Understand Legacy Assurance Plan Of America | How a Living Trust May Help You Maximize Your Incapacity Planning Protections

Summary: An complete estate plan from Legacy Assurance Plan involves more than just planning for what will happen after you die, but also protects you in the event of your incapacitation. In many situations, a plan that includes a revocable living trust can offer special benefits in ensuring that the person you want to manage your assets is free to do so in the manner you would want. A living trust, working together with your financial power of attorney, can give you the protection you need if you were to become incapacitated.

With your favorite football team, each player has a specific job. For example, in pass protection, interior linemen protect against rushers coming up the middle, tackles might block edge-rushing defensive ends and a running back might be tasked with picking up a blitzing safety. Your estate planning team is like that, where each member has a specific role suited to that person's expertise and qualifications. Your estate plan documents also can work together as a team to protect you, such as the event of your incapacitation.

If you desire a plan that will help you plan for the possibility of your becoming incapacitated, an estate plan that includes a will, powers of attorney and a revocable living trust may be very beneficial. Some people believe that the only planning you need to protect against incapacity is a power of attorney for financial matters, but this is not always true.

Certainly, a power of attorney for financial matters is an essential component of a complete plan, and serves a vital role if you become incapacitated. Certain assets, like your Social Security income or some retirement accounts, cannot (or should not) be funded into a revocable living trust. Additionally, you may have some assets that you forgot to fund into your trust before your incapacitation occurred. Your power of attorney offers necessary benefits in that it authorizes your agent to continue to manage those assets even after you've become incapacitated.

With many other assets, however, it is worthwhile to utilize the advantages of a revocable living trust. A carefully drafted trust may be able to give your trustee greater flexibility and discretion in how he/she manages the assets in your trust than an agent would have under the authority of a revocable living trust. Many banks and other financial entities may balk at accepting a power of attorney and allowing your agent to act under the powers assigned by that document. A person acting as the successor trustee of a revocable trust may encounter fewer roadblocks to exercising the authority you want him/her to have.

   

Your power of attorney provides many essential and unique benefits, including possibly protecting your family from needing to go to court and seek the appointment of a guardian or conservator. However, a living trust can also offer many vital advantages when it comes to incapacity planning. Through careful planning and working with reliable estate planning professionals, you can be sure that, when you cannot speak for yourself, your plan can be your voice.  

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Understand Legacy Assurance Plan Of America | How a Living Trust May Help You Maximize Your Incapacity Planning Protections

Summary: An complete estate plan from Legacy Assurance Plan involves more than just planning for what will happen after you die, but also protects you in the event of your incapacitation. In many situations, a plan that includes a revocable living trust can offer special benefits in ensuring that the person you want to manage your assets is free to do so in the manner you would want. A living trust, working together with your financial power of attorney, can give you the protection you need if you were to become incapacitated.

With your favorite football team, each player has a specific job. For example, in pass protection, interior linemen protect against rushers coming up the middle, tackles might block edge-rushing defensive ends and a running back might be tasked with picking up a blitzing safety. Your estate planning team is like that, where each member has a specific role suited to that person's expertise and qualifications. Your estate plan documents also can work together as a team to protect you, such as the event of your incapacitation.

If you desire a plan that will help you plan for the possibility of your becoming incapacitated, an estate plan that includes a will, powers of attorney and a revocable living trust may be very beneficial. Some people believe that the only planning you need to protect against incapacity is a power of attorney for financial matters, but this is not always true.

Certainly, a power of attorney for financial matters is an essential component of a complete plan, and serves a vital role if you become incapacitated. Certain assets, like your Social Security income or some retirement accounts, cannot (or should not) be funded into a revocable living trust. Additionally, you may have some assets that you forgot to fund into your trust before your incapacitation occurred. Your power of attorney offers necessary benefits in that it authorizes your agent to continue to manage those assets even after you've become incapacitated.

With many other assets, however, it is worthwhile to utilize the advantages of a revocable living trust. A carefully drafted trust may be able to give your trustee greater flexibility and discretion in how he/she manages the assets in your trust than an agent would have under the authority of a revocable living trust. Many banks and other financial entities may balk at accepting a power of attorney and allowing your agent to act under the powers assigned by that document. A person acting as the successor trustee of a revocable trust may encounter fewer roadblocks to exercising the authority you want him/her to have.

