This book will guide you, step-by-step, as you to get your financial and legal affairs in order after the death of your Spouse. Some of the topics included are: do you need to probate; how to organize and manage your finances; how to apply for social security, insurance and retirement benefits; when you need an accountant; what if your Spouse owned a business; how to pick an attorney; how to get your own affairs in order; beneficiary designations; power of attorney; medical power of attorney; guardians; wills; trusts; how you can avoid probate. There are no do-it-yourself legal forms, but there are 10 forms and checklists you can download (included in the price of the book) which streamline the process and save you time and energy. A Personal Note from the Author "Although I've been an estate planning and probate attorney for 30 years, I'm really in the peace of mind business. Once your affairs are in order, you will have made things as easy as possible for yourself and you will achieve peace of mind."

New Tax Court decisions have had a major impact on wealth succession planning the last few years, including the popular use of the family limited partnership. This guide will keep you current with legal arguments and technical analyses that apply to estate and gift tax law specific to the business valuation profession, including family limited partnership and wealth succession planning. 220 estate and gift tax law court case abstracts dating back to 1995 including in-depth analysis on the recent Astleford, Bigelow, Holman, and Jelke decisions; articles on estate and gift tax law and FLPs excerpted from the Business Valuation Update; 4 never-before-published research articles by experts William Chandler, Bruce Johnson, Will Frazier, and Owen Fiore; plus a quick reference summary table that outlines the cases abstracted. Court case abstracts from the past year, including in-depth analysis on the Astleford, Bigelow, Holman, and Jelke decisions.

Equity and Trusts in Nigeria covers wide-ranging issues in this area of law and draws from a mixture of property law and the law of obligation. Some of the topics covered are: History and Development of Equity; Equitable interest in land; The nature of trust; Matrimonial property and trusts; Charitable trust; General equitable defenses; Trustees' fiduciary duties; Commercial trusts and insolvency; and the future of equity.

The Estate Planning Handbook covers the basic issues relating to Estate Planning such as wills and trusts, health care surrogates and powers of attorney to the more advanced issues relating to QTIPs, Private Annuities and Family Partnerships along with case law from the tax court.

This handbook is intended to educate and inform people who need to learn about the probate administration process, including the nature of the process, the steps involved, the functions of the probate court and the personal representative(s) of the estate.

WHO SHOULD OWN THE GUIDE?

IF you are named on your own, parent's, relative's, friend's or neighbor's estate plan as a trustee, you will need to know your responsibilities and have the system to successfully address the trust placed in you.

IF you are establishing an estate plan with an independent third party, bank or corporate trustee, you will want to use the guide's, "Notify-Respond-Verify" system. Make sure they get it correct.

IF you are a parent or grandparent, what gift could be more important or useful than a well drafted estate plan and a system to make it work? Give your heirs the tools they can use to make the plan a success.

WHO SHOULD GIVE THE GUIDE?

IF you are an estate planning attorney you realize your clients need a system for transferring and tracking their assets. This is it. The Guide for the Successful Trustee.

IF you are an accountant do your clients have their assets properly titled? Use the "Guide" to get the proper registration and use the system to keep it that way. Thousands of dollars in unnecessary taxes and fees are generated by incorrect registrations.

IF you are a financial advisor, have your peers and predecessors titled all of their clients' past investments properly? What is your liability to clients on past transactions and current estate plans? Meet with the client and family go over the three phases of estate planning. Illustrate the phases and the differences between the three. "The Guide for the Successful Trustee" has the system to make it simple and successful.

JOINT PROPERTY CAN DESTROY YOUR ESTATE. While it seems easy to retitle accounts as joint with a right of survivorship, it can come with DEVASTATING TAXES and LAWSUIT LIABILITY. But there are legal and effective planning solutions to help your family AVOID PROBATE and UNNECESSARY TAXES. Trust planning can provide PEACE OF MIND... but only if you plan ahead, use the RIGHT DOCUMENTS and work with the RIGHT PROFESSIONALS. You'll learn how folk remedies like joint property can produce a tax and legal nightmare; how proven planning techniques can avoid the probate process while avoiding unnecessary taxes; and how a trust can protect your assets from your children's divorcing spouses and bad spending habits.

