How Your Clients Can Protect Their Legacy from a Beneficiary’s Lead Foot Secure Your Client's Legacy By Taking The Following Steps Your clients have worked hard their whole lives and are proud to be able to leave a significant legacy to their beneficiaries. But imagine this: A $250,000 brokerage account your client diligently built up [...]
Presidential Estate Planning Lessons You Can Use To Advise Your Clients February 21 is the day on which we celebrate several US presidents who made noteworthy contributions to our country. As with any discussion that involves politics, a discussion about US presidents risks generating a variety of opinions about which reasonable minds can disagree. However, [...]
Why You Might Not Want To Be a Client’s Beneficiary Imagine the following scenario: As a professional advisor, you have worked with a married couple for decades. They have been ideal clients, have taken a genuine interest in you and your family, and have told you on multiple occasions how much they appreciate your [...]
How a Fender Bender Might Impact Your Client's Finances & Estate Plan In the chilling words of several George R. R. Martin’s Game of Thrones characters, “Winter is coming.” Along with this change of seasons comes a change in driving conditions in much of North America—slippery roads, rain, snow, less sunlight during the morning and [...]
Estate Planning Awareness Week: Don’t Let Your Clients Fall Victim To These Common Myths Next week is Estate Planning Awareness Week (October 18–24, 2021). To that end, this month’s newsletter is geared toward helping you, as a professional advisor, gain awareness and understanding of the most common estate planning myths. Left unaddressed, these myths can [...]
President Biden’s First One Hundred Days: Looking Back and Planning Ahead This year has been unprecedented from a political perspective in many ways. President Joe Biden stepped into office facing huge obstacles related to the COVID-19 pandemic, an economy battered by the pandemic, a crumbling national infrastructure in dire need of repair, an ongoing immigration [...]
The Pros and Cons of Powers of Appointments An often misunderstood but common estate planning tool that can appear in estate planning documents is the power of appointment. Not to be confused with a power of attorney (the document that allows you to delegate certain powers to an agent to act on your behalf while [...]
The Trust Protector: Your Guardian Angel What Is a Trust Protector? Traditionally, the three roles that must be filled when setting up a trust are the settlor (also called a grantor, trustor, or trustmaker), the trustee, and the beneficiary. All three roles are necessary to create a trust that functions properly. Although it is relatively [...]
Powers Of Appointment: A Handy Tool In Your Client’s Toolbox An often misunderstood but prevalent estate planning tool that often appears in estate planning documents is the power of appointment. Not to be confused with a power of attorney (the document that allows a living person to delegate certain powers to an agent to act [...]
How To Protect Your Retirement Accounts Most people are shocked to learn that their retirement accounts can be seized once they pass to their loved ones. During your lifetime, your retirement funds have fairly comprehensive asset protection, meaning they cannot be taken in a lawsuit. Unfortunately, as soon as retirement accounts are inherited, the protection [...]
