Estate Planning News

Lonnie G. Hawkins' son had cancer, his wife had a serious brain injury - and he was in charge of two wealthy women's money.

T oday's 50-something CEOs tend to have vague dreams of more fishing, traveling or sailing when they retire, but they don't know when that might be, so they haven't begun planning for it.

The most recent Estate Analyst newsletter, highlights the different hurdles of planning for new stars, and athletes.

In estate planning, we often focus heavily upon reducing estate taxes and avoiding probate.

Healy, based in Redwood City, is a member of the firm's business and commercial litigation, director/officer liability and white collar crime practice areas.

This week's Your Money column tells of Krysten Crawford and her two siblings, who had to wrap up their mother's financial and legal affairs after she died in February.

Dan Moisand , a Principal at Moisand Fitzgerald Tamayo, LLC in Melbourne and Maitland, Fla., is one of the financial planning profession's most respected practitioners advising retirees and near retirees.

If you answered yes to any of these, here's another question for you: Do you have an estate plan in place? While you may think that estate planning only applies to wealthy individuals with millions in assets who live on, well, estates a think again.

Estate planning is the process of designating, during your life, the disposition of your assets upon your death in a manner that attempts to eliminate administrative uncertainties, reduce taxes, and maximize asset protection.

My associate Joe Sullender, senior vice president for investments at Wells Fargo Advisors, recently became aware of a potential tax consequence of leaving your Thrift Savings Plan balance to your spouse in a beneficiary participant account.

If it wasn't apparent who would take over Ananda when Swami Kriyananda died toward the end of April, he made it pretty clear in his will: "My spiritual successor shall be John E. Novak ." Kriyananda's last will and testament provided that the nine-stone astrological bangle, which Kriyananda wore in his capacity of spiritual director of Ananda, ... (more)

As the State of Wisconsin recently warned, Consumers should be wary of 'living trusts' preparers.

When rapper Heavy D passed away in 2011 from a pulmonary embolism, the public saw his family rally together and settle his affairs.

Today, LL.M. degrees, a.k.a. Masters of Law, or, for the fancy, the Latin name Legum Magister, are offered in a variety of legal specialties ranging from trial advocacy to intellectual property to international law to taxation.

On May 14, 2013, Governor Dayton signed a bill modifying Minnesota Statutes Sections 517 and 518.

There is a need for farmers to pay closer attention to estate planning if they want to pass on their farming operations.

There have been several revisions in Capital Gains tax and surtaxes for the financial year 2013, and to comply with these changes, clients require the services of experts.

"Portability" is a relatively new concept in estate planning. Introduced in 2012 for a two-year period, portability allows a spouse to transfer or make "portable" the unused portion of his or her lifetime gift tax exclusion to the other spouse.

Q: In last week's column you wrote about what information, papers and estate planning documents to keep on hand for my beneficiaries and how to organize them with a guidebook that I can purchase from the Hospice Foundation.

A video missing Utah mom Susan Powell made a year before she disappeared indicates her marriage to Josh Powell was troubled and she wanted documented proof of their assets.