August 26, 2016January 28, 2024

Estate Planning for Ranchers

If you own a ranch, then having an estate plan is essential to making sure that it stays in your family. Getting a plan does not have to be as complicated as you might think it is.

Some of the most important legal documents a rancher can have are the documents that make up the rancher’s estate plan. They are the documents that determine how the ranch will be passed on to the next generation or whether it will have to be sold.

Despite this, many ranchers put off getting estate plans, if they get them at all.

That is unfortunate because estate planning does not have to be very difficult for ranchers if they break the process down into simple steps, as the Huntsville Item explains in “Estate planning and the family ranch.”

The steps are:

Start a conversation with your family about what to do with the ranch after you pass away. This will help determine which of your relatives might want a stake in the ranch and make sure that everyone in the family is on the same page.
After talking with your family, decide what your objectives are for the ranch and what you would like to see happen to it.
Gather all of your important financial documents.
Choose an experienced estate planning attorney that you are comfortable with and have the attorney draw up an estate plan that meets your objectives.
After your estate plan is complete, make sure that you keep it updated whenever circumstances change.

A qualified estate planning attorney can help you keep the ranch in the family or otherwise pass without a hitch.

Reference: Huntsville Item (July 31, 2016) “Estate planning and the family ranch.”

August 25, 2016June 14, 2025

Last Minute Estate Planning

If you have avoided getting an estate plan and are now facing the prospect of death, it might not be too late for you to get a Maryland estate plan that protects the interests of your family.

Ideally, you should get an estate plan long before you become terminally ill. However, not everyone really thinks about the prospect of their own death until it is imminent and that is somewhat understandable. When faced with the prospect of death do not assume you do not still have time to get an estate plan.

There is still be time to do some planning to help your family, consult Profit Law Firm to find out how.

Recently, NASDAQ listed some estate planning tips for people in that situation in “6 Estate Planning Tips for Those Approaching Death,” including:

Make sure to get powers of attorney in place so when you become incapacitated someone else will be legally able to handle your affairs.
Come up with a plan for your estate to avoid probate with the help of a Maryland estate planning attorney and make sure all of your assets are titled appropriately.
You may want to consider swapping assets for capital gains tax purposes, but only do so after talking to your attorney to make sure you do everything correctly.
It might be a good time to make donations to charities you support.
Review any life insurance policies you have to make sure the beneficiary designations are still appropriate.
Talk to your attorney about the best strategies to avoid income and estate taxes for your family. This could include avoiding income in respect of decedent issues.

Reference: NASDAQ (July 26, 2016) “6 Estate Planning Tips for Those Approaching Death,”

August 24, 2016

You Cannot Avoid Paying for Maryland Estate Planning

You might think that you do not really need an estate plan so there is no point in spending money to get a proper one drawn up. However, that just means that your estate will have to pay more later to do the planning that you did not do.

Estate planning is never free. If you go to an experienced Maryland estate planning attorney, then you have to pay for the attorney’s time to create a proper estate plan for you. Some people would rather not pay, so they do not get estate plans. Instead, they expect that their family and the courts will be able to easily handle everything after they pass away.

In reality, they actually will “pay” for an estate plan, as the Green Bay Press-Gazette points out in “Estate planning: Pay now or pay later.”

The truth is that it is far more expensive not to have an estate plan than to have one. If you have to pay Maryland estate taxes because you did not have a Maryland estate planning attorney, you will pay much more in taxes than you would have ever paid the attorney. If your estate has to hire an attorney to sort out your affairs after you pass away and go to court to get a judge’s approval for everything, then that is going to cost a lot more than going to an attorney and getting an estate plan.

Not having an estate can cost your estate in other ways as well. For example, you may have to pay a higher estate tax bill and miss out on the best, cheapest ways to transfer wealth from one generation to another.

Actually getting an estate plan for most people is much easier and cheaper than you probably assume it is. There is no reason not to go ahead and get one, especially since not doing so will just cost your family more money later. Consult Profit Law Firm about creating a Maryland estate plan and save money on Maryland estate taxes.

Yes, you do tend to get what you pay for.

Reference: Green Bay Press-Gazette (Aug. 1, 2016) “Estate planning: Pay now or pay later.”

