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Taxation & Estate Planning

Death and Taxes Blog

Commentary on estate planning, estate administration, and real estate issues from a Chicago-area attorney.
By Joel A. Schoenmeyer

Post Frequency: 2/day

Last Entry: May 07, 2013 at 12:00:50

Charitable Gifts: Points To Ponder

Posted on April 23, 2010
You'd think that making a charitable gift under your Will or Trust would be an easy thing to do. But it's actually pretty easy to mess up. Back when I worked at a big law firm, I had to deal with the estate of a client whose Will left a large amount of money to a charity that didn't exist...

Small Estate Affidavits: Information Your Attorney Needs

Posted on April 19, 2010
If a deceased person owned less than $100,000 worth of property in his or her own name at death (not including real estate), it may be that a probate isn't needed in order to administer the property. Instead, an attorney can prepare a small estate affidavit to transfer the property where it needs to go (to the beneficiaries under the deceased person's Will, if there is one, or to his or her heirs if there isn't)...

Trust Funding and Big Banks

Posted on April 13, 2010
As I've said before, once a client executes a living trust, additional steps have to be taken to avoid probate. Usually, these steps involve changing ownership and beneficiary designations for the client's property, so that the living trust is the owner or beneficiary upon the client's death...

Milwaukee's Best: Captain Frederick Pabst's Letter

Posted on March 29, 2010
My family and I just returned from a mini-Spring Break trip to Milwaukee. (Yes, I know -- Spring Break in Milwaukee? But it was great.) One of the attractions we visited was the mansion of beer baron Captain Frederick Pabst. The mansion is being restored (beautifully), but one thing that caught my attention was a letter that Captain Pabst wrote to his children...

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Personal Liability of an Executor or Trustee

Posted on March 22, 2010
Attorney Timothy L. Bertschy has a nice article (here, but you must be a member to view it) in this month's Illinois Bar Journal, entitled "Personal Liability of an Executor or Trustee - Time for a Change." The article focuses on whether a personal representative can be held personally liable (under contract or tort law) for actions taken on behalf of an estate or trust...

Informality and Probate

Posted on March 08, 2010
Informality is the enemy of estate and trust administration. What do I mean by that? I mean that, when a decedent handled his affairs informally prior to death, or when informality reigns following his death, then you can be assured of a mess. Let me share three examples: 1...

Trusts and Consideration (why $10?)

Posted on March 05, 2010
I got this question twice in one day, so that's probably a sign from someone that I should answer it: Why do trust documents typically recite that the trust creator (sometimes known as the grantor) has transferred $10 (or some other sum) to the trustee? The answer is that a trust cannot exist without assets...

The Art of the Steal

Posted on March 02, 2010
The Art of the Steal is a new documentary currently playing in limited release in Philadelphia and New York City. Hopefully it will come to Chicago and/or DVD soon. The film focuses on the art collection of Albert C. Barnes, who died in 1951. The collection, which is valued at more than $25 billion (yes, billion) dollars, was displayed for many years in his own museum, away from Philadelphia and its art establishment...

The Cancellation of Indebtedness "Scam"

Posted on March 01, 2010
Here's a (seemingly) new credit card company practice that looks like a scam: A decedent dies in early 2007, and her estate goes through probate. The administrator discovers an outstanding credit card balance of about $17,000, and sends notice to the credit card company of decedent's death and the probate...

Wired Magazine on Disposing of your Online Assets

Posted on February 25, 2010
The March 2010 issue of Wired has an interesting article about companies that deal with your online assets after you die. The article says that the companies: ... keep customers' passwords, usernames, final messages, and so on in a virtual safe-deposit box...

Credit Reports

Posted on February 24, 2010
I'm not a financial planner by any stretch of the imagination, but I occasionally come across financial planning tips that might be helpful. So I'm starting a new category of posts, with this one. Have you seen the commercials for annual credit reports? The ones with the guy who sings a song about how he wishes he'd looked at his credit report before he lost all his cash and got stuck in a dead-end job? Unless you've been in a coma, you probably have...

