Most people today have an IRA, and sometimes more than one. IRA’s and 401(k)’s and other qualified plan assets have become more popular, taking the place of more traditional pension plans. Whether an employer makes any contributions, or not, people are increasingly aware of their own need to put money aside for retirement into pre-tax…
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According to The National Center for Education Statistics, about 35% of children ages 3-21 have some kind of learning disability. About 20% have a speech or language impairment. More significantly, about 9% of this population has autism, 6% have an intellectual disability, another 6% have developmental delay, 5% have some kind of emotional disturbance, and…
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Being a family caregiver under any circumstances is a difficult job. If you are a remote caregiver, you have even more challenges because you must make sure your loved one is happy and well without being able to check-in personally. If you are a long-distance caregiver of a senior loved one who is no longer…
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The benefits of doing a living trust and transferring your assets into the trust during life are many. A primary benefit is that your estate will circumvent the probate process when you pass, if you do things right, saving your loved ones many months of administrative burdens, delays, attorney’s fees and other costs. You also…
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The concept of a trust is difficult for many people to grasp because a trust is a concept, and therefore is intangible. Another intangible concept that is more familiar, and therefore seems easier to understand, is a corporation. Corporations have some similarities to trusts and, therefore, provide a helpful comparison. A quick look at the…
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After much anticipation and delay, Illinois families can finally utilize the ABLE Account Program. The ABLE Account Program (15 ILCS 505/16.6) allows individuals receiving SSI and other means-tested programs to open up a bank account (similar to a checking account) which does not count against the means-tested program’s resource limit. A means tested program is…
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An expansion from Do I Need a Will? I have done a series of articles explaining estate planning on a spectrum from simplest and cheapest to more complex and more expensive. Generally, that spectrum flows from planning how assets are owned so that they will pass on death with beneficiary designations, payable on death designations…
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“These times, they are a changin’” is the famous line by Bob Dylan. It was an anthem for the 1960’s and early 1970’s. It seemed pretty profound to us who lived through those times. Today we deal with more mundane things, like estate planning, and times have changed. The number of people who have never…
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In my high school psychology class, my history teacher came and spoke to us one day about his disabled son. He read to us a short story in which he compared having a disabled child to a trip to Europe. The story began with a couple planning to go to Italy to tour all of…
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After considering Who Needs a Will? The probate process can be avoided while still maintaining a very high degree of certainty that your estate will be handled by the persons who choose, the way you want it handled, by using a living Trust. Unlike a Will, where the job is done when the Will is…
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