Inheritance is the stuff of dreams for advisors and clients alike, but it often has nightmarish potential. There's one good reason for this: People have a hard time planning for their own deaths. Sure, most folks of any sort of means have a will...

The next few years will see tremendous change in the world of philanthropic planning. Non-profit entities, as well as the financial and estate-planning communities that serve them, will have to work to adapt to a number of important trends: the...

From David T. Leibell and Daniel L. Daniels of Cummings & Lockwood, LLC, Stamford, Conn., we have this update: IRS approves disclaimer of residuary estate to private foundation. In Private Letter Ruling 200519042 (released May 13), the Service...

Why is it that so many secretaries and mid-level employees believe the estate tax should be permanently repealed? How is it that the gay and lesbian community favor repeal? Why did the congressional black caucus hold a press conference denouncing...

Pundits are warning that when the Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act of 2005 (BAPA) goes into effect this fall (Oct. 17 for most provisions), its clauses on homestead exemptions, pensions and self-settled asset protection...

Modern life creates some distasteful situations. Marriages fail. Wealthy clients want to cut off estranged wives and husbands. Or there's a remarriage and a desire to leave more to the children than to the second wife. Or, a surviving spouse's...

The impact of decisions that planners make about GRATs in transferring wealth can now be more precisely quantified. Advances in quantitative modeling and capital-markets forecasting allow us to evaluate the interactions among the moving parts that...

Ask the typical financial advisor if he provides advanced-planning services, and you are likely to receive an affirmative reply 99 percent of the time. This speaks succinctly to the industry's misconceptions about advanced planning. It is not a...

On June 20, all professionals who practice before the Internal Revenue Service and provide tax opinions must change the way they do business. On that date, the now infamous Circular 230 goes into effect, with compliance language so broad it...

For the fourth time in as many years, the House of Representatives voted on April 13 to repeal the federal estate tax. If what Republicans deride as the death tax survives, it'll be because once again cooler heads prevail in the Senate. Many...