If you are planning on giving a presentation for Continuing Education (CE) or Continuing Legal Education (CLE), don’t forget to double check your to do list… before and after your presentation. Most states require a 60-day timeframe for course approvals, however, some require 90 days. It’s best to go online for your state to see […]

The pair of pears on my desk reminds me of the importance of careful word selection, particularly in business communications. Homophones – words that are pronounced the same, but have different meanings – can be easy to misuse. Spell check isn’t going to point out to you that you’ve used the incorrect form of two/to/too, […]

The most important point to remember about irrevocable trusts is flexibility. When drafting a trust, it is best to craft it to allow the greatest possible flexibility, by allowing the trustee to withhold or distribute income and corpus. If the trust is a non-grantor trust, flexibility allows the trustee to minimize income taxes for the […]

Estate planning attorneys see it all the time. Most clients avoid the funeral planning conversation, even though advance planning can reduce stress at a time of grief, save money and head off family conflict. We have ample evidence that humans have a 100% mortality rate. It’s not a matter of “if” but “when” and the […]

If someone told you not to insure your house, you’d think they were insane. That holds your whole life. If someone said not to bother insuring you vehicle, you’d snort in derision. You need protection from other drivers. If someone asked you if your firm of estate planning lawyers sends client’s personal credit card information […]

In what many consider to be a decision that is long overdue, a federal judge has ruled that the Defense of Marriage Act’s (DOMA) denying equal benefits to same-sex couples violates the equal protection clause of the Fifth Amendment. This recent ruling was handed down as a summary judgment to plaintiff Edith Windsor. Windsor sued […]

Last week I took a vacation cruise with my extended family. On board were my husband and kids, my parents, my siblings and their families, and even their in-laws. It wasn’t even our first cruise together. (The first was to celebrate my parents’ 50th wedding anniversary.)  I readily admit that a cruise isn’t my ideal […]

When discussing social media marketing strategies, I often hear “My clients aren’t on the Internet,” or “My clients are too old for Facebook.” In reality, that couldn’t be further from the truth. According to a recent survey by the Pew Internet & American Life Project, more than half (53%) of Americans age 65 or older […]

If you want the keys to the kingdom of success, a game changer to turbo charging your estate planning practice, this is the Webinar for you. Learn about the 11 essential estate planning systems that bring order to everything you need to run your practice, from system start to finish. It’s really just that simple, […]

In the never ending task of lead generation and prospecting, many sales people are missing out on an underused concept, common courtesy. In a survey conducted by PCPL (Daytona, FL based market research company), only 50% of financial advisors had “any” form of sales lead and follow up program and only 1% are sending any […]