Recent Blog Posts

You Are Never Too Young For A Digital Estate Plan
When you spent thousands of hours of your adolescence posting your eloquent musings on your MySpace account, your grandparents may have done the old person equivalent of rolling their eyes, but now that MySpace has come and gone, you are glad that you had the presence of mind to store your writings as Word… Read More »

Demand For Granny Flats In Central Florida Exceeds Supply
Aging in place, where you continue to live in the house or apartment where you live now for as long as your health allows, is the preferred option if you have family members living nearby. Given the choice between aging in place and moving to an assisted living facility, 90 percent of seniors choose… Read More »

Divorce Is The Most Reliable Way To Disinherit Your Spouse
Over the course of a 67-year marriage, you are bound to see your spouse’s flaws as well as their virtues. By the time you are old enough to think about leaving your wealth to your children and grandchildren in your will, you have probably accepted that your spouse’s financial habits, even the ones that… Read More »

New Restrictions On The Gift Tax Exclusion Will Soon Go Into Effect, But How Soon?
Estate planning lawyers like to keep things light during the first few meetings with clients. It’s easy to think about estate planning as being about enjoying life when, unless life takes an unexpected turn, you will still be here to enjoy life when all that is left of the clients in whose faces you… Read More »

Elderly Couple Loses Savings In Venmo Scam
Alan and Aviva Sturm must have done something right as far as their estate plan. Until recently, they lived in a two-bedroom apartment in an assisted living facility in Boynton Beach. Although they both have heart conditions and Alan has epilepsy, their health is stable, since they could afford healthcare and medications through Medicare… Read More »

Cryptocurrency And Your Estate Plan
Any valuable asset that you own has the potential to become generational wealth. Jewelry, furniture, paintings, and other valuables have all become the subject of hotly contested disputes during probate. Even when the decedent’s will was clear about which family member was to inherit which item, there is still plenty of room for hard… Read More »

What To Do If You Don’t Know Whether Your Recently Deceased Family Member Wrote A Will
The probate process, in which the court accounts for a recently deceased person’s assets, gives creditors a chance to seek payment of debts from the deceased person’s estate, files a tax return on behalf of the estate, and distributes the deceased person’s assets to the deceased person’s heirs, depends on whether the decedent wrote… Read More »

Which Source Of Retirement Income Should You Tap Into First?
Financial planners often start their sessions with new clients by asking them how much money they want to spend in retirement. Economics professor Laurence Kotlikoff thinks this approach is wrongheaded, because you can only spend as much as you have, so it is useless to think about how much money you want without first… Read More »

An Economist’s Retirement Planning Advice
Laurence Kotlikoff has been spreading the word about economics and encouraging the public to think like economists since Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner of Freakonomics were children. Kotlikoff even ran for president in 2012 and 2016, not because he thought he would get more votes than the major parties’ candidates but just to drive… Read More »

How To Prevent Estranged Relatives From Becoming Lost Heirs
At your first meeting, an estate planning lawyer will tell you with a smile that estate planning is about planning for life, not planning for death. As you get deeper into details, though, you will realize that estate planning is also about not leaving messes for the people you care about to clean up… Read More »