The Wealth Advisor Newsletters
Don't Allow New Accounts to Catch Clients Unaware
As a financial advisor, what could be more important than the financial health of your clients? As you know, a comprehensive trust-centered estate plan allows your clients to provide for loved ones, affording them immense peace of mind. But, estate planning is not a one-time event since trust-centered estate plans require careful supervision and regular reviews to function properly. Accordingly, it’s crucial that you participate in the maintenance of your clients’ trusts by monitoring important financial changes and helping clients to update their plans to reflect these changes.
5 Hidden Client Risks That Demand Your Immediate Attention
Estate planning provides your clients with a wealth of opportunities to strategically grow their net worth while also planning for their families’ future comfort and security. Opportunity brings risk, but also the potential reward of deeper, longer-lasting client relationships.
What the 2018 Midterm Election Results Mean for Estate Planning and Deepening Client Engagement
Preparing Your Clients for the Rising Costs of Education
Higher education costs are just that - higher. The steady increase in educational expenses means your clients have much steeper bills for their children’s college tuition than they had for their own. To illustrate how stark this contrast is, the average cost of tuition has increased 213 percent in the last 30 years.[1] To make matters worse, there is no end in sight for this trend. As their financial advisor, you are uniquely positioned to help your clients utilize educational savings tools they may not otherwise be familiar with. Not only will this effort help your clients — it’ll also lead to greater trust in your ability to help your clients strategically position themselves for better financial outcomes overall.
Back-To-School Preparation: Not Just About the School Supplies
With all the considerations about your children’s wellbeing weighing on your mind from day to day, it can be easy to forget about some of the most important factors in keeping them well cared for and secure: naming a guardian in your estate plan.
Solve the Troubled Adult Child Beneficiary Dilemma in Three Easy Steps
Many clients with concerns about a struggling adult child are apprehensive about discussing such a sensitive topic. But broaching this subject can lead to a number of benefits for all parties involved — for the family, for the adult child, and for you as their financial advisor. Working with us rounds out the team of professionals needed to achieve the client’s goals and fully protect a client’s family, resolving these sensitive situations smoothly.
How Remodeling a Client Trust Can Retain Assets Under Management while Saving Clients Money
It’s a common misconception that clients can take a set-it-and-leave-it approach to trusts. Much as houses or office buildings, even those that were originally well-built, must be remodeled or updated from time to time, a trust-centered estate plan can often benefit from a remodel or refresh. Although the principle of trust-centered estate planning has stood the test of time, there are many reasons, such as the recent tax reform, a change in family wealth or circumstances, or just a change in estate planning goals, that may necessitate a remodel for an old trust. Clients gain peace of mind while you get an opportunity to provide value.
Avoiding Disastrous Will or Trust Lawsuits: How to Keep Family Squabbles from Undermining Estate Plans
How to Jumpstart Your Clients’ Year-End Planning
As summer fades in the rear-view mirror, it’s a good time to give yourself a reality check: Clients never have enough time to meet for year-end planning during the busy holiday season (and you might not, either), which is why you should be proactive and meet with them now — even if it seems too early to do so.
4 Times You Should Call an Estate Planning Attorney Right Away: Using Your Clients' Entire Financial Team Improves Results
Don't Put Off Till Tomorrow What You Can Do Today: Why It's Time to Talk with Your Family and Your Estate Planning Attorney
How a Community Property Trust Can Save Tens of Thousands of Dollars in Capital Gains Taxes
Harnessing the Power of Trusts to Help Your Clients Protect Their Heirs
As you settle back into your routine, here’s a question to ponder: Are all your clients’ estate plans structured to provide long-term protection against court interference, creditors, bankruptcy, divorcing spouses, and financial mismanagement? As a financial advisor, you need to assume that “Murphy’s Law” is always potentially in play: if something can go wrong for your client, it very like will go wrong. You can provide great value to clients when you help them anticipate and plan for contingencies.
Help Your Clients Save at Tax Time
As summer gives way to fall, it’s time to start thinking about year-end tax planning. This is an opportunity to communicate with your clients, offer solutions, and deepen your relationship by helping them save thousands of dollars next spring at tax time.
