Three Dangers About Making Your Own Estate Plan
Can I make my own estate plan? Here’s the short answer, don’t do it. This is a common question, and while it is possible to make your own estate plan, it is very complex, and there will be holes. You could Google "how to write a will" but whatever blog article comes up, it won't be a proper will and it won't help your estate plan. But isn’t it possible to create an estate plan from scratch in a matter of minutes? What about a transfer-on-death deed for my land or adding my kids to my bank account? Again, you can, although ... Read More
The HJTA Responds to Prop 19 with an Initiative to Repeal the Death Tax
Many Californians are already feeling the effects of newly passed Proposition 19, also entitled the “Home Protection for Seniors, Severely Disabled, Families, and Victims of Wildfire or Natural Disasters Act.” The Act essentially amended the California Constitution and dramatically changed the property tax reassessment landscape in the State. Although some do support the terms and conditions of Prop 19, there is an effort to repeal the newly passed legislation completely by certain organizations. One of these includes the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association (HJTA), which is a California-based nonprofit lobbying and policy organization that advocates for taxpayers and protections for Proposition ... Read More
Understanding FDIC Coverage on Trust Accounts: A Crucial Aspect of Estate Planning
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The Benefits of Hybrid Policies for Long-Term Care Estate Planning
Nursing home care costs can be outrageous should you become critically ill or injured. You might know from reading my blog articles or from reading my eBook UNDERSTANDING LONG-TERM CARE MEDI-CAL that Medicare would cover only a minimal amount of those costs. Moreover, Medi-Cal may only be part of the solution for you. Private insurance doesn’t seem like a good bet either if you’ve heard horror stories about skyrocketing premium costs and difficulties in even obtaining long-term care (LTC) insurance in the first place. There may be a better way. “Hybrid” policies essentially combine life insurance or an annuity with ... Read More
Life Insurance Is an Important Part of Your Estate Plan
Initially, it may seem as though life insurance does not have much impact on your estate plan. However, life insurance can be an integral, indispensably important part of a well-thought-out estate plan. There are numerous other benefits to owning a life insurance policy aside from providing a large sum of money to beneficiaries. Life insurance provides immediate cash upon death that can pay debts, including large debts such as a home mortgage, final income taxes of the insured, credit card debt and funeral expenses. A life insurance cash infusion can also pay federal estate taxes and avoid the forced sale ... Read More
Court Rules the Fiduciary Rule Is No Longer Enforceable
The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals found that the U.S. Labor Department’s fiduciary rule is no longer protected or able to be enforced. The fiduciary rule required financial advisors to act solely in their clients’ best interest as it related to investments into retirement accounts such as 401(k) and IRAs. Practically speaking, this required financial advisors to disclose all fees and commissions, in an easy-to-understand form, that they would earn from your investments and would prevent them from concealing any conflicts of interest. For instance, without this rule in place, financial advisors could take two similar funds, and invest your ... Read More
Organizing and Storing Important Documents for Safekeeping
Acknowledging how tenuous any individual’s grip on life can be, it is crucial to be ready to transfer relevant personal documentation to your executor, and not wait until some emergency, or worse. In response to this sobering realization, I developed a list of important documents to help ensure all my family’s documents are readily accessible in case of need. I call the list “LifeDocs.” I considered signing up for a subscription service offered by a company, Everplans, to organize and store my family documents on-line in an electronic vault, but decided I am not yet ready to trust our documents ... Read More
Millennials and Finances
Millennials are known as fiscally conservative, savings oriented, and future planners seeking financial freedom as core attributes. A large part of millennials' formative years was influenced by the US sub-prime mortgage crisis beginning in 2007, shortly followed by an international banking crisis, which led to what became known as the Great Recession. The millennial generation would have ranged from ages 11 – 26 years of age when this economic downturn began. Living through this economic volatility, not seen since the Great Depression, gave rise to the fiscally conservative millennial mindset. The other socio-economic force that continues to shape the millennial ... Read More
Almost Everyone Has a Digital Footprint – Do you have a Plan?
In today’s world, there are very few individuals without a digital footprint anymore. From social networks like Facebook, Linkedin, Instagram, Twitch.tv and Twitter, blogs and licensed domain names, email, music, photos, seller accounts on eBay, Amazon, or Itsy, gaming accounts, even your financial, utility, and medical accounts are all part of your digital footprint. When most of us created these accounts, we blithely accepted the End User License Agreement (EULA) without much thought to when we would no longer be around to manage their content and activity. However, a EULA designates in detail the rights and restrictions that apply when ... Read More
Is Long-term Care Health Insurance on the Path of Collapsing?
Routine estimates predict that about 50 percent of older adults will require long-term care at some stage of their lives. If you are an adult 65 or more, the percentage moves up to 70 percent. However, the demand for long-term care far outnumbers an affordable or even existing supply. For years the private sector long-term care insurers have been fleeing the marketplace. Americans who currently carry long-term care insurance are a small fraction, about 7 percent, adults over 50 years of age. There is a private sector inability to meet Americans' overwhelming long-term care needs at an affordable price. The ... Read More
A Solution For Financial Literacy & Wealth
Financial literacy does not require a unique set of skills, specialized knowledge, or even excessive risks. You can choose a path that can, over time, make you a self-made millionaire, provided you are a millennial or younger. Americans who achieve millionaire and multi-millionaire status using the Saver & Investor technique took about 32 years to accumulate multi-million-dollar wealth. Some reached it as early as 18 years. These people are called saver-investors, and when you encounter one, they might not seem that rich at first glance. Saver-Investors typically are ordinary people without any particular advantages in life. They did not come ... Read More
How Do You Prepare For the Next Pandemic in Your Estate Planning?
The disease-causing the 2019 novel coronavirus outbreak got its name on February 11, 2020, by the World Health Organization (WHO). The coronavirus disease 2019 shortly after became known by its abbreviation, CO for corona, VI for virus, D for disease, and 19 for the year of the outbreak; COVID-19. This virus will likely become a milder illness in time because of vaccinations, pandemic controls, and naturally occurring herd immunities. Still, COVID-19 will probably be with us humans forever, endemic in large swaths of the world in varying degrees of intensity. According to National Geographic, COVID-19 may eventually transition into a ... Read More
