What Is Happening With Estate Taxes & Estate Planning?

As you may know, there is no estate tax in place for the year 2010. Estate planning attorneys are trying to determine what is likely to happen next year, to ensure that their clients can be caught up. Unless Congress makes some changes, the estate tax will be back again in 2011. This means that no more than $1 million of an individual's estate would be exempt from the estate tax. Last year's estate tax was $3.5 million exemption. Also keep in mind that the top estate tax rate moves up to 55 percent, which is up from the 45 percent it was sitting at last year.

What does this mean? Currently, if an individual dies in 2010, their estate is not subjected to estate taxes, but that does not mean there is no federal tax liability on inheritances. This has left many estate planners in a lurch. What is the right tax to pay this year?

If you do not have an estate plan in place, you could fall victim to this same turmoil. The only way to effectively minimize taxes is to so with an estate plan so consult a North Carolina estate planner today.

How To: Family Estate Planning Tips

We have been busy preaching the benefits of estate planning. Our last post focused on elderly estate planning and now we are bringing our tips full circle with overall family estate planning guidelines.

Estate planning is a part of financial management. There is no difference in making wise financial investing decisions, paying your monthly bills and planning for your estate. In fact, you can often tackle some of the most difficult decisions of your life now, while you are young with a family so that later, your goals can be achieved. There are many things to look at, but some of those mentioned below are most important for the family unit.

Plan for Your Children

Planning for the care and well-being of your children is very important. If something, happened to you, who would care for your children?

• List a guardian for your children.
• Put in place a trust fund for each of your children to pay for their care should something happen to you.
• Ensure any wishes you have are clearly defined in your will and in the trust fund requirements.

This is something you need to do if you have children under the age of 18, under the age of 21 and you want to put stipulations on their access to money, or for any disabled children of any age.

Focus on Life Insurance

Life insurance is critical when you have a family. Right now, you may have a mortgage to pay. You may have debt and higher financial responsibilities then you will later on. If something happened to you, could your family continue with the lifestyle that they are comfortable with? A life insurance policy can pay off your mortgage and debts and provide your family with the money they need to make ends meet for several years.

Reduce Your Taxes

By establishing the right type of estate plan, you can take control over your financial investing and overall financial management after you are gone. One of the things you can do is to set up trusts that will shelter your assets from estate taxes, which are levied on virtually everyone when they die. You can reduce the amount of money that your family pays to the probate courts.

Make End of Life Decisions

Do you want to your life to be sustained through machines? If you become ill with a life threatening disease, do you want intense and invasive procedures to be taken to extend your life? Do you  have specific wishes about the medical care you receive such as surgical procedures, religious beliefs or others? Do you want your organs to be donated? All of these decisions only you can make, but you cannot make them later. These are decisions you can make now and clearly put in your will.

If you have a family, you do not want to leave them with these financial management decisions. Rather, if you start planning now for your retirement years and beyond, you will find yourself in a position to achieve the goals you have and to help your family to cope in one of the most difficult times of their lives. Make these decisions now before you cannot make them.

This includes providing this information on your pension, your retirement accounts, your investments and your life insurance policies. Verify that those beneficiaries are accurate.

• Do you need to appoint guardianship for anyone? If you have a disabled or minor child, this should be listed in your documents.

When you take the time to make these formal decisions now, you ensure that your estate planning goals are in line. Take some time to consider all of your options before making these decisions. To ensure that your wishes are legally provide, simply work with an experienced estate planning attorney to handle them.

Ask Joseph Leonard and Coastal Investment Advisors for additional personal finance advice or learn money management tips on financial management by downloading this free financial management guide.

Don't forget to see Joseph Leonard in person during an upcoming financial management seminar!

How To: Estate Planning for the Elderly

You have lived your life without a play, but one of the worst financial management decisions you can make is not having an estate plan in place. In many ways, this plan not only cares for you right now but it also gives you the power to make decisions after you are gone. For many, it is a critical step to take long before you are elderly but even if you are older, now is a great time to make some key decisions.

