Estate Planning

Retitling of Assets

In addition to drafting your estate planning documents, we also address the ownership of assets. Income tax issues and the method by which property passes to beneficiaries, whether by probate (under your will) or pursuant to operation of law (jointly held property) or under the terms of a beneficiary designation form (insurance contracts and retirement accounts), impact on an estate plan. Rarely do the assets owned by people adequately fit into the proper estate plan for their needs. Some changes are usually necessary, including transfers of assets between spouses to take full advantage of the amount that each spouse can pass to beneficiaries without the payment of estate tax.

Because each client’s situation is unique, we address retitling of assets as a separate item from the drafting of the estate plan. As with the estate planning work, these tasks are handled on an hourly basis.