Steer Clear of These Estate Planning Mistakes
As estate planning attorneys, we often encounter families who are suffering due to estate planning mistakes that were made by other family members. There is usually some type of damage control that can be done, but as they say, you don’t want to try to close the barn door after the horse has left. Let’s… Read more »
Long-Term Care Costs Are on the Rise
Most senior citizens will require help with their day-to-day needs at some point in time. This is a fact of life that you should be well aware of when you are looking ahead toward your retirement years. Though you will qualify for Medicare coverage at the age of 65 if you worked for any length… Read more »
Can You Use an IRA for Estate Planning Purposes?
An individual retirement account can provide a valuable nest egg during your senior years. However, under certain circumstances, an IRA can also be useful from an estate planning perspective. Essentially, there are two different types of individual retirement accounts: traditional IRAs, and Roth individual retirement accounts. There are some similarities between them, but there are… Read more »
Legacy Planning and Acts of Charitable Giving
Merry Christmas! Tis the Season of Giving! Estate planning can be viewed in one of two ways. You could look at it as a basic effort to make sure that your assets are distributed in accordance with your wishes and leave it at that. On the other hand, you could take a more comprehensive viewpoint… Read more »
Medicaid, Long-Term Care and Your Home
You may be aware of the fact that the Medicaid program is a health insurance safety net for people with very limited financial resources. The limit on countable assets is just $2000 for an individual. If you have never been financially needy, you have probably gone through life with the understanding that Medicaid will probably… Read more »
Can a Person With a Disability Create a Trust to Preserve Benefits?
Before we address the question that serves as the title of this post, we should provide some background information about Medicaid, Supplemental Security Income, and the plight of disabled individuals. Need-Based Government Benefits Medicaid is a jointly administered state/federal government health insurance program that can potentially be available to financially needy individuals. Because it is… Read more »
Will My Heirs Have to Report Their Inheritances to the IRS?
The question of taxation is naturally going to come to your mind when you are devising an estate planning strategy. Your heirs will be receiving windfalls of property, so you could assume that they would be forced to report the inheritances when they file their annual income tax returns. When it comes to the subject… Read more »
Will Assets in My Living Trust Be Counted By Medicaid?
The Medicaid program will pay for long-term care. You may hear this statement and shrug your shoulders, because you will never qualify for Medicaid, and you will qualify for Medicare by the time you require living assistance. This reaction makes sense on the surface, but when you dig into the facts, you will see a… Read more »
Transfer Appreciable Assets at a Gift Tax Discount
The federal estate tax was established back in 1916. What would you do if you knew that your estate was going to be subject to the estate tax? A logical person would consider lifetime gift giving, and this is exactly what wealthy people did after the estate tax was enacted. Tax minded legislators were not… Read more »
Social Security Administration: No COLA in 2016
There are those who assume that a ready-made retirement is right there for everyone, because they know that they will qualify for Social Security and Medicare. To qualify for these programs, you have to accumulate at least 40 retirement credits while you are working and paying taxes. The requirement is quite modest, because in 2015,… Read more »