Three Tools Your Clients Can Use to Save For Skyrocketing College Expenses
Advisors who understand the various tools used to save for college – one of the biggest concerns for clients everywhere – will add significant value to their relationships. So, rather than an exploration of Coverdell or UGMA/UTMA accounts that you’ve all heard about before, this newsletter explores a few trust-based options that can help differentiate your practice and help your clients.
Just When You Thought an Irrevocable Trust Couldn’t Be Changed: 5 Ways to Modify an Irrevocable Trust
Revocable Trusts Are The Solution to Your Client's Needs
A revocable trust-centered estate plan offers many benefits a plain old last will and testament can’t. Trust-centered plans are better for clients and make your work easier. Understanding the benefits of trust-centered planning will position you as the trusted advisor who can spot the issues and implement solutions.
Is There an Income Tax Time Bomb Lurking in Your Client’s Estate Plan?
As the federal estate tax exemption has ballooned from $1.5 million ten years ago to $5.43 million today, the need for estate tax planning has drastically decreased. Instead, higher income tax rates that were ushered in under the American Taxpayer Relief Act of 2012 (ATRA) have shifted the focus of estate planning to a new frontier: income tax basis planning.
The Lifetime QTIP Trust or How to Maintain Control of Your Estate and Keep Spouse No. 2 Happy
Estate Planning for couples in a second or later marriage can be tricky, particularly when one spouse is significantly wealthier than the other. One solution for allowing the well-to-do spouse to maintain control of his or her assets but keep the other spouse happy is the Lifetime QTIP Trust. In this issue, you will learn what a Lifetime QTIP is, the multiple benefits this special type of trust can provide to married clients with lopsided estates, and how you might alter a client’s investment strategy when using it.
The Lifetime QTIP Trust or How to Maintain Control of Your Estate and Keep Spouse No. 2 Happy
What's Hot in Estate Planning Right Now May Surprise You
Estate planning has truly evolved over the past 20 years. Gone is the uncertainty about federal estate taxes and the absolute requirement for married couples to use complex trusts to minimize these taxes. But also gone is planning for the “traditional” family. In this issue you will learn why estate planning has become more complicated and what your clients need to do now to insure their estate plans are flexible enough to roll with the changes.
How Will the 2015 Supreme Court Decisions Affect Your Clients?
While approximately 10,000 cases are appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court each year, only 75 to 80 make it to oral argument. Of those 75 to 80 cases, there are usually only a few that grab the media’s attention. This newsletter highlights three landmark decisions handed down in 2015— Comptroller v. Wynne, King v. Burrell, and Obergefell v. Hodges—that could affect how your clients are taxed, pay for healthcare, and plan their estates.
Three Lessons Business Owners and Others Can Learn From the Estate Planning Mistakes of Farmers and Ranchers
Farming or ranching is more than a means of livelihood – it is about preserving a legacy and unique way of life. Unfortunately, many farmers and ranchers don’t fully protect their legacy with an up to date estate plan. An out of date or inadequate estate plan could result in a farm or ranch that has been passed down for generations ending up being sold and converted into non-agricultural use.
Three Liability Planning Tips for Physicians You Can Use Too
The practice of medicine is a profession fraught with liability. It’s not just medical malpractice claims either – employment related issues (wrongful termination, sexual harassment, and discrimination), careless business partners and employees, and contractual obligations (personal guarantees, leases, business agreements, etc.), coupled with personal liabilities (divorce, vehicular accidents, rental real estate), add to the increased risk assumed by a physician in private practice. Unfortunately, in our litigious society, these liability risks are not unique to physicians. A broad range of people, including business owners, board members, real estate investors, and retirees, need to protect their hard earned assets from a variety of liabilities too.
It's Not Just Death and Taxes: Clients Need an Incapacity Plan that Works When It's Needed
Estate planning is not only about having a plan in place to deal with what happens after a client’s death, it is also about having a plan in place to deal with what happens if a client becomes incapacitated or disabled.
