As an Estate Planning Attorney, I often get mistaken for other types of professionals. A potential client may quiz me about how they should handle their investments in volatile markets, or they may have questions regarding the best approach to filing their income taxes. While...
No two Estate Plans are the same. Each person has unique needs that must be met to form a complete plan. This is especially true for single parents. Raising a child is a tremendous responsibility. Raising a child alone is an even greater challenge. When...
No. Well, probably not. One of our many rights as Americans is that we’re allowed to leave our assets to anyone we want. A father has the right to not leave anything to his adult children, regardless of the existence of a stepmother or not. We...
Here at Crain & Wooley, we constantly battle two things: Bad advice given by others who do not specialize in Estate PlanningProcrastination by those who know they need to update or create an estate plan but put it off for a later date/age Estate Planning is not...
When starting to get their “affairs in order”, most people think about wills, and maybe even a trust. What is often overlooked when considering estate planning is the role that both Medical and Financial Power of Attorney documents play within the plan. Power of Attorney...
Dear Crain & Wooley Family, We are so thankful for each of you and hope that y’all stay healthy during this time of uncertainty. Crain & Wooley remains open to serve your estate planning needs. We are fully functional virtually and are having limited in-person meetings as...
Why is an estate planning firm discussing COVID-19? I mean give it a break already, right? I have read many updates from the CDC, local and national agencies as well as medical professionals guiding us on how best to “flatten-the-curve” so that our medical infrastructure is...
What do Tupac Shakur, Jimi Hendrix, Kurt Cobain, Amy Winehouse, Bob Marley, Steve McNair, Martin Luther King Jr., Stieg Larsson, Abraham Lincoln, Prince, Barry White, Sonny Bono, Howard Hughes, and Pablo Picasso have in common? They all died without a will, trust, or any estate...
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...