Acting as a power of attorney or as an estate trustee carries a great deal of financial and legal responsibility. But in "Let the Records Show," authors Linda A. Alderson and Douglas Alan Alderson have distilled the information and have provided a step-by-step guide to keeping financial and property affairs in order. "Let the Records Show" offers a ten-step guide for effectively handling record-keeping obligations, and it demystifies and simplifies the terminology and related work processes associated with creating a complete and proper information trail to satisfy legal interests. It also provides: Answers to questions to consider before acting as an attorney An overview of accounting and legal terms presented in plain English Tips on the fundamentals of being an attorney or estate trustee Guidance on inventory preparation Comparison between the roles of attorney and estate trustee A review of common problems and how to fix them Information on estate litigation basics Charts, templates, and checklists to help you stay organized Filled with practical guidance on how to maintain financial records to meet the legal requirements, "Let the Records Show" helps to simplify the roles of power of attorney and estate trustee.

In "Administering the California Special Needs Trust, " author Kevin Urbatsch presents a guide for anyone assigned the duty of managing a Special Needs Trust for a person with a disability. Though geared toward those who never have administered a trust, it also provides sophisticated answers for experienced trustees concerning some of the unique responsibilities a trustee of a special needs trust will encounter. Urbatsch, a California attorney who has years of experience in assisting trustees to manage special needs trusts, has written extensively for both attorneys and families on how best to establish a special needs trust. "Administering the Special Needs Trust" addresses specific California issues that a special needs trust trustee encounters daily. In a question-and-answer format, it addresses how to avoid the most common mistakes made by SNT trustees; understand the type of public benefits available for California persons with disabilities; learn how SNT disbursements will affect these public benefits; best pay for a person with a disability's housing, caregiver costs, transportation, and related expenses; handle SNT investments, accountings, and taxes; terminate the SNT. With checklists, form documents, and law summaries included, "Administering the Special Needs Trust" contains a wide range of information for those charged with the responsibility of managing a special needs trust for people with disabilities.

A guide written in layman's terms describing the bookkeeping aspects of being an executor, trustee, or attorney for property under Ontario law. Readers will have access to online spreadsheets available for download. The spreadsheeets include sample entries and formulas to make it easier to get started. As one reviewer has said, "For most of us, taking on the role of an executor is a confusing and daunting task. In this guide, Donna has done an excellent job of explaining the elements of simple estate accounting and provides a useful template to guide you through the process. I cannot imagine a better introduction to this challenging topic."

Now available in paperback, Fiduciary Loyalty presents a comprehensive analysis of the nature and function of fiduciary duties. The concept of loyalty, which lies at the heart of fiduciary doctrine, is a form of protection which is designed to enhance the likelihood of due performance of non-fiduciary duties by seeking to avoid influences or temptations that may distract the fiduciary from providing such proper performance. In developing this position, the book takes the novel approach of putting to one side the difficult question of when fiduciary duties arise, in order to focus attention instead on what fiduciary duties do when they are owed. The issue of when fiduciary duties arise can then be returned to - and considered more profitably - once a clear view has emerged of the function that such duties perform. This analysis has both practical and theoretical implications for understanding fiduciary doctrine. For example, it provides a sound conceptual footing for understanding the relationship between fiduciary and non-fiduciary duties, highlighting the practical importance of analyzing both forms of duties carefully when considering fiduciary claims. Further, it explains a number of tenets within fiduciary doctrine, such as the proscriptive nature of fiduciary duties and the need to obtain the principal's fully informed consent in order to avoid fiduciary liability. Understanding the relationship between fiduciary and non-fiduciary duties also provides a solid foundation for addressing issues concerning compensatory remedies for their breach and potential defenses, such as contributory fault. The distinctive purpose that fiduciary duties serve also provides a firm theoretical basis for maintaining their separation from other forms of civil obligation, such as those that arise under the law of contracts and of torts. Fiduciary Loyalty was the winner of the 2nd SLS Peter Birks Prize for Outstanding Legal Scholarship 2010.