Five Ways to Make Trusts More Flexible
Trusts that continue for the benefit of a surviving spouse’s lifetime and then for the benefit of several generations have become the norm. Drafting trust agreements that will cover the administration, investment, and distribution of trust property over the span of multiple decades is challenging. In this issue you will learn how trust agreements can be made flexible to address changes in the lives of beneficiaries and governing laws using five trust strategies.
How to Help Clients Avoid a Disastrous Will or Trust Contest
A will or trust contest can derail your clients' final wishes, rapidly deplete their estates, and tear their families apart. With with proper planning, however, you can help your clients and their families avoid a potentially disastrous will or trust contest.
How to Become a Multigenerational, Purpose-Driven Advisor
Studies have shown that more than 90% of family wealth is lost by the end of the third generation. To help clients avoid this, advisors must become adept at bridging the disconnect among generations when it comes to the transfer of family wealth.
Strategies for Facilitating Wealth Transfer through Trust and Tax Planning
Studies have shown that 70% of family wealth is lost by the end of the second generation and 90% by the end of the third. Don’t let your clients' families become part of these statistics. You can help your clients understand, and work to overcome, the disconnect that occurs between generations regarding the transfer of wealth.
Seven Trust-Based Asset Protections Strategies for Your Clients
Asset protection planning is a powerful way to provide additional value to your clients. In this newsletter you will learn about seven trust-based asset protection strategies and how they can (1) Protect your clients' assets from creditors, lawsuits, and divorcing spouses; and (2) protect clients' assets gifted to, or inherited by, a spouse, children, or other beneficiaries.
Asset Protection Planning for the Modern Client
In reality, we all need asset protection. This month our goal is to provide an overview of asset protection planning fundamentals to illustrate how planning can benefit all of your clients, not just the wealthy and not just doctors, lawyers, and real estate investors.
An Alternative Strategy to Inherited IRAs After the Clark v. Rameker Decision
The Supreme Court recently proclaimed that Inherited IRAs are not “retirement funds” within the meaning of federal bankruptcy law. This means they would be available to satisfy creditors’ claims if they are left to beneficiaries via a Beneficiary Designation form. But there is an alternative--a Standalone Retirement Trust (SRT) can offer asset protection for IRAs that are received as an inheritance.
Capital Gains Tax is the New "Estate" Tax
With the federal estate tax rate at historically high levels, many clients are turning their attention away from estate tax as the most pressing tax issue in estate planning and turning their attention to basis issues and the capital gains tax. Many moderate estates no longer are subject to the federal estate tax rate, so advisors and clients are looking at other potential tax exposure when planning their estates. Now that the federal estate tax impacts fewer people, they are realizing that taking advantage of the step-up in basis of assets upon death can save up to 20% of capital gains taxes on those assets. For many, Capital Gains Tax has replaced the Estate Tax as one of the primary tax concerns of estate planning.
Portability and Married Couples: Little Downside
Portability laws and the opportunities they create have significantly increased advisors’ roles in estate planning. No longer is the standard credit shelter trust (with QTIP or outright distribution to spouse) the only way for married couples to plan. Now, Attorneys and other wealth advisors have a larger and more complex role in determining whether an estate plan should be credit shelter or portability based.
Three Key Strategies for Helping Clients Navigate Aging Plans
Many of your clients are baby boomers (now ages 50-68) moving into retirement and dealing with all the issues related to aging: elderly parents, kids in college, saving enough to last a lifetime and protecting what they have. With a dizzying array of financial instruments to choose from, complex federal and state laws governing estates, and the crisis in health and long-term care, your clients need your help more than ever to develop an effective plan for their senior years.
Three Simple Ways to Sell Complex Solutions
When it comes to financial and wealth planning issues, people go to a professional they trust. When trust and estate concerns arise, clients need their trusted advisor to listen to their needs and to explain things clearly, especially with complex estate and trust issues.
Building Creative and Flexible Wealth and Estate Planning Solutions for Your Clients in 2014
The signing of the American Taxpayer Relief Act of 2012 (“ATRA”) on January 2, 2013, certainly marked a transition for wealth and estate planning professionals and their clients. Before ATRA, planning was often dominated by the volatility and uncertainty of the federal estate, lifetime gift, and generation-skipping transfer (GST) tax exemptions (referred to collectively as federal transfer tax exemptions).
