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Overview

8.0 Credits
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Federal estate and gift taxes currently affect few clients, but there are many other issues involved in settling an estate or administering a trust. Clients who are beneficiaries of a trust or estate often turn to their financial advisors to understand the administrative process and its effect on their interests. Cut through the jargon to understand legal concepts, communicate a real-world explanation to clients and serve, in some instances, as an advisor to them. Feel more confident to serve in a fiduciary capacity.

Objectives

  • Understand how creditors’ claims impact a beneficiary’s claims
  • Understand the key provisions in a will or trust
  • Understand the duties of an executor or trustee in relation to beneficiaries and other third parties
  • Identify trusts, wills, and other documents encountered, & their uses
  • Understand the stages of an estate administration including costs, collections, payment of debts/taxes, & distribution to beneficiaries
  • Be aware of the duties a fiduciary and members of the estate planning team owe to creditors, beneficiaries, and the courts

Major Topics

  • Issues involved when settling an estate – marshaling of assets, payment of creditors, & distribution and accounting to beneficiaries
  • Explaining the needs and limitations of durable powers of attorney, health care directives, and living wills
  • Why a will is probated, and on what grounds it may be challenged
  • Comprehensive checklists on how to read a will, duties of an executor and trustee, and much more
  • Identification and report of estate assets
  • What to do and what not to do as a fiduciary, executor, or trustee – duty of care, investment, informing, payment of debts and taxes, & defending a will contest
  • How executors and trustees interact with beneficiaries
  • Elective shares, and when a spouse might make that choice
  • What a trustee needs to know about incompetents and minors
  • Rights of creditors, third parties, and beneficiaries
  • Key issues in transferring property to a trust and from a trust or estate to a beneficiary
  • Identifying income, estate, and inheritance taxes
  • Fiduciary accounting – principal and income concepts
  • An introduction to drafting an account, and why it is relevant
  • Administration of revocable trusts
  • Estate basis reporting

Prerequisite

None

Advanced Preparation

None
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