Equalizing Mom/Dad’s Estate Distribuitions When Assets Pass Via Joint Accounts

Tax ID Numbers - A Primer

Adopting The Dead

Ohio Fells Another Trust Mill – UPDATE
My last post pointed to a Columbus Bar Association press release about Columbus Bar Assn. v. Am. Family Prepaid Legal Corp., Slip Opinion No. 2009-Ohio-5336, (available here as a PDF).  In that case the Ohio Supreme Court found that “American Family Prepaid Legal Corporation (“American Family”) and its various allied entities and associates – after being pursued by the Columbus Bar since

Ohio Fells Another Trust Mill
From a Columbus Bar Association press release last Wednesday: The Columbus Bar Association announced today that the Supreme Court of Ohio, in a unanimous decision in Columbus Bar Assn. v. Am. Family Prepaid Legal Corp., Slip Opinion No. 2009-Ohio-5336, (available here as a PDF) took a momentous step to protect Ohio’s citizens from illegal trust mills that prey upon seniors and oth

Income From Restricted Endowment Can Be Used For Construction Project at Cleveland Museum of Art
The Cleveland Museum of Art’s Endowment fund may use the income from four “art-purchase funds” to contribute to the cost of renovating the museum even though such use is against the original intent of such funds, the Cleveland Plain Dealer reported this morning.  Yesterday’s ruling was handed down by Judge Anthony J. Russoof the Cuyahoga County Probate Court thus helping “the museum move its $350 million construction project to completion by 2013. The proje

The Case That Will Never End – Anna Nicole Smith Investigated in Murder Plot
I thought all elements of this case had been covered…  Oh how naive I can be. This article muses about Mrs. Smith’s possible involvement in a plot to kill her late husband’s son while they were battling over her husband’s estate.  And, while hundreds of millions of dollars is a pretty solid motive, the investigation doesn’t appear to have gotten anywhere beyond motive. Smith’s FBI records, obtained exclusively by The Associated Press, say the agency investigated Smith in 2000 and 2001 in a murder-for-hire plot targeting E. Pierce Marshall

The Future of The Estate Tax – Rumor Round-Up
Much has been written of late about our evolving federal estate tax so I thought it prudent to aggregate the claims, guesses and rumors that are out there.  I don’t know if this is meant to assist you with planning decisions or just to get a sense of which way the prevailing winds are a-blowin’ , but I just thought it would be interesting. There are a couple different camps out there and I’ll try to organize them thusly below: 1. The 1-Year Extension In summary this school of thought is of the opinion that congress won’t get into any real debate over the FET this year.  Instead, they’ll merely pass a 1 year extension of 2009’s