Decision Time for Income Tax Strategies as Trust Taxes Soar
Income Tax Options Run Out December 31 for Non-Grantor Trusts. Most clients and advisors have not yet caught up to the impact of soaring income tax rates on non-grantor trusts and on estates in administration. Trustees and estate administrators must be informed immediately to implement strategies to mitigate the 2013 tax rate, eliminate the tax through distribution strategies in 2013, and deploy investment strategies and grantor trust solutions in 2014 and future tax years. Failure to act now will deliver a great shock to trust and estate beneficiaries – a shock that can be drastically reduced or eliminated if smart decisions get made now.
Trusts Solve Client Needs and Add Value to Wealth Plans
Some think that trusts are used only for end-of-life planning. Trusts, however, are like wrenches: they come in a wide variety of shapes and sizes, each particularly suited to a particular need. Some are for wealth accumulation while others are for wealth preservation, and still others are designed to protect future generations. In this edition of The Wealth Advisor, we look at some of the kinds of trusts that can be employed to deal with particular client concerns and needs and how they fit into a client’s overall wealth accumulation and preservation plan.
Identifying Hidden Financial Risks Creates Sales Demand
The world changes; clients’ circumstances change; motivations and interests change. As these changes occur—often gradually—“hidden” risks emerge that can significantly deteriorate future wealth if left unattended. By “hidden” risks, we mean exposures of which the client or potential client is likely to be unaware. Identifying hidden risks in an education-based marketing program delivers an important service to your marketplace and, with this knowledge, provides you with a gateway to meaningful conversations about the added value you can deliver to prospective clients.
Planning for Blended Families: Part II - 3-Step Counseling Strategy for Blended Families
Blended-family clients often require advanced planning strategies and products but are also likely to have relationship conflicts brewing that can complicate matters. Therefore, the attorney must have a counseling strategy that will obtain all the information needed to devise an effective financial or estate plan. Some of what the attorney does in these situations will sound familiar. Other things may not because they tie in to the uniquely confidential legal relationship that only exists between attorney and client or doctor and patient.
Planning for Blended Families: Part I - Intake Process
The “blended family” comprises a fast-growing segment of US households. Whether an attorney or investment advisor, fine-tune your intake or initial interview process to determine the desirability of representing a blended-family client, assess the accepted client to determine your counseling strategy, and hit the ground running with the information you need to begin strategy planning.
Including Life Expectancy and Health Care Costs in Retirement Planning
For families and caregivers, support for aging or impaired loved ones is a financial, physical and psychological drain. In addition, two major bear markets and historically low interest rates have taken a toll on many people’s retirement savings. Many clients are understandably concerned about how they will make it through their retirement years. For the well-informed and proactive advisor, however, this is an unprecedented opportunity. Estimates are that 8-10,000 boomers retire every day. Understanding the issues they face and bringing resources to the table will help you to help your clients, set your firm apart and grow your business.
Why Estate Planning Still Is Important
With the federal gift and estate tax exemption currently (2013) at $5.25 million per person ($10.5 million for married couples), some with “smaller” estates may wonder if they need to do any estate planning. Many states, such as Maryland, impose their own state estate taxes so tax planning in these states still is important. Additionally, there are many reasons for clients to plan their estates other than to avoid estate taxes. In fact, for most Americans, the recent tax legislation has brought incredible freedom: instead of jumping through hoops to avoid estate taxes, clients can turn their focus on the more personal reasons they do estate planning: to take care of themselves and their families the way they want.
Income Tax Planning: What Estate Planners Need to Know
The American Taxpayer Relief Act of 2012 (which became law on January 2, 2013) made permanent the temporary estate/gift/generation-skipping transfer tax exemptions established in December 2010, increased the rate on non-exempt estates/gifts/generation-skipping transfers to 40% and introduced substantial new income tax burdens on high income taxpayers and trusts. In addition, 2013 is the year in which both of the Medicare surtaxes of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010 (sometimes referred to as “Obamacare”) kick in. As a result, many wealth planning professionals will be doing more income tax planning, and estate tax planning will become less of a driving force.
