Posts Categorized: Trusts

If You’ve Been Asked To Serve As Trustee, Here’s What You Should Know

by Tara Cheever ~ Attorney at Law June 14, 2022 Estate Planning, Successor Trustee, Trustee, Trusts

If a family member or friend has asked you to serve as trustee for their trust either during their life or upon their death, it’s a big honor – this means they consider you among the most honest, reliable, and responsible people they know.

That said, serving as a trustee is not only a great honor; it’s also a significant responsibility, and the role is not for everyone. Serving as a trustee entails a broad array of duties. You are ethically and legally required to execute those duties properly, or you could be liable for not doing so. READ MORE

Updating Your Estate Plan: How Many Tweaks Are Too Many?

by Tara Cheever ~ Attorney at Law June 10, 2022 Estate Planning, Trust Administration & Probate, Trusts, Wills

Imagine a recipe card you have used for years. The card may still be readable if you have crossed out and replaced one or two ingredients. However, the recipe is probably confusing if you have altered the ingredients many times. If your loved ones cannot read your instructions to determine whether to add a cup of flour or a cup of sugar, your recipe will not work. You have a fifty-fifty chance for a great dish—or a complete disaster.

The same can be said about a will or revocable living trust. Making one or two changes to a document is generally acceptable, but your instructions may become confusing when revisions are numerous or comprehensive. The primary reason for the confusion is that the old document and any new documents must be read together to understand the full instructions. For this reason, starting over with a new will or a complete restatement may serve you better. READ MORE

How To Pass On Family Heirlooms & Keepsakes Without Causing A Family Feud

by Tara Cheever ~ Attorney at Law June 7, 2022 Estate Planning, Trusts, Wills

Smaller items, like family heirlooms and keepsakes, which may not have a high dollar value, frequently have the most sentimental value for our family members. But for a number of reasons, these personal possessions are often not specifically accounted for in wills, trusts, and other estate planning documents. 

However, it’s critical that you don’t overlook this type of property in your estate plan, as the distribution of such items can become a source of intense conflict and strife for those you leave behind. In fact, if you don’t properly address family heirlooms and keepsakes in your estate plan, it can lead to long-lasting disagreements that can tear your family apart. READ MORE

An Estate Plan Should Not Be a Set-It-and-Forget-It Endeavor

by Tara Cheever ~ Attorney at Law June 6, 2022 Estate Planning, Trusts, Wills

As we all know, life happens. There is really nothing we can do about it. However, some of the most common life events can have a dramatic effect on your estate plan. If you think your estate plan is like a slow cooker and you can set it and forget it, you and your loved ones may be in for a stomach-turning surprise when it is time to put your plan into action. Let us take a look at some common life changes and the impact they may have on your already established estate plan.

It is common for parents to have their estate plan prepared after the birth of their first child. However, depending on what provisions are in the first iteration, a second child might have difficulty getting their share without court involvement if the clients do not revise their plan after the birth of a subsequent child. READ MORE

Don’t Let Your Kids Leave Home Without Signing These 3 Documents

by Tara Cheever ~ Attorney at Law May 31, 2022 Estate Planning, Healthcare, Trusts, Wills

The first document your child needs is a medical power of attorney. A medical power of attorney is an advance healthcare directive that allows your child to grant you (or someone else) the immediate legal authority to make healthcare decisions on their behalf if they become incapacitated and are unable to make these decisions themselves.

Without a medical power of attorney in place, if your child suffers a severe accident or illness that requires hospitalization and you need to access their medical records to make decisions about their treatment, you’d have to petition the court to become their legal guardian. While a parent is typically the court’s first choice for a guardian, the guardianship process can be slow and expensive – and in medical emergencies, time is of the essence. READ MORE

Don’t Have a Lot of Money? Here Are Seven Ways You Can Still Leave Your Family a Great Legacy

by Tara Cheever ~ Attorney at Law May 27, 2022 Estate Planning, Trusts, Wills

Often, people who do not have a lot of money think that it is unnecessary to have an estate plan. After all, what is an estate plan without an estate? Yet estate planning is more than making sure a person’s wealth passes to the next generation. It also involves making your wishes known with regard to certain items of property, burial arrangements, and end-of-life care decisions. Family relationships have been irreparably damaged over the question of who gets the homemade Christmas tree ornaments, and children have agonized over how much to spend on their parent’s casket and other burial arrangements, not wanting to skimp on something they feel represents their love for their parent.

