News & Articles

A Financial Power of Attorney (FPA) allows you to select a trusted family member or friend who will be responsible for managing your money and other property if you become mentally incapacitated (unable to make your own decisions) due to illness or injury. Without this document, bills won’t get paid, tax returns won’t be filed, bank and investment accounts held in your name will become inaccessible, retirement distributions can’t be requested, and property can’t be bought, sold, or managed.

Estate planning can be a very difficult process. While it's not brain surgery, making the decision to move forward with the planning requires us to face the fact that we will not live forever. This thought can stop many people right in their tracks. Others talk themselves out of seeing a qualif...

In 2008, Congress recognized the need for the public to understand the importance and benefits of estate planning by passing House Resolution 1499, which designated the third week of ...

529 Plans -What You Need to Know According to U.S. News and World Report, for the 2019-2020 school year, the average cost of tuition and fees is $10,116 at an in-state public university and $36,801 at a private university. This does not even include housing, books, and meal pla...

Ethical Wills -Passing on Your Wisdom and Experience to the Next Generation Each person accumulates a wealth of knowledge, experiences, and values throughout the course of their life. Regardless of whether you are financially wealthy, you have a great deal to share with your lo...

National Adoption Month: Taking Care of Your New Family Member November is National Adoption Month, which is aimed at raising awareness about adoption and the children who need permanent, loving homes. Thousands of children are adopted each year, bringing much joy to their adop...

Planning for Stepchildren and Step-Grandchildren The structure of families has changed in the United States: According to statistics cited by the Pew Research Center, six out of ten women who remarry are in blended families, and in about half of those remarriages, stepchildren ...

Who's On Your Team? Estate planning is not just about what happens to your stuff when you die. It is about coordinating all aspects of your life so (i) you can be taken care of during times when you are unable to care for yourself, and (ii) your money and property are distribut...

Is a Handwritten Will Effective? After the 2018 passing of the legendary singer Aretha Franklin, her family and lawyer initially thought she had died without a will. But earlier this year, three handwritten wills—two from 2010 that were locked in a cabinet and one from 2014 tha...

What Impact Does the Citizenship of My Spouse Have On My Estate? According to the Pew Research Center, in 2017, there were 44.4 million foreign-born people living in the United States, 55% of whom were non-citizens. As a result, there are many occasions when a non-ci...

Bankruptcy may be one of the last things on your mind when you are creating an estate plan. Fortunately, the number of bankruptcy filings have declined as the economy has improved, but there were still a whopping 969,397 bankruptcy filing...

Productivity Tips for the New Year Are you feeling bogged down in a swamp of clutter, deadlines, and incomplete tasks? As we draw closer to the end of the year, make it your goal to do a few simple things over the course of a day or two that will result in increased productivit...

Important Things Your Agent Under a Medical Power of Attorney Needs to Know Even if you are currently the picture of good health, you may suddenly become too ill to make healthcare decisions for yourself or become unconscious after an accident, needing someone to stand in your ...

Important Estate Planning Considerations for LGBTQ Couples Everyone needs estate planning. Regardless of your age, race, gender, or sexual orientation, properly protecting your future and your loved ones requires a plan. For LGBTQ couples, there are a few things you should cons...

New Year, New Estate Plan Welcome to 2020! A new year is a time for optimism and new opportunities. It is a time to start fresh and make sure you are headed in the right direction. But makingNew Year's resolutions is not enough: Take action now to ensure that you and your famil...

Common Mistakes with DIY Estate Plans The internet offers all the information and tools we need at our fingertips to create our own estate plan, right? For most people, this is simply not true. Several years ago, Consumer Reports®, an independent nonprofit consumer watchdog gro...

Estate Planning is Like Building a Snowman A complete estate plan must include certain essential parts. In fact, it is similar to building a snowman in some respects. The traditional snowman has several critical components: bottom, middle, and top snowballs, as well as “arms” a...

Importance of Properly Revoking Powers of Attorney It is very important to regularly review and update all of your estate planning documents.However, your financial power of attorney is one document that should be reexamined more frequently than others. Revisiting your financia...

Real estate is more than just your primary residence. It can include other real estate such as a vacation home or a rental property. Depending upon the type of real estate you own, the ideal form of ownership can vary. Below, we take a look at the di...

Real estate can take on different forms of ownership depending upon the number of parties and the unique circumstances involved. Understanding how your real estate is owned, or “titled,” is necessary because this determines the extent of control you have over ...

The SECURE Act: How Does It Affect Your Retirement Accounts? On December 20, 2019, President Trump signed the Setting Every Community Up for Retirement Enhancement Act (SECURE Act), which became effective on January 1, 2020. The Act is the most impactful legislation affecting r...