   

Your power of attorney provides many essential and unique benefits, including possibly protecting your family from needing to go to court and seek the appointment of a guardian or conservator. However, a living trust can also offer many vital advantages when it comes to incapacity planning. Through careful planning and working with reliable estate planning professionals, you can be sure that, when you cannot speak for yourself, your plan can be your voice.  

This article written and published by:

Legacy Assurance Plan

8039 Cooper Creek Blvd

University Park, Florida 34201

844.306.5272 (Phone)

info@legacyassuranceplan.com (email)

@assuranceplan

#legacyassuranceplan

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Legacy Assurance Plan Article | Moving to a New State and Its Impact on Your Estate Plan

Summary: Moving to a new state doesn't mean that you have to scrap your estate plan and start over from scratch. However, it also does not mean that you should simply make your move, do nothing with your plan and cross your fingers that the variations in the laws between your old state and your new one won't cause you or your loved ones any problems. You should use the occasion of your move as an opportunity to discuss your plan with a qualified estate planning professional in your new state, who can help you decide what changes with help your plan continue to function at its best.

Today, more than ever, we live in a mobile society. Regardless of whether you're young and single, married with children at home or reached your "empty nest" years, you may encounter the possibility (or need) to move to a new state, whether for your job, your family or for that beachfront (or mountain top) retirement you've always wanted. If you do find yourself moving, and you've already put an estate plan into place, there are certain steps you should consider taking in order to make certain that your estate plan continues to function as well as it should.

You should talk to a legal professional in your new state about your will. Almost every estate plan includes a will and the laws governing wills can vary from state to state. Generally speaking, if your will was validly executed in your old home state, then your new home state would recognize it if you died and it were admitted to probate. However, the variations in the laws between your old home state and your new one may mean that your new state may interpret some provisions of your will differently than your old state. This is especially true if your old state is a "community property" state and the new one is not (or vice versa). 

The differences in the law between the states may mean that your plan may benefit by having certain parts of your will revised. This can be done through a document called a "codicil." In some cases, though, your lawyer may determine that it is easier and more beneficial simply to revoke the old will and replace it with a new one.

If your plan includes a revocable living trust, your should have it checked, too. Unlike wills, the laws governing living trusts do not vary as much from state to state, but there can still be issues that your move has created. If your trust requires updating to optimize it in light of your new state of residency, this is generally achieved by executing a trust amendment. It is much less likely that your move would necessitate revoking and replacing your trust, as opposed to your will.

Of course, your plan probably includes more than just your will and/or living trust. A complete plan generally also has documents like an advance directive and powers of attorney that plan for your incapacity. With these documents, many people benefit by obtaining new documents created in the new state. Even if your old documents are valid in your new state, you would want to give your loved ones the least stressful experience when they have to present these documents and deal with medical professionals. One way to expedite the process is to make sure that the documents your doctors see are ones with which they're familiar, so you'll want to give serious consideration to obtaining new versions of these documents when you move.

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Legacy Assurance Plan

8039 Cooper Creek Blvd

University Park, Florida 34201

844.306.5272 (Phone)

info@legacyassuranceplan.com (email)

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Legacy Assurance Plan Article | How Pocket Deeds Can Impact the Effectiveness of Your Estate Plan

Summary: Pocket deeds are one type of technique for avoiding probate, but they can be risky and unreliable. An estate plan that includes a pocket deed (or deeds) that creates one outcome and a will or trust that intends to create another can be ambiguous and leave your loved ones in a state of uncertainty as to your goals, and possibly force the courts to become involved to sort it all out. Working with reliable estate planning professionals can help you ensure that you have an estate plan where all of the pieces work together effectively.

For many years, people have sought out various means to avoid probate. While some methods like revocable living trusts and death-beneficiary deeds or account designations can, depending on your circumstances, provide reliable and effective means for avoiding probate, there are other methods that are often much less reliable. A "pocket deed" is one such risky method.  