Using Trusts to Protect Inherited IRAs
Clients want to protect their IRA and retirement plan assets for their families, but most do not understand what can happen to those accounts after they die. And, unfortunately, much of the information plan owners and beneficiaries receive from family members, other lay sources, and, surprisingly, even some advisors is outdated or incorrect. In this issue of The Wealth Advisor, we will explain some of the rules about retirement plans that every member of the advisory team must know and how a properly prepared retirement plan trust (which we will here refer to as an “IRA Trust”) can protect the plan assets after the owner’s death.
What the New Tax Law Means to You and Your Clients
On January 2, 2013, the President signed into law the American Taxpayer Relief Act of 2012 (the 2012 Tax Act) to deal with the so-called “fiscal cliff.” The 2012 Tax Act included revisions to estate, gift and generation-skipping transfer (“GST”) tax laws and income tax laws that will affect estate planning for the foreseeable future. In this edition of The Wealth Advisor, we will take a first look at those changes and what they will mean to you, your clients and your practice.
Don't Let the Tax Tail Wag the Dog: Client Concerns, Not the Estate Tax, Should Drive Estate Planning
Washington’s negotiations about 2013 tax laws are getting lots of press. As estate planning professionals, we are often asked our opinions about what the 2013 estate tax laws might be and the resulting implications for our clients. But for the vast majority of Americans, what the estate and gift tax laws will be in 2013 is really irrelevant. Those who could make large gifts have probably done so in 2012, and the 2013 estate tax exemption is only relevant to those who have a 2013 death. In this issue of The Wealth Advisor, we will take another look at one of those client concerns -- asset protection. With our increasingly litigious society, asset protection planning has become more important and is often a key motivator for clients who need other estate planning, too.
Year-End Tax Planning In 2012
Year-end tax planning is always important, but this year it is especially difficult because of uncertainty about what the tax laws will be for 2013. The Bush-era tax cuts are scheduled to expire on December 31 and the President and Congress have once again delayed taking any action. No one knows which, if any, of the Bush era tax cuts will be extended or which, if any, will be allowed to lapse, in whole or in part. Almost everyone, however, is expecting that taxes will increase because of the large deficit between the federal government’s spending and its revenue.
Uncovering Charitable Planning Opportunities
Charitable giving is discretionary spending. It is affected by both the economy and the income tax rates. Not surprisingly, charitable giving has been down in recent years, but this does not mean clients are less charitably inclined. Many just need to be pointed in the right direction. With the $5.12 million transfer tax exemption ending on December 31st and higher income tax rates looming for 2013, now is an excellent time to begin discussing charitable planning solutions. Choice of a charitable planning technique is mostly driven by the type of client and asset involved. Therefore, in this issue of The Wealth Advisor, we will focus on the types of clients who might benefit from charitable planning and for each the kinds of charitable planning that can work for them, and some pitfalls to avoid.
How to Talk to Prospective Clients about Estate Planning
Helping clients build, manage and protect their wealth is the goal of each member of the advisory team—financial/investment advisors, CPAs, attorneys and insurance agents. Estate planning is part of this larger process and, as a result, should be on each advisor’s checklist for every client. In this issue of The Wealth Advisor, we will examine how to help clients and prospective clients efficiently identify their concerns and anxieties that validate the need for estate planning and will discuss some issues that tend to arise more frequently than others or are sometimes overlooked by advisors. We’ll include some planning solutions used to address specific client concerns, how non-lawyers can benefit from the estate planning process, and some unique opportunities stemming from the tax law changes set to take effect on January 1 of next year.
Income Tax Issues When Planning for the Sale of a Closely Held Business
When a closely held business is a significant part of a client’s estate, as is often the case, business succession planning becomes an important part of the client’s estate planning. Estate planning issues include how to turn the business into cash for the owner’s retirement, who will take over or buy the business from the owner (family members, an outside buyer, employees, key employees, other owners), and how the sale should be structured. In this issue of The Wealth Advisor, as we continue our discussion of business succession planning begun in a previous issue, we will look more closely at the income tax issues that must be considered during discussions of a sale or transfer of a closely held business.
