Part of an estate planning attorney's job is to play devil's advocate and ask the question "what if?" What if you can't sign your own name?What if your mental capacity is diminished and you need a guardian?What if you can't make your own medical decisions? Let me...
After our initial post about the SECURE Act, we began to receive questions, and in response have created a list of FAQs. Each of you is in a unique situation and as such the below questions are general in nature. Reach out to a...
As an estate planning firm, we encourage all who we encounter to stop procrastinating and be proactive in creating a plan. Sometimes things occur in life that makes us all more aware of the need for an estate plan or at a minimum the need...
The law finds its way into a lot of movies. I might be so bold to say that law finds its way into MOST movies. Sometimes the law is an essential plot point of the movie. One recent example is Knives Out. As I watched...
The End of the Stretch IRA The Stretch IRA was a financial strategy that allowed inherited IRAs to be stretched out over the lifetime of a beneficiary. To put it another way, Stretch IRAs allowed a beneficiary who was younger than the former owner of the...
In 2019, Crain & Wooley has served more than 400 individuals and families with best-in-class estate planning services. Part of our commitment to our clients and our community is to share relevant and applicable education that will help our neighbors plan in advance and keep...
This year’s legislative session brought some changes to the Estates Code. Not all of these updates apply to each of our clients; however, sharing the most up-to-date information will allow you to be ready should a friend or loved one experience a unique situation. Number of...
Have you noticed that life keeps getting more and more complicated? Things that we thought we knew and understood seem to not be as simple as they once were. An area of law that is often misunderstood in this manner is community property. In Texas, community...
The process of getting a divorce touches literally every part of your life – including your estate plan. How would you feel if after your divorce was over and you thought everything had been taken care of, your ex-spouse was still involved with the disbursement...
When a person creates a trust, it is important for them to change ownership of assets out of their individual name and into the name of a trust. For example, a home originally owned by John Doe would be changed to show that John Doe,...