by Lisa Adler | Aug 27, 2015 | Appointment of Healthcare Representitive, Incapacity Planning, Intestate, Living Wills, Power of Attorney, Trusts, Wills, Wills & Trusts
I just tweeted an article by a Boston financial planner, Dee Lee, who discusses the importance of parents with minor children getting their estate plans in place. I strongly feel that setting up an estate plan with protections for minor children is just as important...
by Lisa Adler | Aug 14, 2015 | Appointment of Healthcare Representitive, Estate Administration, Guardianship, In the News, Incapacity Planning, Litigation, Living Wills, Power of Attorney
A few weeks ago, I wrote about the importance of having your now adult child get his or her estate planning documents prepared. The idea may seem unnecessary at first blush — your now 18 year old (or twenty-something) “adult” child has just reached...
by Lisa Adler | Jul 5, 2015 | Appointment of Healthcare Representitive, Incapacity Planning
It’s the stuff of parents’ worst anxieties when headed out of town for business or vacation, leaving their minor children at home in the care of a friend of family — their child is injured or becomes sick in their absence. Imagine, leaving with your...
by Lisa Adler | Jun 19, 2015 | Appointment of Healthcare Representitive, Incapacity Planning, Living Wills, Power of Attorney
Having a child attain the age of 18 brings with it the legal age of majority and autonomy in her decisionmaking. One aspect of this age of “adulthood” that may not be readily apparent to both the now-adult child and her parents is the immediate loss of...
by Lisa Adler | Feb 28, 2015 | Estate Administration, Incapacity Planning, Trusts, Wills, Wills & Trusts
This is a topic of much passion for me. Estate planning is a necessary protection for all parents with minor children. Yet, national surveys reveal that less than 40 percent of Americans with children under the age of 18 have their estate planning documents in...
by Lisa Adler | Dec 20, 2014 | Elder Law, In the News
Update on the ABLE Act: From the National Academy of Elder Law Lawyers: Congress passed the ABLE Act on this week, which creates tax-favored accounts for children and adults whose disability occurred before age 26. The ABLE Act allows these tax-favored accounts to...
by Lisa Adler | Dec 3, 2014 | Estate Administration, Wills & Trusts
The IRS announced the 2015 Gift and Estate Tax Exemption Amounts, along with other tax changes, here. For persons dying in 2015, the Federal Estate Tax exemption amount has increased to to $5,430,000, up from the 2014 exclusion amount of $5,340,000. This means that,...
by Lisa Adler | Dec 1, 2014 | Elder Law, In the News
The National Academy of Elder Law Attorneys asked its members to share this post: “This Week: House Could Vote on Tax-Favored Accounts for Some Persons with Disabilities The House may potentially vote on a bill this week that would create tax-favored accounts...
by Lisa Adler | Sep 15, 2014 | Estate Administration, In the News, Trusts, Wills, Wills & Trusts
Yesterday I visited Indianapolis’s Cat Haven, a wonderful local non-profit that provides homes for abandoned cats. Many of these cats are elderly (10 years old or older), which gave me pause to consider how a cat that age would end up abandoned. It seems...
by Lisa Adler | Sep 10, 2014 | Appointment of Healthcare Representitive, Elder Law, Guardianship, Incapacity Planning, Living Wills, Power of Attorney
Fellow legal bloggers Danielle and Andy Mayoras (find them here and here) have a great article today about end-of-life lessons to be learned from Joan River’s passing. All estate plans should include planning for incapacity and end-of-life decision making. The...