Your family can have peace of mind knowing with certainty that they are carrying out your wishes if they have a crystal clear understanding of what those wishes are. Whether or not you have much money, you can leave an important legacy to your family simply by making a plan. READ MORE

Key Milestones For Planning Your Retirement

by Tara Cheever ~ Attorney at Law May 24, 2022 Estate Planning, Healthcare, Retirement Planning, Trusts, Wills

The key to having a comfortable retirement is to save as much as possible as early in your career as possible. Time, tax breaks, and compounding interest all add up, and by getting into the habit of saving when you are young, it will be exponentially easier to reach vital retirement goals as you get older.

With this in mind, one of the most important things you can do at this age is to take full advantage of employer-sponsored retirement accounts, such as 401(k)s, 403(b)s, IRAs, and other tax-advantaged plans, especially if your employer offers a match. A common rule of thumb is that you should save at least 15% of your pre-tax income each year. If that’s not possible, then save as much as you can – and at least enough to get the full benefit of your employer’s matching contribution if one is offered.  READ MORE

Estate Planning Lessons We Can Learn from Encanto

by Tara Cheever ~ Attorney at Law May 20, 2022 Estate Planning, Trusts, Wills

Like the Madrigal family, you can use your estate plan to benefit the world around you. You can design your plan so that the money and property you leave will cultivate a legacy that will not only impact your immediate family but can also benefit the community for generations to come. The Carnegie Foundation, which funds libraries and learning centers around the country, and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, which fights poverty, disease, and inequity worldwide, are well-known examples.

But you do not have to be a billionaire to establish a family foundation. In its simplest terms, a family foundation is a means of providing charity that is funded with family assets and often employs family members to work for its cause. Family foundations are an effective way to involve your family in establishing a charitable legacy that can benefit the community. READ MORE

10 Common Estate Planning Mistakes Your Family Can’t Afford to Make – Part 2

by Tara Cheever ~ Attorney at Law May 17, 2022 Estate Planning, Incapacity, Trusts, Wills

Without a thorough understanding of how the legal process works upon your death or incapacity, along with knowing how it applies specifically to your family dynamics and the nature of your assets, you’ll likely make serious mistakes when creating a DIY will or trust. And the worst part is that these mistakes won’t be discovered until you are gone – and the very people you were trying to protect will be the ones stuck cleaning up the mess you created just to save a few bucks. 

Estate planning is definitely not a one-size-fits-all endeavor. Even if you think your particular situation is simple, that turns out to almost never be the case. To demonstrate just how complicated estate planning can be, last week in part one, we highlighted the first five of 10 of the most common estate-planning mistakes, and here we wrap up the list with the remaining five mistakes. READ MORE

Dutiful Child or Manipulator of the Elderly?

by Tara Cheever ~ Attorney at Law May 13, 2022 Estate Planning, Incapacity, Personal Representative, Trusts, Wills

As parents age and their physical and mental capacities diminish, it is natural for their adult children recognizing the parents’ decreasing ability to care for themselves, to step in and help them. Often, a specific child will take over the responsibilities, such as taking the parent to doctor’s appointments or the attorney’s office. As the parent begins to depend on the child more and more, it may make sense to appoint the child as a trusted decision-maker and even give them a larger inheritance to compensate them for their time. At the same time, other family members must take extreme care to ensure that a manipulative caretaker is not exploiting the elderly parent.

