Splitting gifts with your spouse can reduce your gift tax liability, but specific rules must be followed to avoid unintended outcomes.
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Estate tax planning can get complicated if you or your spouse is a nonresident alien.
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A Crummey trust allows you to leverage the annual gift tax exclusion to transfer substantial amounts of wealth to your family tax free. But pitfalls to this strategy exist.
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Your beneficiary designations and jointly held assets can wreak havoc if you don’t coordinate them carefully with the rest of your estate plan.
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A defined-value gift may be right for you if you’re transferring hard-to-value assets. However, to pass muster with the IRS, precise language must be used in the transfer document.
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Ambiguous language in your estate plan may lead to family disputes after your death.
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If you own real estate in multiple states, consider using a revocable trust to minimize or avoid excessive probate costs after your death.
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Lifetime giving is a smart strategy to reduce your taxable estate, but the gift tax rate of 40% is steep. Making a “net gift” can potentially reduce your effective gift tax rate.
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Did you know that you can exercise some control over your charitable endeavors using a donor-advised fund (DAF)? As the name implies, recommendations are integral to a DAF.
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Do you need to file a gift tax return this year? It depends on the type of gifts you made.
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Appointing the right trust protector is critical. Given the power he or she has over your family’s wealth, you’ll want to choose someone whom you trust and who’s qualified to make financial decisions.
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Can a charitable remainder trust achieve similar results as the formerly available “stretch” IRA?
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A divorce is a life event that calls for an estate plan review and possible revisions.
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Can estate planning benefits convince you to convert your traditional IRA to a Roth IRA?
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Even with the gift and estate tax exemption amount reaching more than $12 million for 2022, making lifetime gifts continues to be a beneficial estate planning strategy.
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Much can change over one’s lifetime (personal circumstances and tax laws), making estate planning difficult. Building flexibility into your plan is key.
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Choosing the “wrong” executor could cause a multitude of problems for your family.
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Underestimating the impact of state estate taxes can upend your estate plan.
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Building your wealth around a single stock can be risky for both your investment plan and your estate plan.
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In light of the COVID-19 pandemic, are you leery about visiting your advisor’s office to attend to estate planning documents? You’re not alone, and you may have other options.
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