The Internet has opened up the world for do-it-yourselfers, including the option do your own estate planning. People have saved a tremendous amount of money by “Googling it” and finding how-to videos and instructions on all kinds of things. From alternatives to medicine that promise relief from ailment and good health to do-it-yourself Will kits,…
Anyone who is thinking about estate planning thinks (or should be thinking) about probate. Probate is the term that generally describes the administration of an estate of a deceased person. Probate is also the process for administrating the estate of a deceased person that is established in the State Probate Act. That process is handled…
Most people help their children when their children need help, even when they are adults. Sometimes that means making “loans” to them. You should think about how to handle gifts or loans to children in a Will or Trust. Your family will thank you for it! Imagine that your son’s car breaks down, and he…
Trusts are very robust and handy estate planning tools. If you are not familiar with trusts, perhaps you should read some articles that explain what trusts are (See Trusts Compared to Corporations; The Benefits of Living Trusts; and Avoiding Probate is a Matter of Trust) Even if you are familiar with trusts, the difference between…
Some significant changes affecting trusts have come to Illinois with the New Year. Effective January 1, 2020, the Illinois Trust Code replaced the Illinois Trusts and Trustees Act. One of the biggest areas of change involves the duty of a trustee to provide an accounting. One of the hallmarks of the fiduciary duty that applies…
I’ve seen it time and time again. A client comes in who has added a son, or a daughter, or a grandchild, or a niece or nephew, or someone else to the client’s bank account… or that is the client’s plan. It seems like a good idea. It gives another person access to the bank…
Fear of Estate Planning, as in doing a Will or Trust (or both) is a common malady. Everyone knows they should do something, but few people know exactly what that something is they should be doing. Fear of the unknown often keeps people from doing what they know they should do. That “something” we should…
If you are getting together with your family members this holiday season it may not seem like a great time to talk about dying, but actually it is! Hollywood has combined death and holidays for years. Well, truth be told, Dickens started it. A Christmas Carol is a look at the world without Scrooge, and…
In 2003, experts estimate that an estimated 37 million individuals will need some form of long-term care by 2050.[1] According to the AARP, approximately 65% of seniors will need some form of long-term care during their lives;[2] of those, 35% will enter a nursing home at some point.[3] Whether it is home health agencies, nursing…
When people die leaving debts, other obligations and property and funds to be distributed to the rightful beneficiaries, the default mechanism for handling those things is called probate. Probate is the process of handling the estate of someone who has died. This includes paying all of the debts and final bills, satisfying any lingering obligations,…