Estate and Wealth Transfer Planning

No matter your net worth, it’s important to have a basic estate plan in place to ensure that your family and financial goals are met after you die.  A basic estate plan should cover the following three questions: Who do you want to inherit your assets?  Who do you want handling your financial affairs when you die or if you’re ever incapacitated?  Who do you want making medical decisions for you if you become unable to make them for yourself?  Without a Will, a Power of Attorney, or Health Care Surrogate, you are taking the risk that the state will be making the important decisions for you. 
 
More advanced planning includes the use of a Trust to put conditions on how and when your assets will be distributed upon your death.  A trust also allows you to reduce your estate and gift taxes and to distribute assets to your heirs or other beneficiaries.  A Trust is not just for the wealthy.  It allows your trustee to distribute assets to your heirs and/or beneficiaries without the cost, delay and publicity of probate court, which administers wills.  In addition, a trust can often provide greater protection of your assets from creditors and lawsuits. 
 
If your net worth is at least $100,000 (dead or alive), and meets one of the following conditions, a trust would be of benefit to you if:

You have a sizable amount of your assets in real estate, a business or an art collection;

You do not want your heirs to receive their whole inheritance immediately upon your death;

You want to ensure that your children and grandchildren are adequately cared for after the surviving spouse dies;

You and your spouse wish to maximize any estate-tax exemptions;

You have a disabled relative you wish to provide for. 

OTHER PLANING OPTIONS

It is important to note that other estate planning options are available to save taxes and achieve other goals and objectives.  These options include, but are not limited to, the creation or implementation of the following:

            Lifetime Trusts
            Lifetime Trusts Created by Parents(s) at Their Death
            Gifts to 529 Accounts
            Gifts to one or more Irrevocable Investment Trusts
            Making of Annual Exclusion Gifts
            Payment of Tuition Expenses or Medical Bills
            Making of Charitable Gifts
            Life Insurance Trust
            Family Limited Partnership
            Qualified Personal Residence Trust
            Charitable Remainder Trust
            Grantor Retained Annuity
            Grantor Retained Unitrust

HOW DO YOU GET STARTED WITH
YOUR ESTATE PLANNING?

By contacting a professional. 

But even the professional will need an in-depth assessment of your goals, needs, and overall financial situation. Because of this, we have prepared a comprehensive “PRACTICAL GUIDE TO ESTATE PLANNING” booklet for our clients to read and fill in prior to beginning the estate planning process. To review this brochure, and our “CONFIDENTIAL ESTATE PLANNING INFORMATION FORM,” to give us please click on the links below. We have also attached a memo about the current state of Gift and Tax Planning for 2010:

A PRACTICAL GUIDE TO ESTATE PLANNING

CONFIDENTIAL ESTATE PLANNING INFORMATION FORM

MEMO: 2010 ESTATE AND GIFT TAX FIASCO

PLEASE NOTE: To the extent that this website contains tax related matters, it is not intended to be used for the purpose of avoiding penalties that may be imposed by law. For more information, please click on the website below.

For more information regarding your legal questions, please call us at (954) 772-8050.

Neither receipt of information presented on this site nor any email or other electronic communication sent to Louis C. Anderson, LLC, or its staff through this site will create an attorney-client relationship, and any such email or communication will not be treated as confidential. No user of this site should act or refrain from acting on the basis of information included on this site without seeking legal advice of counsel in the relevant jurisdiction. Louis C. Anderson, LLC, expressly disclaims all liability in respect of actions taken or not taken based on any contents of this site.

PROFESSIONAL AFFILIATIONS:

AMERICAN BAR ASSOCIATION

FLORIDA BAR ASSOCIATION

BROWARD COUNTY
BAR ASSOCIATION

ESTATE PLANNING COUNCIL
OF BROWARD COUNTY

COMMUNITY FOUNDATION
OF BROWARD

AGENT, ATTORNEYS TITLE INSURANCE FUND, INC.

AGENT, OLD REPUBLIC NATIONAL TITLE INSURANCE CO.

AMERICAN CANCER SOCIETY’S NATIONAL PROFESSIONAL
ADVISOR NETWORK

ROTARY CLUB OF FORT LAUDERDALE NORTH

LAUDERDALE BY THE SEA
CHAMBER OF COMMERCE