Decisions to Make Now

The following are some of the most important decisions you can make for yourself:

• Who is your durable power of attorney? This person ensures your wishes occur. They hold on to your will. They provide guidance for medical decisions if you cannot make them yourself. They also provide you with someone to rely on after you die to carry out your last wishes.
• Do you have a trust set up? Trusts can help your family to avoid at least some of the estate taxes they are likely to pay. Trusts also allow you to move property from yourself to others without having to worry about the legalities of doing so. Further, trusts can be in use to care for specific goals you have such as taking care of children, leaving money behind for young adults or even caring for your pet or favorite charity.
• Talk to your estate planning attorney, tax accountant or another professional to find out how you can minimize your taxes. Many times, there are instances when you can reduce the amount of tax paid to the government on your estate. It takes only a few minutes to make these decisions but it can make a big difference later.
• Do you have a formal will in place? Is that will updated to include any of the major life changes in your life? You will want to update your will often and you want to have several copies including one with an attorney, your durable power of attorney and another with your family.
• Do you have life insurance in place? While your estate may be tied up in probate for up to a year, your family may need money to pay for their needs throughout that time. A life insurance policy can provide this to your loved ones.
• Have you updated and assigned beneficiaries? This includes providing this information on your pension, your retirement accounts, your investments and your life insurance policies. Verify that those beneficiaries are accurate.
• Do you need to appoint guardianship for anyone? If you have a disabled or minor child, this should be listed in your documents.

When you take the time to make these formal decisions now, you ensure that your estate planning goals are in line. Take some time to consider all of your options before making these decisions. To ensure that your wishes are legally provide, simply work with an experienced estate planning attorney to handle them.

Ask Joseph Leonard and Coastal Investment Advisors for additional personal finance advice or learn money management tips on financial management by downloading this free financial management guide.

Don't forget to see Joseph Leonard in person during an upcoming financial management seminar!

Top 10 Estate Planning Tips

Estate planning is one of the best decisions you can make for yourself, your property and for your family. Estate planning is simply the process of organizing your assets, bills and wishes so that when you die, everything is planned out. That way, your family does not have to handle the financial management of your estate without being able to know what your wishes are. Further, estate planning helps you to save money.

However, there are many factors that play a role in estate planning to think about. The following 10 tips can help you to make the right decisions about planning your estate.

      

1. Hire an attorney to do the legal work of establishing trusts and management wills for you. While you can do some of this yourself, it is critical to realize that without the proper wording, you are unlikely to have the results you want to have.
2. Monitor estate tax laws and tax laws in general that affect your estate. You will need to come back to your plans from time to time to make changes so that your goals are still met.
3.  Update your will and your estate documents anytime a major change occurs in your life whether that be getting married, divorced, having a child, adopting a child or buying new property.
4. Plan to avoid taxes. Through trusts and other methods, you can safely protect the property you have worked so hard to build from costly estate taxes. In fact, many people can avoid probate altogether.
5. Look over your estate plans each year, especially towards the end of the year. Have you made wise financial decisions and can you make changes now that would be helpful later, such as adding more to your IRA before the end of the year.
6.  Do invest in life insurance. The right type of life insurance is an easy way to provide your family with a near immediate payment that they can live off of while your estate is being probated. Purchase an affordable plan that pays your families expenses for a year, which is the length that probate can hold up your estate.
7. Do more than just take a video message. Did you know that a video message of your will is simply not enough? You need to have a formal document that outlines what your wishes are. Further, you can use the video to explain why you made the decisions you did.
8. Put in place an element in your estate plan for medical emergencies and long term care. You need to have a living will put in place and you should also appoint someone to make key decisions for you, based on your needs, when you cannot.
9. Care for your minor children and disabled children now. Any parent with a child under the age of 18 needs to have a will that outlines what should happen to the children should the parents die. It should also provide for their financial well being if possible.
10. Take the time to put a plan in place. As simple as this estate planning tip sounds, it is the most important piece of estate planning advice. You do have assets and wishes that should be heard.

Ask Joseph Leonard and Coastal Investment Advisors for additional personal finance advice or learn money management tips on financial management by downloading this free financial management guide.

Don't forget to see Joseph Leonard in person during an upcoming financial management seminar!