August 23, 2016February 15, 2024

Avoiding Estate Mistakes

If you do not have an Maryland estate plan or have a bad plan, then it is likely that your loved ones will have a more difficult time than necessary inheriting your wealth. Fortunately, for most people getting a good Maryland estate plan is easier than they often think.

One of the many reasons people in Maryland put off planning for their estates is that they imagine it is much more difficult to do than it really is. For most people a good Maryland estate plan follows a simple formula. They need to decide who they want to inherit their property, hire an experienced Maryland estate planning attorney and have the appropriate documents drawn up.

Recently, Kiplinger wrote about four steps to take in “4 Strategies to Avoid an Estate-Planning Mishap.”

They include:

Get a basic will that details who you want to have your property and what they should have.
Create a living trust and put your most important assets in it. With a trust in place most of your estate will not need to go through probate after you pass away, which makes things much easier on your family.
Make sure all of your financial accounts are properly titled. Some you might want to put in your new trust. For others you can make them payable on death so they will automatically go to a person of your designation after you pass away.
Consider getting a life insurance policy. If your family is in need of cash after you pass away, they will have access to it through the life insurance benefit. This is a good way to make sure that your family has what it needs while waiting for your estate to be legally settled.

A qualified Maryland estate planning attorney can help you design – and implement – a Maryland estate plan appropriate for your unique circumstances.

Reference: Kiplinger (Aug. 2016) “4 Strategies to Avoid an Estate-Planning Mishap.”

August 19, 2016February 12, 2024

Estate Planning Documents You Need

Everyone needs an estate plan, and every estate plan will contain a mix of different documents depending on the complexity of the estate assets and individual preferences. However, there are a few documents that everyone needs.

Estate plans come in all shapes and sizes. Some are extraordinarily complex and contain thousands of pages of legal documents. Other estate plans contain only a few basic documents. One of the interesting things about estate plans is the documents that make up the simplest estate plans are also part of the most advanced plans. These documents are the basic framework of estate plans. The Chicago Tribune recently discussed what these basic documents are in “Documents you need before you die or become incapacitated.” They include:

Will – At its core a will is simply a legal document that declares how a deceased person’s property that is not disposed of by any other legal means should be handled.
General Durable Power of Attorney – A standard document that allows a person to determine who should handle his or her finances in case of incapacity.
Health Care Power of Attorney – Similar to the other power of attorney, but it allows for someone else to make medical decisions for an incapacitated person.
Living Will – Gives prior instructions to medical personnel about what means should be used to prolong a person’s life in the event that the person is terminally ill with no chance of recovery and unable to give instructions at the time.

Meet with an estate planning attorney at Profit Law Firm, PLLC to determine what additional documents you may need.

Reference: Chicago Tribune (July 25, 2016) “Documents you need before you die or become incapacitated”

August 18, 2016February 8, 2024

Estate Planning and the Family Farm

Like any other business owner, farmers need to carefully plan how the farm will be passed on to heirs. However, farmers do have some unique estate planning issues to consider.

In the eyes of the law, a farm is just a type of business. Like any other business, it can be passed to other people when the current owner passes away. However, estate planning for farms often has issues that are not as much of a concern for other types of businesses. Most farms have a lot of valuable assets, such as land and equipment, which could add up to an estate tax liability. However, farms often do not have the liquid assets to easily pay those taxes. Ohio’s County Journal and Ohio Ag Net recently discussed some ways to plan for this problem in “Estate planning for farmers: Providing for liquidity concerns,” including:

Develop a plan to build up liquid assets that can be made available to the estate after the farmer passes away. This can be as simple as investing farm income in securities.
Life insurance can be purchased to provide cash to beneficiaries.
If the farm is held in partnership or as a corporation, then creating buy-sell agreements with other owners to purchase an individual’s ownership stake upon death can provide money for the deceased’s estate.
The likelihood of the farm estate having to pay the estate tax can be reduced during the farmer’s life in several different ways, including creating a gifting plan with the help of an attorney and selling off older equipment that is no longer needed.

An experienced estate planning attorney can help you to create a plan specific for your farm.

Reference: Ohio’s County Journal and Ohio Ag Net (July 19, 2016) “Estate planning for farmers: Providing for liquidity concerns”

August 17, 2016October 25, 2023

Is a Trust Appropriate?