With more people living into their eighties and nineties, elder abuse is a serious and increasingly common problem in our society. Elder abuse can take several forms, including physical, sexual, emotional, and verbal abuse or caretaker neglect or exploitation. Up to one-half of all elder abuse in the United States is financial exploitation, which is the aspect this article focuses on. Financial exploitation includes outright theft of money or property, illegal transfers of property, identity theft, and misusing a position of trust, such as through a power of attorney. READ MORE

10 Common Estate Planning Mistakes Your Family Can’t Afford to Make – Part 1

by Tara Cheever ~ Attorney at Law May 10, 2022 Estate Planning, Incapacity, Trusts, Wills

If you die without an estate plan, the court will decide who inherits your assets, which can lead to all sorts of problems. Our state’s intestate succession laws determine who is entitled to your property, which hinges largely upon whether you are married or have children. Spouses and children are given top priority, followed by your other closest living family members.

If you are single with no children, your assets typically go to your parents and siblings and then more distant relatives if you have no living parents or siblings. If no living relatives can be located, your assets go to the state. It’s important to note that state intestacy laws only apply to blood relatives, so unmarried partners and close friends would get nothing. If you want someone outside of your family to inherit your assets, having a plan is an absolute must. READ MORE

Make Sure Your Kids Are Prepared with This Summer Camp Checklist

by Tara Cheever ~ Attorney at Law May 6, 2022 Estate Planning, Guardians for Minor Children, Healthcare, Trusts, Wills

This year, summer camps are expected to be back in full swing after two pandemic summers forced them to close or operate at limited capacity. Camp is an excellent opportunity for kids to make new friends, try new activities, and gain self-confidence and resilience. But as parents and counselors know, a lot of preparation goes into making lasting summer camp memories.

Camp is a unique experience because it may be the only time during the year that kids are away from home – and parental supervision – for an extended period. Although the time spent apart can be positive for the parent-child relationship, there are several contingencies that families should plan for ahead of time. After your child is off at camp, it may be too late to update contact information, medication lists, and temporary guardianship permissions. READ MORE

How Creating A Life & Legacy Plan With Us Creates And Preserves Your Family’s Legacy

by Tara Cheever ~ Attorney at Law May 3, 2022 Estate Planning, Trust Administration & Probate, Trusts, Wills

Best of all, the Family Wealth Legacy Process is offered at no additional cost to you, since it is part of each plan we create for our clients. And the process of documenting this recording is as easy and convenient as possible: We use a series of helpful questions and prompts, which makes the process both easy and enjoyable. From start to finish, the entire process takes less than an hour. 
My favorite part about this process is that most of our clients tell us that going through it helps them rekindle life moments and memories they would otherwise not share with their loved ones. Indeed, this unique process can enrich your family with something far more valuable than any tangible asset you might leave, and instead leave behind a lasting legacy of love.  READ MORE

Silent Trusts: Could I Be the Beneficiary of a Trust and Not Know It?

by Tara Cheever ~ Attorney at Law April 29, 2022 Estate Planning, Successor Trustee, Trustee, Trusts

After a trust has been created, the trustee has specific legal duties to the beneficiaries. Although a trustee’s duties vary by state, in most states, a trustee must disclose the trust’s existence, identify themselves as the trustee, and send the beneficiaries yearly accounting statements on request with information about the trust’s assets (accounts and property), taxes, distributions, and performance.

A silent trust eliminates the legal requirement that the trustee tells the beneficiaries about the trust’s existence or terms for a period of time. Typically, a silent trust’s terms will provide a triggering event, such as the beneficiary reaching a certain age or achieving a particular milestone or the trustmaker’s death or incapacity. The trustee’s obligations to inform the beneficiary begin only upon the occurrence of the triggering event. READ MORE

3 Reasons Why Transferring Ownership Of Your Home To Your Child Is A Bad Idea

by Tara Cheever ~ Attorney at Law April 26, 2022 Estate Planning, Trusts, Wills

Another drawback to transferring ownership of your home in this way is the potential tax liability for your child. If you’re elderly, you’ve probably owned your house for a long time, and its value has dramatically increased, leading you to believe that by transferring your home to your child, they can make a windfall by selling it. And by transferring the property before you die, you may think that you can save your child both time and money by avoiding the need for probate.

Probate is the court process used to distribute your assets according to the wishes outlined in your will or according to our state’s intestate succession laws if you don’t have a will. Depending on the complexity of your estate, probate can be a long and expensive process for your loved ones; however, that expense is likely to be relatively minor compared to the tax bill your heirs could face. READ MORE