Estate Planning for Disability
Planning for the possibility of disability is probably the most overlooked part of estate planning. While many people will give serious consideration to estate planning for their death, few will seriously consider planning for their disability. Yet disability planning should be the more important part of estate planning from the client’s perspective both because it benefits the client directly, and because, until a person is well past retirement age, the probability of becoming disabled in the next year exceeds the probability of dying in that period. In this issue of The Wealth Advisor, we will examine what happens when someone becomes disabled and has not planned for it, and how the right planning can prevent a court from having to step in to protect the client and the client’s assets. Proper planning can allow the advisory team to continue its role in helping manage the client’s assets and provide for the client and the client’s dependents.
Estate Planning for Business Owners
The owners of small businesses often have multiple advisors, but rarely are the advisors consulted as a team with coordinated input. The team approach, however, is what produces the best results. In this issue of The Wealth Advisor, we will explore the role of advisors in helping business owner clients plan for what is usually their client’s largest asset, their business. This issue will also explain what business succession/exit planning entails and how this planning can be coordinated with a business owner’s personal estate planning.
Planning for Advanced Asset Protection
Asset protection is vitally important in our ever more litigious society, and more wealth planning teams are needed who understand the intricacies of this area and can collaboratively implement advanced strategies. Whether creating an entire plan for the client or creating additional asset protection measures added on to an existing plan, you want to know with a high degree of certainty that the plan will be effective if an attack ever comes.
Understanding Practice/Business Transition Planning
A large part of many financial service professionals’ practices is helping clients with business succession planning. Yet only 29% of these professionals have created a formal practice transition plan for their own businesses. In this edition of The Wealth Advisor, we will look at some of the steps involved in transition planning for a financial service practice, including when and how to get started, valuing the practice/business, and the timetable to consider.
Using Advanced Irrevocable Trusts for Income and Estate Tax Savings: Making 2012 Count
The next nine months are an exceptional window of opportunity for your clients to make family wealth transfers. The federal gift and estate tax exemption is $5,120,000, and both income tax rates and interest rates are at the lowest point in a generation. With federal deficit spending also at record levels, tax and interest rates seem sure to rise. Unless the President, the Senate, and the House of Representatives all agree otherwise, income and estate taxes will increase dramatically on January 1, 2013.
An Overview of Estate Planning
Our clients expect their estate planning will cause their property to go to whom they want, the way they want, when they want and that it will minimize the impact of taxes, professional fees and court costs. They also expect their estate planning will help them keep control of their property while they are alive and well and provide for themselves and their loved ones if they become disabled. Traditional estate planning often falls short of some of these goals. In this issue of The Wealth Advisor, we will examine the traditional estate planning process, some of its shortfalls, how modern estate planning overcomes them, and the pros and cons of modern versus traditional estate planning.
Paying for College
According to the College Board, the average cost of attending an in-state four-year public college in 2011-2012 is more than $19,000 per year; for a four-year private college it is nearly $40,000 per year. Over the last decade, published tuition and fees for in-state students at public four-year colleges and universities increased at an average rate of 5.6% per year beyond the rate of general inflation. As a result, saving for college is the most significant savings goal of many families facing future college costs for their children, especially considering the recent wide-spread depletion of portfolio and home values starting in 2008. Advisors who understand the various education savings tools will bring significant value not only to their clients, but also to the advisory team.
Continuum of Care: Client Update Meetings/Financial Control System
You want a satisfying, long-term relationship with clients, meaningful recurring revenue and referrals from existing clients. Your clients want a trusted advisor relationship with you and they want coordinated estate, financial and tax planning that protects them, their family, and their business interests. A client update process or financial control system is an essential strategy that will assure these outcomes over time. It also creates the opportunity for recurring, positive contact between the various members of the client’s estate, financial and tax planning team. In this edition of The Wealth Advisor, you will learn some strategies for how to implement and/or improve a client update process/financial control system in your practice. You will also learn how to manage it so that it will produce a winning situation for the client and the various members of the advisory team.
