Many people don’t realize that their IRA, if they don’t spend it all down in their lifetime, can be used to create a “pension” for their kids if they take a few simple steps to secure that set up. That’s what we talk about in today’s show. It’s called “stretching” an IRA, and it’s the process of taking your IRA funds and created a new IRA for your beneficiaries. When the IRA is turned over to them they then become…
Probate is the process of settling the estate of a deceased person or “decedent”. It’s not a complicated process, and in many ways Washington State has one of the more streamlined probate systems in the United States, but it still can be long and frustrating. After losing a loved one, it’s often the last thing on someone’s mind and it can be difficult to sort through the decedent’s belongings to find all of the necessary information or paperwork required for…
I get two kinds of calls all the time in the office related to contesting a will. The first kind of call comes from someone who believes they have been wronged by someone in their will. Imagine someone doesn’t get something they thought they had something coming to them and they are angry – that’s the first part. The second kind of call I get all the time surrounding a will contest is someone that wants to create a will…
Many people don’t realize there are actually two different types of power of attorney. One type, the springing type, doesn’t actually exist until the person whom the power needs to be used for is incapacitated. The other type, durable, exists the moment the power of attorney is signed. Why does this matter? Why is it important? There are critical differences between the two that can make a family’s life easy or hard, depending on the choices made. To learn more,…
Bonnie and Clyde created a trust to ensure that when they passed away they no one would have to worry about probate and the people they cared about the most used the money and assets they were going to inherit in a way that actually benefited their lives. Or so they thought. See, when Bonnie and Clyde finalized and signed their living trust they felt so good about it that they thought they were done with the process. That explains…
When someone dies and they have to go through probate to transfer their property to their heirs the court will at some point issue something called Letters of Administration. Today we are going to talk about what those are. The non-technical definition of Letters of Administration (often just referred to as “letters”) is the document that appoints a specific person to be the personal representative, giving them the authority to act on behalf of the decedent’s estate to take care…
When it comes to estate planning and IRA’s most people think simply designating a beneficiary to take the IRA when you pass is good enough. But that’s not exactly the case. There are a few reasons why this is a problem. First, the beneficiary has complete control to withdraw all of the funds at once. That sounds like it might be fine, except for one problem: when they pull that money out, assuming you had a traditional IRA, they will…
