(Spoiler Alert) Now that the award-winning TV series Breaking Bad has finished its run, if you plan to watch past episodes and don’t want to know how it ends, don’t read this post. (Still reading? Don’t say I didn’t warn you.) Walter White dies in the last episode of Breaking Bad. Here in Albuquerque, where […]

In an effort to make things easier for their loved ones, people sometimes enter into prepaid funeral contracts. The idea is that you pay for all of your own funeral and burial or cremation expenses in advance. When you pass away, your family notifies the service and the service handles everything. When you enter into […]

Planning for international clients takes special care. This blog focuses on how to handle assets outside the United States. In last week’s blog I examined how citizenship and residence are important in determining U.S. estate taxation. As American lawyers, our focus is American law, as it should be. However, when a client has assets overseas, […]

Before Thanksgiving I didn’t blog, as I usually do, about “talking turkey” about advance care planning with loved ones. But have no fear, there’s still time before Christmas and New Year’s!Here’s a lighter approach than usual, courtesy of the blog “Pallimed,” which offers these 21 conversation-starters (I’ve grouped them by theme). Some are humorous, others […]

As of November 29, 2013, the number of indexed pages on the internet was over 1.37 billion pages. That’s a huge amount of data to sort through when you’re looking for specific information. Fortunately, Google offers several search operators that make it easier to find what you’re looking for. 1. Search on a specific site […]

Planning for international clients takes special care. This blog focuses on the estate taxation of the people involved based on their citizenship. In next week’s blog I will examine foreign assets. A person who is a citizen of the United States gets an exclusion of $5.25 million this year ($5.34 million in 2014). The same […]

Have you ever considered using a “hope-based” presentation technique instead of using fear? When holding a seminar, you have about 2 hours to start developing a relationship with your potential prospects. During that short time with your seminar attendees, what you present and how you present it can have a direct impact on setting appointments. […]

Looking for and finding just the right person for your team can be difficult and stressful. I can relate all too well. Back in June, I began to restructure and expand our department by adding two new team Members to increase the support we provide. About the same time, one of my existing team Members […]

As I’ve written before, recognition of same-sex marriage has been expanding rapidly in the United States. Sixteen states and the District of Columbia allow (or will soon allow) same-sex marriage. Further, New Mexico has no state law allowing or denying such marriages. However, the most populous counties in the state allow same-sex marriage and are […]

As I mentioned in one of my previous posts, attorney biographies are the most-read content on a law firm’s website (responsible for over 60% of your website’s total traffic – WOW!). So devoting a bit of time and attention to these significant pages is a really good idea.Here are ten tips to help you make […]