Retirement Planning: Coordinating with the Client's Overall Planning Objectives
Coordinating retirement plans with wealth transfer planning can be challenging. This is primarily because retirement accounts are driven by income tax laws designed to encourage Americans to accumulate wealth for retirement, not for transferring wealth upon death. In this edition of The Wealth Advisor, we will examine some of the critical rules in using IRAs and qualified retirement plans for wealth transfer planning, common misperceptions in this area, and why naming a trust as beneficiary may be the only way to accomplish some of the client’s planning objectives. Completely covering these subjects requires volumes, so we will cover only the basics.
Asset Protection Planning - Teamwork Is Required for Success
Asset protection planning is a growing area of practice for many members of the estate planning team. But, it is not something that one member of the team can do alone. It may not take a village, but it does take a team. In this issue of The Wealth Advisor, we will examine a variety of asset protection strategies - from rather simple to quite complex, how they work, the levels of protection they can provide, how these strategies can work together, and the advisor team approach to asset protection planning.
The Debt Ceiling Debate and the Estate Tax, Pets, Guns, and Alimony...What Could They Possibly Have in Common?
Trustee Selection for Irrevocable Trusts
Most professionals who work with trusts have plenty of “nightmare stories” about trustees chosen by clients for their irrevocable trusts. No doubt this is because trustees are often chosen without careful consideration of the qualifications required. In this issue of The Wealth Advisor, we will examine who can, who should, and who should not serve as trustee; non-tax and tax factors that should be considered when selecting a trustee; who can, and should, be given the right to remove and replace a trustee; and using a team approach to segregate duties among lay and professional trustees.
Opportunities with Planning for Pets
For many clients, pets are members of the family. These clients often say that if something happens to them, they are more concerned with what will happen to their pets than to their children or spouse. This issue of The Wealth Advsior examines the issues surrounding caring for pets after the disability or death of the pet's owner. Given many clients' feelings towards their pets, and the costs of care and longevity of some types of pets, this is an area where the planning team can differentiate itself and provide real client value while also generating additional revenue for multiple team members.
New Planning Opportunities with Non-Spouse Rollovers
Before 2007, a non-spouse beneficiary of a qualified plan was stuck taking distributions under the terms of the plan, which typically required full distribution within five or fewer years of the participant's death. The Pension Protection Act of 2006 (PPA 2006) authorized non-spouse beneficiaries (before it was only surviving spouses) to roll over to an Inherited IRA. This issue of The Wealth Advisor looks at a very recent pronouncement from the IRS that finally makes this PPA 2006 provision useable and, therefore, is very beneficial to clients and all wealth planning professionals who understand its implications.
Simplifying the Taxation of Trusts
The last issue of The Wealth Advisor examined trusts and the asset protection benefits provided to trust makers and their beneficiaries through the utilization of ongoing trusts. This issue of The Wealth Advisor addresses related and important questions about the taxation of trusts, which are important to all wealth planning professionals.
Understanding the Significance of Trusts
This issue of The Wealth Advisor addresses a topic that is important to clients and all wealth planning professionals - trusts. When used properly, trusts can provide significant advantages to clients and to the advisors who recommend them. Given the numerous types of trusts, this newsletter explores the general advantages of trusts as well as some of the most common types of trusts.
Understanding the Opportunities with Aid & Attendance Benefits
with planning for Medicaid, particularly where the client's advisors work together to create a plan that addresses all aspects of the client's planning needs. This issue addresses a related topic, VA Aid and Attendance pension benefits. Even advisors who focus on higher net worth clients should not discount the opportunities that exist with Aid and Attendance pension benefits. There are now over 25 million U.S. veterans eligible for some type of VA benefits, many of whom have no idea Aid and Attendance pension benefits exist (and their local VA office won't tell them about it!). Moreover, World War II veterans are dying at the rate of approximately 1,800 per day. Thus, the need for this type of planning is greater than ever.
Life Settlements: Understanding the Opportunity for Your Clients
This month's issue of The Wealth Advisor addresses a topic that many professionals do not understand fully, life settlements. For the right clients, a life settlement offers a significant advantage over the alternatives - and one that the client and the planning team should at least consider.
