Articles Posted in Estate Planning

The Portland Museum of Art in Maine recently initiated legal action against the caretaker of an art collector. The Museum claimed that the caretaker bequeathed as much as $2 million to museum, but was convinced to not do so before her death.

As a result, the art collector changed her will months before death in 2015 and removed the Portland Museum of Art as a primary beneficiary. In legal briefs filed in preparation of the case, the museum alleged that caretaker displayed characteristic signs of elder abuse and kept the art collector from interacting with her family.

Unfortunately, there are a number of cases where one person manipulates another individual who is in a vulnerable position to an illness or an advanced age. This manipulation is often done to defraud the individual and take their money.

We love our pets, but many of us are still uncomfortable with confronting end of life issues. When accidents occur and people lack essential estate planning tools, it is very common for pets to being end up being sent to shelters or rescue centers.

To avoid this unpleasant idea and to make sure that a pet is cared for following a person’s death or incapacity, some people establish a “pet trust”. Being a relatively uncommon type of estate planning tool, however, people often have questions about just what these trusts include.

As a result, this article discusses six important things that you should know about pet trusts.

When major life events like marriage and divorce occur, it is a wise idea to review your estate plan. That’s because these life events have the potential to significantly change a person’s estate plan.

The purpose of this article is to review some key factors that you should consider about estate planning when you recently got married or divorced.

Estate Planning Issues Following Marriage

After creating an estate plan, it is easy to fall into the trap of thinking that you have now done everything necessary to plan for the future. In many cases, however, people fail to make sure that all beneficiary designations as well as assets are titled in a way to reflect your plans.

It is critical to make sure that these assets are properly titled because when people die, they often have two types of estates: those that must be probated as well as “non-probate” assets.

Not Everything Passes through a Will

The Michigan Supreme Court recently decided the case of Hegadorn v. Dept. of Human Services, which involves the Medicaid spend down process.

A “spend down” in this context refers to the process of reducing the assets of a person applying for Medicaid so the individual qualifies for Title XIX Medicaid coverage. Spend down also refers to reducing a Medicaid applicant’s monthly income so a person’s income makes them eligible for Medicaid.

How the Three Cases in Hegadorn Arose

Our experienced estate planning lawyers have helped a number of people create estate plans that can be used to carry out their wishes. We have also encountered a number of clients who attempted to create online estate planning documents, but who ended up facing expensive and substantial obstacles.

Do it yourself estate planning documents, however, can contain a number of shortcomings ranging from small errors including typos to much larger mistakes including estate planning documents that miss critical estate plan clauses.

The Challenge Presented by Online Estate Planning

Estate planning is one of the least understood areas of law. One of the commonly overlooked parts of estate planning is the number of people who have the potential to benefit from proper estate planning. The great value of estate planning is not that lets people define their legacies, it also lets people decide the impact that their wishes have on the people they love.

Estate planning also enables people to provide important instructions about health care decisions as well as who will be responsible for making these decisions. In an effort to further explain the truth behind some of the longest lasting and most widely shared estate planning myths, this article explains some of the important details that you should understand about this process.

# 1 – Estate Planning is Only for the Extremely Wealthy

It is important to share details about your estate plan with your loved ones so that they can do their best to make sure that your estate goals can be carried out. Deciding what to share, however, can be difficult. This article discusses several of the important things that you should make sure to tell your loved ones about your estate plans.

# 1 – Whether You Have An Estate Plan

It is important to inform your loved one about any basic estate planning documents that you might have including a last will and testament, power of attorney, health care proxies, or a living will. You might have even decided to create a trust to pass assets to beneficiaries. You should also tell your loved ones about any advance directives including financial or health care powers of attorney that you might have created to address any issues of incapacity.