A "pocket deed" is a nickname given to a deed that is validly executed by the owner during his/her lifetime, but not recorded until after he/she dies. This planning technique allows the transferring owner to maintain control of the property for the remainder of his/her life, and allows the property to pass outside of probate.

In a recent Michigan case, the state's courts were forced to resolve the estate of Vivian Hornak, an 87-year-old widow who lived in Saginaw County. When the woman died in the spring of 2010, she left behind two sons and several grandchildren. The woman also had an estate plan that included a will. Hornak's will left her 80-acre piece of property to a grandson, Keith Amman. The rest of her wealth she split among her two sons and the children of her two deceased daughters.

After the will was already admitted to probate, one of the sons, Kenneth Hornak, presented to the court four deeds. In the two 2004 deeds, the widow deeded all of her real property to herself and Kenneth jointly. In the two 2010 deeds, she transferred all her real property 100% to Kenneth. All four deeds were validly signed by the woman, but none had been recorded at the county Register of Deeds office. 

In this case, Kenneth lost his claim to all of the property that the deeds covered for a somewhat unique reason. Back in 2007, he filed for bankruptcy. At no time during the entire bankruptcy process did Kenneth disclose any of the ownership interests he held under these unrecorded deeds. As a result of his failure to disclose his ownership of the properties during his bankruptcy, the probate court invalidated the deeds.

Kenneth appealed, but lost. As the Michigan Court of Appeals court noted in its ruling, the estate plan the woman undertook when she signed the deeds in favor of her son seemed to be in distinct conflict with the estate plan she created under the terms of her will. It will always remain unclear which "plan" represented Vivian's true goals. That's why having a reliable estate planning team, to whom you can consistently turn for your planning needs is so important. Your planning professionals can help you make sure that all of your estate planning pieces work together in synergy to yield a plan with a single, consistent and clear set of objectives representing your true wishes for your legacy.

This article written and published by:

Legacy Assurance Plan

8039 Cooper Creek Blvd

University Park, Florida 34201

844.306.5272 (Phone)

info@legacyassuranceplan.com (email)

@assuranceplan

#legacyassuranceplan

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Legacy Assurance Plan Article | Ensuring Proper Execution of Your Estate Documents in Order to Protect Your Plan

Summary: Little things can have big consequences when it comes to estate planning documents. In some cases, improper witness signatures can lead to the complete invalidation and nullification of the estate plan you carefully laid out in your will. Each aspect of your estate plan, whether during the creation process or the execution phase, must be carried out with utmost care. That's why, whether you're creating your plan or executing your plan, it's important to work with an estate planning team that you trust. 

There are many steps that go into estate planning. You must decide how you would like your wealth distributed after you die. Of course, you also have to make the decision to go out and procure an estate plan (a step which slows many people down due to simple procrastination). Once you've overcome all the hurdles and decided which loved ones to whom you will provide distributions, and once you've decided to take that plan and memorialize it on paper, there is still another step: making sure that the plan documents you sign are legally enforceable. 

This step might seem obvious or simple, but sometimes it is not. Recently, an appeals court in Tennessee ruled on an estate plan contest case related to the execution of a will. The father had created a will before he died in July 2011. The father's will was admitted to probate later that month. The will named two of the man's children as Co-Executors. 

The man left behind four surviving children. A fifth child, who had four children of her own, predeceased the man. The man left distributions to two of the children (the two who were also named as Co-Executors), as well as three of the deceased daughter's grandchildren. The other two children, along with the deceased daughter's fourth child, were not mentioned in the will. 

When the man had executed his will back in 2008, two unrelated people had signed the document as witnesses. The son, in his will contest, argued that the witnesses did not sign the will validly under the rules of Tennessee law. Although he lost in the trial court, the Court of Appeals ruled that he was correct. 

The problem was that the witnesses signed what's commonly referred to as a "self-proving affidavit," but did not sign the will itself. (Self-proving affidavits are affidavits attached to the end of wills that allow the executor to prove that the will was properly witnessed without requiring the witnessed to come to court and testify that they witnessed the will.) 