Wills and trusts are the two pillars of estate planning and determining how assets will be passed on to future generations. You need to know whether or not you need one, the other or both.

The two main ways that people pass their assets to their heirs are through a will and through a trust. They both serve the same basic function of transferring assets—but in very different ways. Wills normally go though probate court while trusts are handled privately. It is important to know if you need one or the other. For wills, that is a simple question to answer. Everyone needs a will. Even if you have a trust, you will need a will to deal with any assets inadvertently or intentionally left out of the trust. Trusts are more complicated. Recently, the Brainerd Dispatch discussed some considerations about whether a trust is necessary in the article, “Commentary: When does it make sense to add a trust to your estate plan?” Things to consider include:

Privacy – Wills are normally made available to the public, but most trusts can be kept private. If you do not want other people to know the details of your estate, then a trust is what you need.
Property in Multiple States – If you have property in more than one state, then a trust might be best. Otherwise, your estate may have to be probated in each state to deal with the property.
Control – Trusts can offer you much greater control over how your heirs will inherit your assets.
Charity – Trusts are generally a better tool for giving part of your estate to charity. If set up properly, you can even get a tax break now, keep control of your assets and have the assets go to charity after you pass away.

For help determining what is necessary for your situation, consult an estate planning attorney. For consultation on your situation contact Profit Law Firm, PLLC.

Reference: Brainerd Dispatch (July 23, 2016) “Commentary: When does it make sense to add a trust to your estate plan?”

August 16, 2016August 15, 2022

Planning Your Own Estate

In the past few years, many services have sprung up that offer to help people create their own estate plans—such as by offering them downloadable forms. These services are often inexpensive but also risky.

You can find a lot of advice on the Internet that will tell you that estate planning really is not that complicated. In a sense, that advice is correct. The core of estate planning can be very simple. However, that advice makes it too easy to be deceived into thinking that you can create your estate plan on your own without the help of a professional. What an individual client has to do to create an estate plan can be—and often is—simple, but that is only because experienced estate planning attorneys do most of the complicated work. Recently, the Northwest Indiana Business Quarterly discussed the problems of creating an estate plan on your own in “Dangers of DIY Estate Planning.”

The article discusses many potential pitfalls of creating your own estate plan, but they all essentially boil down to the simple proposition that if you do not have professional expertise in estate planning, then you are likely to make mistakes that could cost you and your family. These mistakes can range from very simple oversights, such as not knowing how many witnesses are needed to make a will effective, to very complex mistakes, such as failing to properly understand how your estate planning choices effect the taxation of your assets after you pass away.

It actually does not matter very much whether the mistake you make is simple or complex because dealing with the mistake will almost always cost your estate more money than you saved by creating your own estate plan.

Do not risk these mistakes. Meet with an experienced estate planning attorney to discuss your needs.

Reference: Northwest Indiana Business Quarterly (July 25, 2016) “Dangers of DIY Estate Planning”

August 12, 2016October 25, 2023

You Have an Estate

Even though you might not realize it, you do have an estate. You should plan for what will happen to it.

The word “estate” conjures up certain ideas in the popular imagination. The term has connotations of mansions with well-manicured lawns. Estates are where the very rich live secluded from the day-to-day world of ordinary people.

The Rockefellers and Carnegies of the world had estates. People of more ordinary means do not think that the term applies to them.

However, as Detroit Lakes Online points out in “Help your loved ones: Get ahead on estate planning,” almost everyone alive has an estate.

Estates are not just something the very wealthy have. The term refers to the totality of everything you own when you pass away. Even if you live alone in a small apartment, you have some possessions. Homeless people often own something, even if it is nothing more than the clothes they wear. In fact, very few people can claim not to own anything at all.

The fact that you have an estate, no matter how large or small, means estate planning is appropriate for you. Estate planning lets you determine who gets all of the possessions that make up your estate. It also lets you plan for who will handle things for you should you be unable to handle everything for yourself.

Even if you do not care who gets your possessions or who handles your affairs, you probably have people in your life who will care. If you do not make those plans, then they will have to clean up a potential mess and have a much more difficult time doing so.

Unfortunately, that mess likely will be cleaned up in court—unless you take steps now to plan around it.

Reference: Detroit Lakes Online (July 5, 2016) “Help your loved ones: Get ahead on estate planning”

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