With no New Hampshire estate plan in place, your family could be exposed to serious issues with housing. Depending on how the home is owned and deeded, it might become a thorny part of your NH probate. Many people cannot afford to make estate planning mistakes that would jeopardize their ability to let their loved ones move on during this very difficult time. This is where the support and experience of a Read More
Estate Planning: What Is a Step Up in Basis?
Passing on assets to your loved ones is a very common goal in estate planning. It involves many different assets that you could pass on outright to your loved ones through beneficiary designation forms, such as on a life insurance policy or retirement account or through strategies like trusts. If you are passing on assets outside of retirement accounts, be aware that these could be impacted by a step up in basis. A Read More
How Does a Power of Attorney Work in New Hampshire?
Do you have a plan for what happens if you’re incapacitated and not able to speak to your own decisions? If not, you should do this in a power of attorney plan. A power of attorney allows the appointed agent to act on behalf of the principal or the creator. The creator of the document determines whether or not the power of attorney is specific or more general in nature. When the agent can show this document to other Read More
Most Important Terms to Know with Trust Distribution
There are several common phrases and words often referenced in a trust document to describe the purposes for discretionary distributions. These usually fall under the category of standard of living, emergencies, welfare, support and maintenance, education and health. When the creator of the trust has included provisions for the trustee to make their own calls about what applies for trust distribution, it’s helpful Read More
Should You Establish a Trust in New Hampshire?
There are many estate planning tools out there and you must decide what’s going to work for your individual plans. The two most common tools are a will and a trust, which function individually as well as together. When you have not used these tools before, you’ll likely want the help of an experienced estate planning lawyer to give you further details about these so that you know what to expect and how to Read More
What Other Documents Might My Personal Representative Need?
When you pass away the will is the basic document in your estate plan that helps make things easy for this person but it's not the only document that your executor might need. If you can be organized and work with an estate planning lawyer to discuss the specifics of your situation, you will make it that much easier for your executor to know where to look to find this important information. Most executors will not Read More
Should I Make My Trust Easy to Change?
Before sitting down to work with an estate planning attorney, you have an important choice to make: to make your trust easy to change or not. This is the primary distinction between a revocable and an irrevocable trust. Although the term trust accurately describes both of these, they accomplish different purposes based on the fact that you can update one but not the other. There are many good reasons that you might Read More
What Is the Difference Between Intestate and Probate?
When you pass away without a will, you are said to have died intestate. This means there is no documented plan for what will happen to your assets. In these cases each state has specific rules about who will receive your assets and how those will be divided. This is a leading reason why it's important to set aside a time to meet with an attorney to create a will. There's plenty of confusion between the concepts of Read More
Advantages of Using a Revocable Living Trust for Asset Transfer
There are many different advantages to using a revocable living trust as part of your estate planning. If an accident or an illness leaves you incapacitated but still alive, your successor trustee is able to handle your financial affairs without the need for appointing a conservator or a guardian by the court. Another major benefit to using a revocable living trust is that if the beneficiaries of your trust are Read More
What Qualities Should I Consider in Naming Someone as Trustee?
One of the most important distinctions between a revokable and an irrevocable trust, concerns who will be appointed as the successor or initial trustee. If you are putting together an irrevocable trust, naming yourself as a trustee would defeat the primary purpose of this estate planning strategy. Naming a successor trustee of a revokable trust or a primary trustee of an irrevocable trust, however, requires careful Read More
