Estate Planning
Estate Planning is the process of determining how your wealth and assets should be transferred to the heirs of your choice: your children, grandchildren, friends, families, charitable causes, etc. and then deciding which legal tools and structures to use to best meet your estate planning goals.
Estate planning is not simply reducing or eliminating taxes and avoiding probate. Only after establishing how you want your estate’s assets to be distributed should you consider ways to reduce taxes and avoid probate. From there, good estate plans deal with a host of other issues. Now, with all but a few estates exempt from the federal estate tax, those other issues are, or should be, at the forefront of estate planning.
An estate plan is to ensure that you are taken care of the rest of your life and that your wealth is transferred to the people you want to have it. A good estate plan ensures these goals are accomplished with as much efficiency and as little cost as possible. An estate plan addresses the management and distribution of an individual’s property and financial obligations after he or she dies with financial tools such as wills, revocable living trusts and power of attorney.
For a comprehensive overview of Estate Planning, please start with our article:
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Ethical Wills – How to Transfer Your Values to Future Generations
You have more than the money and property in your estate to leave your loved ones. More and more people are interested in leaving something more meaningful and intangible as part of their legacies. They want to add a more personal element or statement to their estate plans. Estate planning at its most basic is […]
The Essential Estate Planning Questionnaire and Checklist Provides Simple Questions in Preparing for Retirement
Estate Planning is not all about reducing estate taxes. That always was the case, but few people realized the importance of the non-tax factors until the 2001 tax law began the phase out of the estate tax. Every estate plan, regardless of the estate’s size, needs to address certain issues. Ignore these issues, and your […]
Estate Planning Mistakes: Why Most Estate Plans Fail, Part II
In last week’s edition of Retirement Watch Weekly, we began revealing a list of reasons why most estate plans often fail. Please read on for the rest of the list… Clients generally need an estate planner who will spend some time getting to know about their families, their finances, and their general goals and values. […]
Estate Planning Mistakes – Why Most Estate Plans Fail
A large percentage of estate plans fail to achieve one or more of their goals, and many of them fail for a surprising reason. One cause is the most surprising and perhaps most frequent reason estate plans fail: The estate owners do not implement their plans. The failure to implement an estate plan is surprising. […]
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7 Estate Planning Twists Everyone Should Know
You learn a lot of interesting things in estate planning. Most estate planners like what they do because of the variety of issues they face and the interesting things they learn about people. Here’s a collection of issues I’ve come across recently and questions I’ve been asked. When I was in law school, the transfer […]
How the Stock Market Can Change Your Estate Plan
A new tax law isn’t the only reason to revisit your estate plan. The stock market and interest rate changes can alter the effects of many estate plans, often without their creators knowing the consequences. Here’s a guide to how changes in the stock market might affect your estate plan. As you know, the values […]
How To Secure Your Digital Legacy and Estate Plan, Part II
In last week’s edition of Retirement Watch Weekly, I detailed steps to secure your digital legacy (see Part I here). Today, we’ll return to this discussion… Bottom line: To make your estate plan complete, you’ll want to compile an inventory of all your digital accounts and assets. The inventory should include the name of the […]
How To Secure Your Digital Legacy in Your Estate Plan
Almost all of us have digital assets that should be included in our estate plans. Technology and digital assets have become major parts of most of our lives, often more than we realize. A digital asset is any account, electronic device, or portion of a website that is password-protected. That covers a lot of ground. […]
Asset Protection
Building a Legacy
Business Ownership and Succession
Digital Assets Estate Planning
Estate Planning Basics
Estate Planning Checklist
Estate Planning for Singles
Estate Planning Forms and Documents
Estate Planning Mistakes
Estate Planning Strategies
Estate Tax
Executors and Trustees
Family Limited Partnerships
Gifts and Gift Giving
Grandchildren
Heirs, Beneficiaries, and Children
IRAs & Your Estate
Power of Attorney
Probate
Trusts
Wills and Estate Planning
