The Plain English Attorney Blog
Far too many attorneys overcomplicate things, making topics convoluted and difficult to understand to the average person. This blog is committed to explaining legal planning topics in an easy to understand format, in plain English. Enjoy the blogs, and please let us know if there is a topic you would like covered.
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This is one of those uncommon times I tell my clients it is important to stay updated with the office newsletter because that is where we post information about critical updates in the estate and Medicaid planning world. For this one, it is mainly small business owners under The Corporate...
When my grandfather passed on, I was just a few weeks away from heading out to law school. My grandmother helped raise me after my mother passed on, so when she started calling me in law school with legal questions, I did my best to explain things to her in plain English because whenever she...
Taken From “The Simple Guide to Special Needs Estate Planning”
“No, you can’t,” the woman was loudly saying. “You can’t leave money to an autistic child! Are you crazy?”
I usually enjoy attending conferences and informational fairs, and my office...
Not every inheritance is welcome or wanted, strange as it seems. There are tax issues, potential lawsuits looming, or even just a desire to see the inheritance go somewhere else. However, there are different ways people believe they can waive off an inheritance, and not all of them are...
The internet can be a tremendous help with research. However, there are a lot of myths, misconceptions, and outright falsehoods out there, especially when it comes to estate planning. We don’t have time to list them all, but here are the top five we have curated to help you get started.
1....
Funding a Revocable Living Trust is critical to ensuring your estate avoids probate. Unfortunately in my line of work, I see too many trusts where nothing, or almost nothing, is actually funded in the trust. That is why I make sure at least every six months or so to post this chapter from my book...
Medicaid is one of the most effective, and most needed, programs when it comes to caring for seniors and our most vulnerable citizens. However, the rules are designed to be extremely complex so that families will tend to throw their hands up in frustration, spend everything they have, and then...
One of the biggest frustrations I see in my line of work is when people who are already going through a crisis because of the death or a long-term illness of a family member end up in probate. This time-consuming, frustrating, and paperwork intensive process only compounds the grief and agony...
When it comes to estate planning, what you do with your estate is wide open. However, there are only two heavyweights when it comes to how you pass along your estate. You are either using a Last Will and Testament, or a revocable living trust as the base of your plan. But which one is best?...
Who's on the team? Or more specifically who's on your team? When it comes to your legal and financial picture in the long run, and who is working with you and your family, it takes more than one professional to know, understand, and monitor everything. This is why a new business model is emerging...
Today we're going to talk about a hot topic, and I keep getting questions about this: “Hey, can't we just remotely sign our estate planning documents?”
The simple answer is “no.” In addition to it not being even legal at this time (at least in the State of North Carolina),...
When it comes to estate planning, there’s always more information coming our way. It’s also not just about tax updates or changes to law, but it can often be just better ways to serve our clients through technological advancements and new platforms. While state bar sponsored...
