In Washington State, there are two estate taxes that can potentially be imposed on you. It doesn’t mean you get taxed twice, it just means that there are two levels of taxation that exist. There is the state estate tax and the federal estate tax. The state estate tax has the lower threshold. It’s got the more hurtful rules and it’s the one that most people have to worry about here in Washington State. In Washington State, in 2017, the…
There is a way to eliminate probate from many or almost all of your assets. That is by creating non-probate sort of structures to take care of them. Non-probate assets are essentially defined as any asset that pass to people outside of probate. Probate assets are assets that have to be distributed and retitled via the probate process. Non-probate assets for the most part are anything that you can distribute to a beneficiary designation. So think about life insurance, retirement…
What is a revocable living trust? Imagine a trust just like a box. You can pull whatever you want in the box. You can take anything out of the box anytime and while you are alive you are the person who is in charge of the box. You are the person who benefits from the box. Once you die, the person who is in charge of the box changes, the person that gets the benefit of the box changes but…
The first limitation is ‘it does not eliminate probate’. In Washington State, eliminating probate is not a big deal. The fees are not based on the percentage of assets. It’s relatively flat and low. But it does take time, money and effort. If you’re interested in eliminating probate, a will does not do that for you. The other thing to consider is if you have a property in another estate, you have to open up a probate in each state…
Everyone has an estate plan even if you haven’t created one yet. If you haven’t created your own, the government is going to create or has created one for you. This means a couple of things: a) it’s more expensive if the government does it; b) you don’t get to get any choices with regards to whom your people are; c) you don’t get any choices to who gets your stuff. The four basic documents are power of attorney, medical…
Today, we talk about more basics to lay the foundation for Estate Planning greatness – The 4 Essential Estate Planning Documents. 1. Power of Attorney. this is the document that allows someone, a person that you name, to manage your financial affairs if you are unable to do so. If you do not have this in place, the court will assign for you. You would need to pay the court and the person who the power of attorney work is…
Most people think estate planning is just taking care of things when you die. Most people would be wrong. On this episode of Estate Planning TV I’m going to talk about the three primary jobs of estate planning. 1. It gives you protection while you are alive. Believe it or not, estate planning covers you when you are alive. There are 2 important documents that do this. The first is called Power of Attorney. Power of Attorney appoints someone to…
