The affluent have always had access to strategies designed to help them pass money to their heirs with minimal tax obligations. One of the most common estate tax planning strategies is an Irrevocable Life Insurance Trust (ILIT). An ILIT is easy to understand, relatively easy to implement, and in many situations, avoids the need to incorporate other wealth transfer or estate tax reduction techniques.
How individuals can plan philanthropic activities so that they can help their favorite charities, while maximizing the advantages of their philanthropy – from an estate- and tax- planning perspective – for themselves.
Estate planning is a very important part of planning for the future of a person’s family. When it comes to estate planning, three key documents are the last will and testament, the living will, and the health care proxy.
Charitable gift made during a person’s lifetime can serve as a valuable estate planning technique that offers three important tax benefits.
In a perfect world, we all begin saving for retirement in our mid-20s—and the closer we get to retirement, the more confident we feel about having enough saved to live comfortably. However, we do not live in a perfect world. In reality, life throws at us many twists and turns that leave many behind in their retirement savings.
Have you heard of the Great Wealth Transfer? If you’re a millennial, it will likely be of particular interest to you, as it may involve an inheritance coming your way. But do you know how you would handle a large influx of money? How millennials manage their wealth in the coming years will play a large role In achieving financial confidence.
Do you think of your spouse or life partner as your “better half”? If so, you know that your relationship is more than just two people meeting halfway. In a life partnership — and in the family that grows from it — the whole becomes greater than the sum of its parts. One spouse may go out into the world and earn a paycheck, while the other stays home and keeps the household running. Each person has an important role separately; but together, they create a family and a home. If either spouse were suddenly unable to contribute, the entire family would suffer.
Through the lens of history, we know this was an early market bubble, and as the saying attributed to George Santayana promises, “Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” Yet people continue to lose money on the next big thing with every business cycle, from subprime bubbles, to tech bubbles, to housing bubbles.
If you are like most Americans, meeting the future financial obligation of sending your child to college requires years of disciplined saving and intelligent investing. One strategy for accumulating the necessary funds to pay for college is through a 529 college savings plan. But, is it the right approach?
The number of men and women in the United States appears to be approximately equal . . . at first glance. Women walk a different path than men, and a much longer one. After the age of 40, women outnumber men in every age cohort. At age 65, there are twice as many women as men.1 Given varied roles throughout their lifetime and a changing career path, women need to take charge of their own retirement planning. Here are three myths women face, and the retirement planning realities.
