Real Estate

How Does Life Insurance Work in Farm Estate Planning?

Published on: November 2, 2018 | By McCulloch & Miller, PLLC

Life insurance can be useful in paying off debt, covering funeral costs and serving as a useful resource so that estate proceeds or any one person’s savings don’t have to be tapped.

Life insurance may be the least sexy part of the transition from one farming generation to another, but this financial tool can be very valuable. If parents or grandparents have planned properly, the proceeds from the life insurance may provide the funds that permit the farm to stay in the family. The proceeds, which are not subject to estate taxes, can be used to buy out the non-farming siblings so that the family ownership of the land can continue to another generation.

Successful Farming’s recent article, “Using Life Insurance in Estate Planning,” quotes David Bau, a University of Minnesota Extension educator based in Worthington, Minnesota. He says, “Life insurance is expensive, but it’s still a very good tool in the process. The farming heirs can have insurance on their parents, and they can use that money to buy out the estate.”

Your Mid-Year Estate Planning Checklist: 10 Things You Should be Doing Now

Published on: June 29, 2017 | By McCulloch & Miller, PLLC

Here is a helpful checklist of the top ten ways to keep your estate plan current.

Review your existing Will and any trust agreements. Over the course of a year our personal and our professional lives can change dramatically. Tax laws and regulations are also subject to change as new political administrations come into office. It is therefore important to periodically make sure that your documents will work the way you want them to. Some questions to ask: Is your plan tax efficient? Do you need to make any changes about the timing and manner in which your assets will transfer to your beneficiaries? Do you need to change any beneficiaries or add anybody new? These are all basic questions to keep in mind when reviewing your existing documents.
Consider whether your named fiduciaries are still appropriate. Your executors and trustees will be tasked with some significant responsibility. You should consider whether the persons you appointed in your documents are up to the tasks that lie ahead of them or if an alternate person or persons should be appointed.

The Biggest Purchase is Not Your House

Published on: March 17, 2017 | By McCulloch & Miller, PLLC

If you think of retirement as a one-time purchase, it is the biggest thing you’ll ever buy. Trying to pay for retirement without the funding, is asking for the impossible.

Compared to buying a new car or a house, paying for retirement is the biggest purchase of a lifetime, according to a study from Merrill Lynch and Age Wave reported in Credit Union Times, “Retirement Is ‘Life’s Most Expensive Purchase.” Conversations over the course of four years with 50,000 people about their plans for retirement revealed some very problematic trends.

The average cost of retirement is over $700,000. That’s about 2.5 times that of the average home. The average cost of a home is $278,300.

A Checklist for Post-Funeral Tasks

Published on: December 12, 2016 | By McCulloch & Miller, PLLC

There are a number of tasks that need to be done after a loved one passes. A Houston estate planning attorney can help make these tasks easier.

Most people don’t know that there is a time limit on certain tasks that need occur after someone passes away. According to WXYZ Detroit’s article, “Tips you need to know to take a loved one's estate through probate,” you’ll need to contact the Probate Court within 42 days of the death to find out whether you’ll need to have either a formal or informal administration of the estate. That’s just for starters. Here are other things that need to be done after the funeral:

Don’t rush to have an obituary notice published. There are scam artists who use the obituaries as an information source for going after estate assets, planning burglaries and engaging in identity theft.

How to Address Giving Your Houston Home to Your Heirs

Published on: August 8, 2016 | By McCulloch & Miller, PLLC

Passing your home to your heirs can occur in a number of ways, depending upon your situation and your family. It’s not a do-it-yourself project—even in the simplest cases.

If you own a home and want to leave it to your loved ones, there are steps you need to take to ensure that your wishes are achieved. According to Fox News, “You're Going to Die—Here Are the Best Ways to Deal with Your Home,”, inheriting a collection of 80s Transformers action figures won’t have a big impact on your heirs, but a sizable asset like a house will.

Here are a few ways to help prepare now.

Not Your Everyday Yard Sale: Houston’s New Estate Sale

Published on: June 3, 2016 | By McCulloch & Miller, PLLC

Whether for reasons of death or divorce, an estate sale can be an emotional roller coaster. Prepare yourself for challenges so that you are not taken by surprise when possessions unleash a flood of memories.

It's not always easy to make rational decisions when handling the logistics of an estate sale, explains a recent post on WCPO, "4 tips for dealing with the emotional side of estate sale planning." Here are four good suggestions for dealing with the emotions that often accompany such an endeavor.

Get advice. Don't take on this responsibility alone. As you begin the process of selling the contents of an estate, find yourself a support system. This can include members of your family, friends, and experts (like an estate planning attorney). These folks can provide you with valuable advice, and you may feel more comfortable when you've considered input from others. Given that this is an extremely emotional experience; you might also want to talk with a member of the clergy or a counselor as you go through the steps of preparing for the estate sale.

There’s Nothing Easy about Easement Valuations in Houston

Published on: April 29, 2014 | By McCulloch & Miller, PLLC

Generally the best way to value things is by looking at what similar things sell for. There is not a lot of buying and selling of facade easements. So what you do is value the property as it is and then value it as encumbered by the easement. If you can’t find sales of similar properties both with and without the easement, it all becomes rather hypothetical.

Proving the value of something is not easy. It's hard enough when you are trying to value tangible items, but what about those intangibles? A particular intangible, non-market benefit of great importance has become all the harder to prove: the easement valuation.

The developing trend against easement valuations was pointed out in a recent Forbes article titled “Easement Valuations Not So Easy Anymore.” If you have any possible interest in leaving an easement then it’s a problem well worth your planning attention.

Using Trust Funds To Purchase Home in Houston

Published on: October 31, 2013 | By McCulloch & Miller, PLLC

As interest rates rise, more children of high-net-worth families are likely to tap into their trust funds to buy a home.

Buying a home means chaining yourself to a mortgage and the financial institution holding it. This arrangement is oftentimes considered a necessary evil of adulthood. But then again, when there are trust funds available to help, buying a home might not be such a necessary evil at all.

Under the right circumstances, trusts may be tapped to assist you and your loved ones, even when it comes to bypassing the bankers and buying a home. This is more and more useful as interest rates rise.