More on the Astor Trial

Posted on February 22, 2010
I've written a fair amount on the Brooke Astor situation, reviewing the book Mrs. Astor Regrets (here) and talking about the case's conclusion here. But perhaps I was premature. One of the jurors in the case has now come forward to say that she voted to convict because she was afraid for her safety...

Scott Lee Cohen, the Estate Tax, and Traditional Media Failure

Posted on February 15, 2010
Two stories: 1. On February 2nd, a guy named Scott Lee Cohen won the Illinois Democratic primary for lieutenant governor. You probably know the rest -- this guy had a whoooooole bunch of skeletons in his closet. Cohen, under a lot of pressure, resigned after being made the butt of many a joke (and, if possible, making Illinois politics look even more ridiculous than it already did)...

More Probate Litigation -- Because of the Recession?

Posted on February 10, 2010
Is it the bad economy, or something else? It seems like I've had a lot of clients walk through my door of late, presenting the same scenario: -Parent died -One sibling "took over" the probate (either because they were named in the Will as executor, or just because they took the initiative) -That sibling isn't doing his or her job By "isn't doing his or her job," I mean that the sibling is not carrying out the fiduciary duties associated with administering an estate...

A Little Advice For Young Attorneys

Posted on February 01, 2010
I was recently asked by a 3rd year law student for some advice on how to succeed upon graduation. Basically, what I told her can be summed up in three words: "find your niche." I realize that this isn't a revolutionary idea, but I think too many young attorneys don't realize the importance of marketing yourself...

Property Schedules in Trusts

Posted on January 27, 2010
Here's a question I get a fair amount: "Should we list all of our property on a schedule attached to our living trusts?" I see trusts (usually older ones) with schedules attached, but my answer is typically "no." Property changes -- we buy a new house, switch our investment accounts from one custodian to another, and change our life insurance policies...

Movement in the Cook County Probate Court

Posted on January 26, 2010
Attention Cook County probate practitioners: Judge James W. Kennedy of the Cook County Probate Court has retired, effective as of last Friday the 22nd of January. To replace him, Judge Mary Ellen Coghlan has moved over into deceased estates from guardianship, leaving the following judges for deceased estate matters: Calendar #2: Judge Budzinski (Chief Judge of the Probate Division), Room 1803 Calendar #8: Judge Coleman, Room 1804 Calendar #7: Judge Coghlan, Room 1802 Calendar #11: Judge Malak, Room 1801

The Ethicist on Switching Guardians

Posted on January 24, 2010
"The Ethicist" column in today's New York Times magazine addresses the issue of whether to tell your friends that you are removing them as guardians of your children under your Will. The column is here. I'm not an ethicist (insert attorney joke here), but I agree with Randy Cohen that there is no need to tell the friends about the switch...

Trust-Administration Agreements

Posted on January 19, 2010
Setting up a trust can be a pretty effective way of avoiding expensive and public court proceedings (which are necessary in a probate situation). But sometimes problems arise with a trust, problems where a court proceeding may be needed. Settlements are always a possibility, but there's been some confusion in the past about how you work out a settlement, especially when not all parties are of age (or even born)...

5 Things You Need to Know About the Estate Tax in 2010: #5 (2011 and on)

Posted on January 13, 2010
So where do we go from here? It's hard to know. If we're going to think in terms of what might happen, then we have to consider the following three possibilities: #1: No action by Congress (no federal estate tax in 2010, but federal estate tax automatically comes back with a $1 million exemption in 2011 and thereafter); #2: Prospective action by Congress (federal estate tax re-enacted for 2011 and thereafter -- and maybe for the rest of 2010 as well); and #3: Retroactive action by Congress (so federal estate tax applies in all cases, even for 2010 -- obviously there's the retroactivity problem here)...

