In Florida all sorts of clerks, customer service people, insurance sales people, brokers, account managers, and other employees of financial institutions give customers advice about how to title accounts and name beneficiaries. In an effort to avoid probate, these seemingly harmless changes can cause many problems with estate plans. Most…
Recently we have begun seeing more cases involving agents who abuse their power of attorney in order to benefit themselves. Most people do not realize that once they have become an agent for an individual, their duty is to act in the best interest of the individual and not for…
Today a client of mine in Mexico contacted me about the transfer of their membership interest in an LLC upon their death. He had recently been told he had the “Pig Flu” or Swine Flu as we call it in the United States. Hopefully his case is not bad and…
There are many times to update a Florida Will. Most updates are centered around significant life events like a wedding, divorce, new child, death in the family, or even moving to a new state. Two of the most important things to change in a will are the designations for guardians…
Helmsey’s estate made 53 charitable grants this week. Most of the money was given to hospitals and for medical research. Only 1 Million was given to 10 animal and dog charities equally. These donations came after a New York judge ruled that the trustees for the Helmsley Charitable trust has…
David A. Atraus, a Nevada Estate Planning Lawyer, has published a book titled Faith-Based Estate Planning: Our Values and Valuables. The book was written after contacting hundreds of religious clergy throughout the nation, and took him several years to write. Upon a first glance, I was very impressed. The book…
SB 1718 & HB 5117 dealing with funding the court would create new filing fees in probate and Guardianship cases that would range from $1,000 to $5,000, depending on the value of the estate of the person being protected. The increase in filing fees is linked to probate cases but…
Often when someone dies, they have money in a bank account that does not have a joint owner or a payable on death designation (POD). These banks often tell family members that they need “Letters of Administration” to distribute the funds. While this may be trust in some cases, most…
Back in 2006 and 2007 I wrote several articles on Digital Assets and Estate Planning. Now that we are in 2009, there is even more need for Digital Asset protection in your Florida Estate Planning Documents. Digital assets are those that expire upon your death and are often associated with…
The Palm Beach Post.com has an article which describes a recent trend in Annuities in which scammers sell and churn an insurance policy sold as an annuity in which there are very high surrender fees and limited access to the money for 10 or more years. These policies are being…