So what did all this ultimately mean? It meant, in the opinion of the appeals court, that no one legally signed the man's will as a witness. That, in turn, meant that the will did not meet the witness requirements established by Tennessee law, and so, the man had no valid will and died intestate. As a result, each of his children, as well as each of the children of his deceased daughter, were entitled to the portion of his estate established by Tennessee's intestacy laws.  

While we may not know with absolute certainty what this man's true goals were for his estate, his intended objectives almost certainly were not the same as the plan contained in the state intestacy laws. All of this happened simply as a result of how the witness signature areas were prepared on his will.

This article written and published by:

Legacy Assurance Plan

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University Park, Florida 34201

844.306.5272 (Phone)

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Legacy Assurance Plan Article | Man with No Surviving Children, Siblings, Parents or Spouse Leaves Behind Complicated Estate Planning Mess

Summary: Everyone has good reasons why they should create an estate plan. Depending on your circumstances, though, it could be especially important that you make sure you have a valid plan on paper. If you and your partner are not married, getting an estate plan established is extremely important. If you have no surviving spouse, children, siblings or parents, a plan is vital to make sure that your wealth goes to the people or charities you want to receive it. When it comes to creating your financial legacy, it well worth the necessary time and money to ensure that you, not the laws of the state where you live, are in control of dictating its terms.  

In March 2016, the Michigan Court of Appeals issued a ruling in the case of the estate of Kenneth Koehler. The circumstances of Koehler's death and estate planning were, while rare, not completely unique. Koehler died in early 2012 at the age of 59. According to his obituary, he left behind a girlfriend, two uncles, several cousins and a pair of dogs, Smokey and Mr. Boo. Oh, he also left an estate worth approximately one-half million dollars. 

What Koehler didn't leave behind was a surviving child, spouse, parent or sibling. He never married and had no kids. He was an only child and his parents were dead. Another thing Koehler didn't leave behind was an estate plan stating how he'd like his roughly $500,000 in assets distributed. Due to the specifics of Michigan law and the complexities of the man's family history, his estate would plunge into litigation for nearly half a decade. 

Part of the problem related to the fact that many of the Koehler's direct ancestors on the paternal side of his family tree died young. Kohler's father died at age 29. His paternal grandfather died at age 20, a few months before Koehler's father was even born. Koehler's paternal grandmother died young, too, leaving Koehler's father orphaned at age 15.   

Why did all this matter? Largely because Koehler never created an estate plan. The intestacy laws of Michigan, like those in most states, look to distribute an intestate estate to the closest biological and legal relatives that can be found. Koehler's girlfriend had neither a biological nor a legal relationship to him, so she received nothing. Koehler's children, spouse and siblings couldn't inherit, because Koehler had no such relatives. His parents couldn't take because they were already dead. At that point, Michigan law indicated that the man's estate should be split between any aunts, uncles and cousins he had, with his paternal relatives splitting one-half and the maternal relatives splitting one-half. 

While Koehler had several maternal relatives (the ones mentioned in his obituary) whom originally appeared close to splitting the entire estate, a long-lost paternal uncle (a half-brother to Koehler's father) intervened in the case and claimed that, because he was the man's sole surviving paternal relative, he should get half of the estate. The maternal relatives tried to stop him by arguing to the Michigan courts that Koehler's paternal grandfather never supported Koehler's father and that fact prohibited the paternal uncle from receiving anything due a technicality in Michigan intestacy law about "rejected" children. In the end, the paternal uncle won because the Michigan statute upon which the maternal relatives pinned their case required the parent to have "rejected" the child and Koehler's grandfather did not reject his child by refusing to support him; he merely failed to do so because he was already dead before the child was even born.

While Koehler's paternal uncle was right on the content of Michigan's intestacy laws, one has to wonder if the outcome that occurred was one that Koehler himself really would have wanted. His girlfriend got nothing, but an uncle who was not even mentioned alongside his other uncles in his obituary ultimately receives 50% of his wealth. Whether it was or was not consistent with Koehler's true wishes, it took years of litigation to finalize. All of this, including the final distribution of assets and the years of litigation, could have been avoided with an estate plan. Regardless of the quality of his relationship with any of his cousins or uncles, or the status of his legal relationship with his girlfriend, a properly drafted and executed estate plan would have allowed him to direct his assets, in the precise amounts he wanted, to exactly the people he wanted to receive them (and only to those people.) By doing nothing, he left the Michigan courts to decide what his legacy should be.