Understanding Medicaid Planning Opportunities - For Your Clients and You
The last issue of The Wealth Advisor addressed the significant need for clients to plan for the possibility of disability, and how proper disability planning more often than not involves the coordination of financial and legal solutions. This issue addresses a related and often misunderstood topic, Medicaid planning.
Planning for Disability
No one likes to think about the possibility of their own disability or the disability of a loved one. However, as we'll see below, the statistics are clear that we should all plan for at least a temporary disability. This issue of The Wealth Advisor examines the eye-opening statistics surrounding disability and some of the common disability planning options. Disability planning is one area where we can give each and every one of our clients great comfort in knowing that, if the day comes for themselves or a loved one, they will be prepared.
Planning for Tax-Qualified Plans
Planning for tax-qualified plans, which includes IRAs, 401(k)s and qualified retirement plans, requires a careful examination of the potential taxes that impact these assets. Unlike most other assets that receive a "basis step-up" to current fair market value upon the owner's death, IRAs, 401(k)s and other qualified retirement plans do not step-up to the date-of-death value. Therefore, beneficiaries who receive these assets do so subject to income tax. If the estate is subject to estate tax, the value of these assets may be further reduced by federal and perhaps state estate tax. And if your clients name grandchildren or younger generations as beneficiaries, these assets may additionally be reduced by the generation-skipping transfer tax - at the highest federal estate tax rate. All told, these assets may be subject to 70% tax or more.
Policy Reviews of Trust Owned Life Insurance (TOLI) - Why you should make it part of your standard estate planning process
This issue of The Wealth Advisor explores many of the common misperceptions about trust owned life insurance - plus a process for you to add significant value for your clients by incorporating policy reviews of trust owned life insurance. Although trust owned life insurance (TOLI) is a common planning vehicle for high net worth individuals and families, relatively few TOLI policies ever meet their initial projections. Industry studies reveal that TOLI portfolios rarely receive the required vigilant fiduciary oversight routinely associated with other assets held in trust, such as equities, real estate, etc.
10 Tips for Helping Families with Special Needs
This month's issue of The Wealth Advisor examines the unique planning requirements of families with children, grandchildren or other family members (such as parents) with special needs. There are many misconceptions in this area that result in costly mistakes in planning for these special needs beneficiaries. It is therefore incumbent upon us - the client's advisors - to ensure that clients understand all of their options.
The Continuing Need for Life Insurance
Last month's issue of The Wealth Advisor examined the various educational savings vehicles available to clients, including 529 plans, UGMA/UTMAs, Coverdell Education IRAs and life insurance. Using life insurance as an education savings vehicle prompted several questions about other uses for life insurance. Therefore, this issue of The Wealth Advisor examines some of these other common uses for life insurance, the only asset class that can ensure the completion of proper funding for a myriad of unique planning needs - regardless of the state of the federal estate tax!
Understanding Educational Savings Vehicles
Last month's issue of The Wealth Advisor examined the many benefits of 529 Plans, including the income tax and gift and estate tax benefits of these popular educational savings vehicles. There are, however, several other educational savings vehicles that clients should consider; this issue examines some of these other vehicles - and the advantages and disadvantages of each.
529 Plan Benefits Made Permanent by the Pension Protection Act
Whether your client is a parent with future educational obligations for young ones, or perhaps a loving aunt, uncle, grandparent, or stepparent, now more than ever 529 plans are an attractive tool for the escalating costs of education, as well as for income and estate planning purposes. This is because one of the hidden gems of the new Pension Protection Act of 2006 (signed into law on August 17, 2006) is a provision that makes permanent the income-tax-free growth of Section 529 plans used for qualified higher education expenses. Prior to this new law, these provisions would have expired December 31, 2010.
The Pension Protection Act: New Opportunities for Retirement Planning
The new Pension Protection Act of 2006 (signed into law on August 17, 2006) creates significant planning opportunities for advisors and their clients who understand it. This newsletter focuses on two key provisions: (1) non-spousal rollovers from a qualified plan to an inherited IRA and (2) charitable contributions of IRAs during lifetime.