This book is designed for law school courses covering intestate succession and wills. The cases, problems, and questions are drawn extensively from Texas materials and attempt to provide the student with a comprehensive understanding of how property transmission at death is handled in Texas.

New Strategies for asset protection, estate planning and privacy. The author, attorney Robert J. Mintz, describes the latest strategies for insulating and shielding assets from potential lawsuit liability. Detailed examples, diagrams, and real life case studies are provided for using Family Limited Partnerships, Limited Liability Companies, Asset Protection Trusts and creative privacy plans. Offshore corporations and bank accounts are clearly explained and the advantages and disadvantages of popular techniques are presented.

Your financial legacy is different than anyone else s. The effort you put into earning and saving your money, your retirement plans, your dreams for your family s future: these are all uniquely yours. Blindly following a cookie-cutter tax solution will jeopardize these wishes and cost you dearly. Cut Your Tax in 2010 gives you the straight talk on why most of us are destined to pay too much in taxes and what you can do to escape this fate. Learn: Why Uncle Sam desperately wants your money How to protect your personal and business assets in four smart steps How an estate plan can save your family more than just taxes Plus, get insights on the capital gains trap, the tax benefits of living trusts, and other tax-saving tips. This book is ideal if you are a retiree or someone working towards retirement who has built up a financial legacy for your family. Don t hand Uncle Sam more of your hard-earned money than he deserves. Learn what it takes to truly protect it, grow it, and pass it on.

Don't Fall Victim to Discriminatory Laws Not when you and your partner can do something about it. You and your partner can empower yourselves though the proven legal techniques described in the book Estate Planning for Domestic Partners: The Legal Secrets You Need to Know to Protect Your Partner and Your Future. Written by a prominent partner protection planning attorney, this valuable information can help you navigate around the restrictive laws that prevent you and your partner from gaining full marriage and tax rights by using other legal principles such as contracts, trusts, and powers of attorney.

Are you interested in paying the minimum amount of estate and gift taxes? Would you like to avoid probate and keep your financial affairs private? Estate Planning in Arizona is the reference you need. Written for Arizonans with little or no legal experience, this book tells you what you need to know:

The basics of wills and trusts
Protecting your assets
Appointing guardians for your children
Health care directives and living wills
Taking title to real estate
. . . and much more!

Providing you with a better understanding of the laws and issues involved in estate planning, this comprehensive, easy-to-understand book will help you to preserve wealth, protect your family, and create a winning succession plan.

The use of international trusts continues to expand, and practitioners increasingly need to be aware of cross-border considerations. This title provides a concise and practical overview of the key aspects of law and practice in all the key jurisdictions offering trusts.
Private and commercial trusts are established under the law of an increasing number of jurisdictions, which are competing to attract trust business, and these laws are often dissimilar. As international trusts mature, established trust jurisdictions are changing their laws to comply with the legal demands and standards imposed by international agencies, as well as to meet the legitimate expectations of the institutional investor. The courts of international centers are also developing their own jurisprudence. In addition, jurisdictions new to trusts are introducing trusts in the vehicles which they offer investors, and legislation from these new trust centers is opening up new routes for international investment and tax mitigation.
This book provides a comprehensive treatment of the subject, covering all the key on-shore and off-shore jurisdictions that practitioners typically encounter. It offers a very practical overview of the subject using a questionnaire format for each country, avoiding academic material, and giving concise answers to the sorts of frequently asked questions that arise in trust law and practice. The questionnaire covers a full range of subjects such as the mechanics of trusts, issues such as anti-money laundering laws and conflicts of laws, shams, protectors, and forced heirship as well as the different types of trusts used in a jurisdiction.
Formerly an annual special issue in the journal Trusts & Trustees, this title has been improved and extended with a reworked questionnaire, new countries and contributors, and a new editor, Charles Gothard.

