What Happens When Blended Families Ignore Estate Planning?
In standard estate plans, a surviving spouse often has no legal obligation to stepchildren.
In standard estate plans, a surviving spouse often has no legal obligation to stepchildren.
Your family may struggle to get the money you leave them if it gets caught in probate. Set up a trust to ensure that your loved ones are secure, even when you’re gone.
Families that include individuals with special needs require planning to secure their loved ones’ security in the future, both in legal and financial terms. There’s usually no expectation of the child becoming an independent adult, so careful planning is needed, as advised in the recent article “Financial Planning for Families with Disabilities” from Wealth Management. Many families neglect planning for their retirement, focusing all their resources on developing a plan for their disabled child. However, retirement and their child’s future need to be secured, which is where an estate planning attorney can help. In 2014, Congress created The Achieving a…
For people nearly or newly retired, who potentially still have decades ahead for their assets to compound and grow, estate taxes are a huge concern.
For couples with an age difference of 10 years or more, assets need to last significantly longer to cover both of their retirements, making the risks of missteps higher.
From engaging with people professionally and personally, to posting photos, storing files and accessing our bank account information, this all represents what’s known as our ‘digital legacy.’
Although the beneficiary designation in a 401(k) plan was old, and tied to a previous relationship, a federal court concluded that it was nonetheless valid.
Withdrawals from traditional inherited retirement accounts are treated as income by the IRS, so the timing of these distributions matters for tax strategy.
For most business owners, the business is the most valuable item on their balance sheet.
Getting married in middle age or beyond, is not only a significant personal milestone, it’s also one of the biggest financial decisions of your life.