Six Difficult Assets For Planning
By carefully considering what to include in your estate plan—and what to leave out—you can help your family avoid unnecessary conflict and heartache.
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By carefully considering what to include in your estate plan—and what to leave out—you can help your family avoid unnecessary conflict and heartache.
Taking Social Security while still working, may sound like a good way to boost your income while you prepare for your impending retirement, but this strategy can have unexpected costs.
Murdoch’s succession plan sheds light on whether an irrevocable trust can truly be changed, revealing key insights for estate planning.
Legal tools like power of attorney and healthcare directives are essential in forming a proactive legal strategy for cognitive decline.
When managing your estate, people often overlook intellectual property (IP). If you are an artist, inventor, or business owner, your IP can be one of your most valuable assets. Incorporating IP into your estate plan is crucial to ensure that it benefits your heirs, primarily through a testamentary trust. However, what is a testamentary trust, and how can it protect your intellectual property? What Is a Testamentary Trust? A testamentary trust is created as part of your will and only takes effect after you pass away. It allows you to name a trustee who will manage the trust’s assets, including…
I’m a man of means by no means
King of the road…
I am the beneficiary on my father’s life estate deed of his home. He passed in October 2018. I am wanting to sell the house and have not filed a warranty deed to put the house in my name. Also, the life estate deed is via power of attorney because my father had Alzheimer’s and at the time of the preparation of the life estate deed, would not have been considered able to make such a decision.
Planning to age in place secures your finances, healthcare and legal rights, while you continue to live independently in your home.
Seventy-seven percent of respondents in a recent survey said estate and legacy strategies were important for everyone, not just wealthy individuals, yet only 24% said they had taken the basic step of designating beneficiaries for all of their accounts.
Halloween and the Honoring of the Dead: A Journey from the Catacombs to Candy Corn When it comes to honoring the dead, our cultural traditions are full of ghosts, saints, and all manner of solemn and playful commemoration. But how did we arrive at the modern mash-up of costumes, jack-o’-lanterns, and haunted houses that we call Halloween? Let’s take a journey through time—from the underground burial chambers of ancient Rome to the Day of the Dead altars in Mexico—and see how our festive approach to remembering the departed has evolved. And, of course, we’ll tie it back to those personal connections that make honoring the dead a universally shared human experience—like the plaque I’m having installed on the final resting place of my parents. The Origins of Honoring the Dead: Catacombs and Saints Our journey begins deep below the surface of ancient Rome, where early Christians sought refuge in catacombs—underground burial places outside the city walls. These tunnels were not only places to hide from persecution but also served as sites for mourning, prayer, and remembrance. The reverence for martyrs and the ritual of praying for the departed laid the groundwork for what would become All Saints’ Day and All Souls’ Day, marking a time when the faithful would pause to remember those who had died. By the 8th century, these practices were formalized. Pope Gregory III declared November 1st to be a day dedicated to honoring all saints, both known and unknown—a move that transformed the casual veneration of the dead into a structured ecclesiastical event. Thus, All Saints’ Day (also known as All Hallows’ Day) and its companion, All Souls’ Day (November 2nd), became key moments for Christians to visit the graves of loved ones, light candles, and pray for their souls. The Celtic Samhain and the Rise of Halloween Meanwhile, in the lands of the Celts—today’s Ireland, Scotland, and parts of France—another festival was marking the turn of the seasons and the passage from life to death. Samhain (pronounced “Sow-in”) was an ancient harvest festival that took place on October 31st, and it was believed that on this night, the boundary between the world of the living and the realm of the spirits grew thin. People would light bonfires, wear costumes to ward off wandering ghosts and leave offerings to the departed to ensure a bountiful harvest. As Christianity spread across Europe, old pagan customs mingled with new religious traditions. By the time All Saints’ Day was established, its “eve” on October 31st—known as All Hallows’ Eve—became a night to honor the dead in a way that fused both Christian and Celtic beliefs. The transformation was gradual and patchy, but the seeds were sown for what would eventually become our modern Halloween. The Mexican Día de los Muertos: A Celebration of Life and Death While Halloween was brewing in Europe, other parts of the world developed their own traditions to honor the dead. Perhaps none is more colorful and iconic than the Mexican Día de los Muertos