The Gay Marriage Alternative provides LGBT and other unmarried couples with partner protection planning solutions now that are equal to or better than rights married heterosexual couples take for granted... without changing the law. The right combination of trusts, powers of attorney and medical directives can provide these rights while retitling accounts as joint with a right of survivorship, drafting Wills, and transferring funds to a partner can lead to tax or administrative disasters. Find out the right way you and your partner can seize legal equality, security, and peace of mind. While the struggle for nationwide marriage equality may take decades, partners can protect each other now.

ESTATE PLANNING: The Heroes Way for Baby Boomers, is a one-of-a-kind book that answers the question: How do you help people stare mortality in the face, and enjoy it as they plan the distribution of their legacy after death? This book provides you George Washington as a modern hero, with surefooted steps exploring and explaining every angle of the death and inheritance system. The Heroes Way, tells you which Revocable Trust may be right for you. If you do not like the plan, that's great! At least, you are thinking for yourself, and know what you are talking about. You will be learning how you want to create your trust, not the way someone else deems is right. That means you understand how "credit shelter trusts" work. Then you can get the job done.

Drafting effective wills and trust allows property to be given to the people or institutions that matter most to an individual. This book explains how to do the special, thoughtful drafting required by anyone who truly cares about distribution of property, care of elderly parents, guardians for young children, or care for pets after the owner is gone. The book is richly illustrated by samples of techniques used in the actual wills and trusts of well-known Americans. Topics covered include: WHAT HAPPENS WITHOUT A WILL; CAPACITY TO MAKE A WILL; SELECTING THE TRUSTEES; DESIGNING PET TRUSTS. Realistic, thought-provoking DRAFTING EXERCISES followed by detailed POINTERS FOR DRAFTING help the reader develop the skills needed for effective drafting. The concluding chapters cover related documents, including: MEDICAL AND FINANCIAL POWERS OF ATTORNEY, MEDICAL DIRECTIVES and LIVING WILLS. About the author: Lucy Marsh, Professor of Law at University of Denver Sturm College of Law is a native to Denver. She is a 1963 graduate of Smith College and a 1966 graduate of the University of Michigan Law School. While attending the University of Michigan, she played a key role in setting up the first legal clinic in Ann Arbor to serve the underprivileged. She has led a distinguished career as an attorney, professor and advocate for community causes. Admitted to the bar in both Connecticut and Colorado, she was the first woman elected to the Colorado Bar Association Real Estate Section's Title Standards Committee, served the city as member of the Denver District Attorney's Office in the 1970's, was a commissioner to the Colorado Real Estate Commission, and provided legal assistance to the Colorado AIDS project. Her academic career at the University of Denver began in 1973 as a part time professor and led up to her present position as a full professor in 1982. Since that time she was voted DU Professor of the Year in 1985 and was elected by the students in 1987 to give the commencement address. She now leads a unique program in which the students in her Trust and Estates classes participate in a Will's Lab, providing free services for the indigent and elderly. She also employs a unique teaching tool called the Technicolor System, attributed to her father, Thompson Marsh, to assist in the learning process by color coding different types of information in student's legal drafts

The principles of Nigerian law of succession and the statutes backing them are presented in practical language; and includes an extensive number of case studies. Among the topics covered are legitimacy, legitimation and rights of inheritance; intestate succession (non-customary); testate succession (wills); succession under customary law; and administration of estates. Itse Sagay is a Senior Advocate of Nigeria and was previously a professor of law and Dean of the Faculty of Law at the University of Benin. He is currently in private practice, and a consultant to numerous local and international clients.

No matter what your age or marital status, someone in your family will be affected by probate in one way or another. Julie Jason's Guide to Connecticut Probate: What Every Connecticut Family Needs to Know About Probate, gives you a lay of the land in an easy to understand form that you and your family members will enjoy reading. Acclaimed by experts in the trusts and estates field, this book will help you learn important lessons that your family can apply today to address uncertainties, save money, avoid unnecessary taxes, find and work with an experienced lawyer, and set up a family plan to organize affairs. Worth the price of the book alone is the reference section containing official Connecticut forms and publications and other valuable resources.

Overview of the laws of trusts in Nigeria as well as a study of the sociological nature, function and adequacy of trusts as a means of administrating property in Nigeria.