As a parent, your top priority is the well-being and future of your children. You plan for their education, health, and happiness, and often this planning includes the tradition of choosing godparents to guide and mentor your children if something happens to you.
While selecting godparents is a meaningful tradition in many cultures, it's important to understand that naming a godparent is not the same thing as naming a legal guardian for your children.
Read MoreIt might seem a bit early to think about your 2024 taxes, but as the time for paying 2023 taxes comes to a close, it's the perfect time to take a closer look at your financial situation and make some strategic moves that can help you minimize your tax liability for this year.
Year-end tax planning isn't something you do at the last minute; it's a series of thoughtful steps you can start taking right now. In two segments, we’ll explain eight key actions you can take during this year to save money on your 2024 taxes.
Let’s get started.
Read MoreAs a parent, you have probably thought about the importance of naming permanent legal guardians for your child in case something happens to you, and maybe you have already done it. If you haven’t yet, take this as the sign that now’s the time to do it, in case the unthinkable happens to you. Here’s a free website where you can name legal guardians for your littles, right now: https://jaapurves.kidsprotectionplan.com/
But in some cases, naming permanent legal guardians for your child may not be enough to guarantee your kids will always be cared for in the way you want by the people you want. And, there may even be a risk of your kids being taken into the care of strangers or someone you would never want.
Read on to find out if that’s the case for your family, and if it is, contact us ASAP to get your Kids Protection Plan in place.
Read MoreThe fall season is a beautiful time of year, but it also marks the beginning of flu season, which can pose a serious threat to your elderly loved ones. Fortunately, there are several steps you can take to ensure their well-being during the colder days ahead, including making sure you’re able to step in and help them with their medical and financial needs.
Keep reading to find out how.
Read MoreYou might think that estate planning is something you can complete one time and then check off your to-do list for good. But the reality is that in order for your estate plan to work for you no matter how your life changes, your plan needs to change with it.
To make sure any big changes in your life are considered in your plan, I recommend reviewing your estate plan with your attorney at least every three years. But if any major life events happen before then, it’s crucial to have your plan reviewed as soon as possible so it can be updated if needed.
Earlier, we started to explore ten life changes that might affect your estate plan. This week, we’re covering five more life events that mean it’s time to review your plan.
Read MoreWhen you think about those loved ones who’ve passed away, you probably don’t think very much — or even at all — about the “things” they’ve left you. And when they do leave something behind, what you likely cherish most about the object are the memories and feelings it evokes, not the thing itself.
For the founder and CEO of New Law Business Model, Alexis Katz, the most treasured memento her late father left her wasn’t even something he intended to be special — it was just a random voicemail on her cellphone. And the message wasn’t meant to be anything sentimental.
His message simply said, “Lex, it’s your dad. Call me back.”
Following his death, Alexis loved listening to that message to hear her father’s voice. Of all the assets he left behind, that voicemail was what she cherished most.
Until one day, she went to listen to the message and discovered it had been erased — and her father’s voice was lost to her forever. She still recalls that day as one of her worst ever, yet like most painful events, it taught her an important lesson.
Read MoreFollowing the death of the policy holder, the way in which proceeds from a life insurance policy are paid to the beneficiary (or beneficiaries) is known as the settlement option. And you might be surprised to learn that there are a variety of settlement options available besides the most common method — a lump-sum payout.
Depending on the life insurance company and policy, these options may be selected by the policy holder ahead of time or chosen by the beneficiary upon the insured’s death. Whether you’re the policy holder or beneficiary, it’s important that you understand these options in order to maximize the policy’s financial benefit and reduce potential taxes.
Here are six popular life-insurance settlement options:
Read MoreMaybe you thought that creating a Will or Trust is something you can do once and then your family and assets are protected forever after. It seems to be how most lawyers structure their services, so it wouldn’t be surprising if you did think this. You work with your lawyer, they draft documents, you bring them home in a binder or notebook, put them on a shelf or in a drawer, and you never hear from them again. Estate plan, done. But, it’s not, and thinking of it that way could leave your family with a big mess when something happens to you.
In reality, life events can drastically affect your estate plan and even cause your plan not to work in the way you intended. To make sure your plan remains up to date throughout your life, we recommend reviewing your plan at a minimum of every three years. Because we are so passionate about this, we offer to review our clients' plans every three years for free.
Read MoreAs our senior population continues to expand, an increasing number of elder abuse cases involving professional guardians have made headlines. The New Yorker exposed one of the most shocking accounts of elder abuse by professional guardians, which took place in Nevada and saw more than 150 seniors swindled out of their life savings by a corrupt Las Vegas guardianship agency.
The Las Vegas case and others like it have shed light on a disturbing new phenomenon — individuals who seek conservatorship to take control of the lives of vulnerable seniors and use their money and other assets for personal gain. Perhaps the most frightening aspect of such abuse is that many seniors who fall prey to these unscrupulous guardians have loving and caring family members who are unable to protect them.
In the first part of this series, we detailed how criminally minded individuals can take advantage of an overloaded court system and seize total control of seniors’ lives and financial assets by gaining court-ordered conservatorship. Here we’ll discuss how seniors and their adult children can use proactive estate planning to prevent this from happening.
Read MoreElder abuse can take a wide variety of forms, but we think the worst of the worst is caused by unscrupulous conservators or adult guardians appointed by a court to care for seniors who are no longer able to care for themselves. And though you may not want to believe such a thing could happen, you need to know that without the right planning in place, even your loved ones in your own family who are seniors could be at risk.
In fact, there are currently 1.5 million American adults under conservatorship (or adult guardianship, depending on the state), with an estimated 85% of them over age 65. All total, these conservators control nearly $273 billion in assets. And a 2010 report by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) found hundreds of cases where conservators were involved in the abuse, exploitation, and neglect of seniors placed under their supervision.
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