is not the type of thing you want to deal with on such a tight deadline.”

Dawson has devoted the last seven years to speaking nationally and consulting with families about the importance of protecting their estates.

“I encourage people to talk to all of their family members and find out what each one wants and expects,” Dawson said. “You’d be surprised at how hard that is to do. Talking about dying is a very difficult thing. Families avoid it. But it’s important that people work through their resistance so that they can draw up fair wills that everyone can live with and the family is not destroyed.”

As Zuker has traveled across the country this past month, he has witnessed the pulling together of families. The rise in estate planning is an extension of the rush for Americans to take care of their loved ones, he said.

“People are reconnecting with their families, planning reunions and turning to family and friends for sustenance,” Zuker said. “These events have caused people to reprioritize and reassess what we need to do. Thinking about one’s will and getting one’s financial matters squared away goes with that type of thinking.”

Like most Americans, the Sniders lead busy lives and figured they had plenty of time to get their affairs in order. Since they’ve been working with Condon, Thomas Snider says he has felt less anxious.

“It doesn’t make us feel more secure as far as the world situation is concerned, but it makes us feel more secure in our own estate and that we are taking care of our children,” he said. “If you listen to the stories of the people who have passed away, how the state came in and took stuff, and ordered this and that, it should make you take care of your own situation. We felt that it was important to do, even though this is stuff we should have thought of a long time ago.”

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Times staff writer Liz Pulliam Weston contributed to this report.