5 Things You Need to Know About the Estate Tax in 2010: #4 (State Death Taxes)

Posted on January 12, 2010
Short post today, both because I've covered this issue fairly recently and because I'm dealing with a burst pipe in my basement. The fact that there is currently no federal estate tax does NOT mean there are no estate taxes on the state level. The chart in this article is a must-see -- it lists all of the states with an estate or inheritance tax (or both), along with exemption amounts and rates.

5 Things You Need to Know About the Estate Tax in 2010: #3 (Trust Problems)

Posted on January 11, 2010
An effective estate plan should be flexible enough to accommodate changes in circumstances -- maybe not every change, but many of them. For instance, instead of specifically referencing the estate tax exemption amount when drafted, most well-drafted documents contain a formula based on the exemption amount in effect when the decedent dies...

5 Things You Need to Know About the Estate Tax in 2010: #2 (Retroactivity)

Posted on January 08, 2010
Perhaps I am getting ahead of myself -- I have been assuming that we will not have a federal estate tax for 2010. It's possible that Congress might get its act together and actually pass an estate tax bill in 2010 that applies for both 2010 and the future...

5 Things You Need to Know About the Estate Tax in 2010: #1 (Capital Gains)

Posted on January 07, 2010
Up through 2009 (and starting again in 2011, assuming the law isn't changed), there was a federal estate tax. That was and will be the bad part, at least for people who owed or will owe tax. The good part was that, in exchange for potentially being subject to the estate tax, you got a "step-up" in basis...

5 Things You Need to Know About the Estate Tax in 2010: Introduction

Posted on January 06, 2010
I'm going to be starting a series of posts entitled "5 Things You Need to Know About the Estate Tax in 2010." The first post should be up tomorrow, but before that, I need to vent. I've put off writing about this because (1) I get angry just thinking about it and (2) I was hoping against hope that something would be changed by the end of 2009 (it wasn't, obviously)...

The Summer Hours

Posted on January 05, 2010
The Summer Hours is a French film directed by Olivier Assayas (he also directed Irma Vep), and starring Juliette Binoche. It's also one of the few films I've ever seen address how children deal with the loss of their parent. By "deal with," I mean both how they emotionally cope with the loss, and how they try to move forward and dispose of (in this case) their mother's belongings...

Her Fearful Symmetry, the Victorians, and Decapitation Provisions

Posted on January 04, 2010
The holiday break gave me a chance to finish Audrey Niffenegger's Her Fearful Symmetry, which I mentioned in my last post. There are a few references to probate and estate planning in the novel, but this is my favorite -- it's a quote given by one of the main characters (Robert) while he gives a tour of London's Highgate Cemetery (which plays a major role in the book)...

Audrey Niffenegger's Her Fearful Symmetry and Probate

Posted on December 29, 2009
I enjoyed Audrey Niffenegger's first novel, The Time Traveler's Wife. Haven't seen the movie -- looks a little too sappy -- but the book was great. Right now I'm working on Ms. Niffenegger's newest, entitled Her Fearful Symmetry. I've just started it, but the novel appears to be a riff on the old idea of "stay in a haunted house overnight to get an inheritance...

Brooke Astor Saga Reaches Conclusion

Posted on December 23, 2009
I reviewed Meryl Gordon's book Mrs. Astor Regrets earlier this year (here) -- it was one of my favorite books I read in 2009. The trial of Mrs. Astor's son, Anthony Marshall, is coming to a conclusion (barring appeals). Mr. Marshall was found guilty of "looting his mother's fortune" (another lawyer, Francis X...

Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye, and Probate

Posted on December 17, 2009
The headline of this post makes the English major in me very happy. Here's the story -- this morning Roger Ebert posted a link to this 1957 letter (from J. D. Salinger) on Twitter. (BTW, you can find me on Twitter here, although only about 20% of my tweets are estate planning or probate-related...

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