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Estate planning attorney Sarasota

Estate Planning Series: What Is Estate Planning and Why Is It Important?

By Estate Planning

The term Estate Planning refers to the act of preparing for the transfer of a person’s wealth and assets after they pass away. Your “estate” consists of all of the property you owned at your time of death, including but not limited to: real estate, bank accounts, stocks, life insurance policies and personal property. Estate planning is essential because it prevents your assets from ending up with unintended beneficiaries, protects your family and can minimize the amount of taxes that need to be paid for your beneficiaries to receive your property. Additionally, Estate Planning establishes what kind of funeral arrangements that you want, states what kind of life-prolonging medical support you wish to receive if incapacitated and avoids the time as well as the costs associated with probate proceedings. Estate Planning is a way to ensure that your wishes for your assets are honored after you pass away, and can greatly reduce the amount of stress and uncertainty your loved ones will be faced with when you die. Grieving is difficult enough without having to handle a myriad of complex decisions, and Estate Planning can help your family minimize their stress in difficult times such as these.

The skilled attorneys at Bach & Jacobs are experienced in Estate Planning, so if you need assistance or have any questions, please contact our office at (941) -906-1231.

September 12, 2017
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Care Planning Part 2

By Long-Term Care

While typical estate planning includes planning for incapacity during one’s lifetime as well as distribution of one’s assets upon their passing, Elder Law attorneys have an added focus of planning with long-term care in mind. If and when long term care becomes necessary, your end of life planning documents allow those you trust most to ensure you are cared for in a manner that comports with your wishes. Adding certain provisions to existing planning documents can enable those trusted persons to pursue additional planning strategies if and when the time comes for a senior to utilize long-term care. When the time comes for Medicaid pension planning, it is critical that the agent have the authority to take specific actions on behalf of the elderly person, such as establishing and funding an irrevocable trust, filing a Medicaid application, or preparing a VA pension application. The grant of authority must be clearly stated within the documents. Having clients in our office before they are in need of immediate long-term care allows our attorneys to successfully assist our clients in the most effective manner possible.

If you have further questions, contact our office at (941) 906-1231 to schedule an appointment with one of our attorneys.

August 11, 2017
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Losing Capacity

By Asset Protection Planning, Estate Planning, Guardianship

It is important that while competent you decide who will make personal decisions and who will make financial decisions on your behalf should you lose capacity. Consulting with an attorney regarding your choice of agent or fiduciary will help ensure that your wishes are followed. If a person has not made these decisions and consulted with an attorney, a legal guardianship proceeding may be commenced to appoint an individual who will make decisions on a person’s behalf if the person is incapacitated.

For help regarding these matters, contact our office at (941) 906-1231 to schedule an appointment with one of our attorneys.

July 18, 2017
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Babette Bach to speak at the Friendship Center on: “How Would A Disability Upset Your Retirement Financial Planning?”

By Asset Protection Planning, Firm News

Babette Bach will be speaking at the Friendship Center, 1888 Brother Geenen Way, event at 2:00pm on Wednesday, May 17th, 2017.  The topic is “How Would A Disability Upset Your Retirement Financial Planning?”. In this hour long program Babette will discuss the necessity to plan for disability and guardianship avoidance. Additionally, she will discuss recent legislation regarding living wills and trends in other states towards compassion choice. For more information on this event, please go to: www.friendshipcenterforagingstudies.org. and click the following link to see the flyer for this event: fcas-may-2017-bach-wright

May 10, 2017
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What to Know About Having Witnesses Present at Your Will Signing

By Estate Planning

When you create a Will, you must obtain signatures from at least two witnesses at the time you sign it for it to be considered valid. The purpose of having two witnesses is so that, if the validity of your Will is ever challenged, they can both attest to your state of mind. These witnesses do not have to read your Will or even be aware of its contents, they just have to be able to certify that you were competent when you signed it. If you are working with an attorney, they should make you aware of this information and help explain the process of having a document witnessed. However, it is good to know some general information regarding rules for witnessing so that you feel more prepared when the time comes to make your Will official or update it.

If you would like to choose your own witnesses, be careful who you pick. Select individuals that are credible and will likely live longer than you, in case they are later asked to testify about the validity of your Will. If possible, avoid having beneficiaries of your Will also be witnesses, as this could be considered a conflict of interest. However, having a beneficiary or interested person witness the Will does not automatically invalidate the Will. If you would rather not choose witnesses, the attorney that you have been working with will likely have paralegals or legal assistants on-hand that can serve as credible witnesses. This eliminates the added stress of having to choose your own witnesses and bring them to the signing. At Bach & Jacobs, members of our team generally serve as witnesses during Will and trust signings.

Make sure you have the right number of witnesses, as every state requires that you have two individuals sign your Will in order for it to be legally binding. Additionally, these witnesses must sign your Will in front of you. Generally, your witnesses will sign the Will immediately after you do.

February 9, 2017
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Estate Planning Documents Everyone Needs To Have

By Estate Planning

Attorney Babette Bach Esq. is looking forward to speaking on the topic of “Estate Planning Documents Everyone Needs To Have” at The Glenridge on Palmer Ranch, 7333 Scotland Way, Sarasota, FL 34238 on Thursday, January 26th, 2017 at 1pm. Please call Dr. Smith at The Glenridge on 941-552-5369 for more information on this event.

If you have further questions on this topic or wish to discuss having your estate planning documents drafted, please contact our office at (941) 906-1231 to schedule an appointment to meet with one of our attorneys.

 

January 19, 2017
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How Does Remarriage Affect Estate Planning?

By Estate Planning

As our society has increasingly high divorce and remarriage rates, more individuals are faced with the task of updating or revising their Estate Planning documents to account for their change in partner. However, remarriage can make Estate Planning quite complicated, especially if each or either spouse has children by a previous partner.

The first step in updating your estate plan if you plan on getting remarried is to review yours and have your current partner review theirs. If you both decide that you would like to continue to keep your assets separate and leave everything to your respective children, then you will need to contractually agree to this by entering into a prenuptial agreement or “prenup”. At this time you may want to amend your advance health care directives and medical release forms as well.

If you have further inquiries, the skilled attorneys at Bach & Jacobs can assist you with Estate Planning. Please call our office at 941-906-1231 to schedule an appointment.

January 12, 2017
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