This article written and published by:

Legacy Assurance Plan

8039 Cooper Creek Blvd

University Park, Florida 34201

844.306.5272 (Phone)

info@legacyassuranceplan.com (email)
@assuranceplan
#legacyassuranceplan

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Getting an Estate Plan to Ensure that You are in Complete Control

Summary: Family relationships today are more complicated than ever. According to recent statistics from the US Centers for Disease Control, more than 40% of new births in the US are born to unmarried mothers. With fewer children than ever being born to married parents, the importance of NOT relying on intestacy laws is higher than ever. Whether you are worried about illegitimate children (or illegitimate children of your children) "coming out of the woodwork" after your death, or you want to ensure that your estate provides for someone who is like a child or grandchild to you (but with whom you do not have a biological relationship,) a detailed estate plan can give you the control over your legacy that you need to ensure that your wealth goes to the people who matter to you.    

Dianna Allen was one such of example of illegitimacy and the estate planning near-catastrophe her circumstance caused. Ola Irene Tucker, mother to three children, died in 2010. Two of Tucker's children died before her, with the third passing mere months after she did. Tucker died with no estate plan in place, meaning that her estate would be distributed according to the intestacy laws of her home state of Tennessee. In September 2010, two of Tucker's grandchildren asked to be appointed co-administrators of the estate, which would mean that they would handle distributing their grandmother's wealth. They informed the court that Tucker had five grandchildren, including Allen. 

The complication with Tucker's estate emerged when a third grandchild challenged Allen's right to receive any portion of their grandmother's estate. While Allen claimed to be the biological daughter of one of Tucker's sons, and had provided to the court evidence to show that she was an out-of-wedlock child born to Tucker's son, she had a problem. As the opposing grandchild pointed out to the court, Allen's mother was married to another man when Allen was conceived and born. The other grandchild argued that, under Tennessee law, this meant that Allen was not a child born out of wedlock at all, but was the legal daughter of the other man (the husband of Allen's mother.) This would mean Allen had no legal relationship to Tucker's son or to Tucker and, because of that, had no right to receive anything from Tucker's estate. Based on the state of Allen's mother's marriage, the trial court agreed and ruled in 2014 that Allen could not pursue a claim to part of Tucker's estate.

By the summer of 2015, the Tennessee Court of Appeal overturned that ruling and sent the case back to the trial court. While the law creates a strong legal presumption that a child born to a married woman is the child of that mother and that husband, this presumption is not irrefutable. With enough proof on her side, Allen could possibly overcome this presumption and establish that Tucker's son was her biological father.  

While the appeals court's ruling clears the way for Allen to receive a portion of her grandmother's estate, it points out many pitfalls of failing to plan. First, this case started in September 2010 and, by the late summer of 2015, was once again pending before a trial court in Loudon County, meaning that the administration of Tucker's estate ultimately took five years or more to resolve! 

Additionally, the facts of Tucker's case point out just how few situations in today's world fit into the tidy, clear-cut parameters of intestacy laws. Sometimes, one has children who have children of their own outside the bounds of marriage. Without an estate plan, one's wealth is potentially in jeopardy from one's long-lost illegitimate children or the illegitimate children of one's own children. The case of the estate of rock singer Prince is such an example, with numerous individuals coming forward claiming that the dead musician is their biological father. 

The same is true in reverse. The greeting card aisle in your local store has an entire selection of cards conveying love and affection to someone who role is "you're like a mother to me." Similar relationships exist between people who have grandparent-grandchild type relationships despite having no biological connection. In any of these circumstances, proper and careful planning is a must. A well thought out plan will allow you to dictate the terms of the distribution of your wealth. Within certain legal limitations (like the prohibition against completely disinheriting a surviving spouse,) your plan gives you the freedom and control to direct your wealth to all of the people who matter most to you, and to ensure that only your true loved ones take from your estate.

This article written and published by:

Legacy Assurance Plan

8039 Cooper Creek Blvd

University Park, Florida 34201

844.306.5272 (Phone)

info@legacyassuranceplan.com (email)

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