Minnesota has a professional firms act that requires licensed professionals (as defined in MN Statute 319B.02 subd.19) to, among other things, register their business as a professional firm. One particular requirement of the statute, that all owners of the business be licensed professionals, often makes succession planning a challenge. Under most circumstances, an LLC member […]
PART V: WHAT? RECOGNIZING THE ASSETS. “An artist is someone who produces things that people don’t need to have but that he for some reason thinks it would be a good idea to give them.” ~Andy Warhol, Pop Art Pioneer So far, this series has revealed why estate planning for artists is so essential, who […]
Historically, determining a decedent’s heirs was easy – determine all of the decedent’s living family members on the date of decedent’s death and if decedent’s wife was pregnant on the date of his death, wait to see if the child is born alive. Now, however, science has provided us with the ability to freeze genetic […]
As the gay marriage debate rages on across the country, another related issue is gaining traction as well—gay divorce. Gay marriage is currently legal in six states and the District of Columbia. There is no marriage residency requirement in these states either. That means couples can get married in these states without living there. And […]
Recently, at a Wills For Heroes clinic, a first responder asked what the requirements were for a Will to be valid in Minnesota and wondered if a Will could be handwritten. I thought these were interesting questions and wanted to share my answers with all of you dedicated Epilawg readers. Will Requirements First, Minnesota, like […]
If you are one of the millions of parents who own a life insurance policy, you may have your child named individually as a primary or contingent beneficiary if you were to pass away while the policy was still in effect. However, naming a child individually, especially under the age of eighteen, can have unintended […]
May 2012 was a big month for Facebook co-founder, Mark Zuckerberg, with his company going public and his surprise wedding to longtime girlfriend, Priscilla Chan. Zuckerberg and Chan were able to pull off a very private and intimate celebration but what followed was a flurry of news reports speculating about the financial planning that had […]
Suppose your aging mother asks your sister to take care of her finances and help her to balance her checkbook. You live out of town, and think it’s a great idea. To make things easier, your mother adds your sister as a joint owner of her bank account. When your mother dies, her Will leaves […]
PART IV: HOW? DETERMINING THE TOOLS. “When an artist of talent makes a painting or a sculpture, he is always aware of the potentials and limitations of his materials; the better the artist, the more likely he is to know just what he can and cannot do with them.” ~Bruce Cole, Art Scholar and Senior […]
My clients frequently claim that their number one goal in establishing an estate plan is to “avoid probate.” Upon further discussion, I discover that most have a number of misconceptions regarding what probate actually is. Probate Probate is, quite simply, the legal process by which assets owned by a decedent are transferred to the rightful […]
We previously discussed the options available to a surviving spouse inheriting a qualified retirement account. This article will address the options available to a non-spouse beneficiary inheriting a qualified retirement account. Just for a brief reminder, for purposes of this article, the term “retirement account” will be used to encompass all qualified retirement accounts, meaning […]