Many years ago, I was meeting with some new clients: a married couple in their 50’s with several million dollars in assets. They’d provided copies of their brokerage account statements for two IRAs and a joint account for me to review. I asked if they’d done any estate planning and they enthusiastically answered, “Yes!”, clearly … Continued
Every parent can probably remember being asked when they were expecting, “Are you hoping for a boy or a girl?” The quick answer, of course, is that you are hoping for a child that is healthy. Raising and caring for a child with special needs can be extremely rewarding, but it can also present greater … Continued
Every family is different. Some are very open, sharing details about nearly everything in a loud boisterous manner; others are more reserved and less comfortable revealing personal information. No matter what your family dynamic, there comes a time when it is important to share some details with your adult children or the family members who … Continued
In today’s world of innovation, where one idea could turn a young entrepreneur into an overnight million(billion)aire, it is becoming increasingly common for a financially successful individual to accumulate far more wealth than their living parents ever could. It is in this group of high net worth investors where a unique wealth transfer strategy may … Continued
Intellectual property (IP) is a critical driver of innovation and economic competitiveness. In the last several years, new groundbreaking products and services have been made available to the world markets from right here in Silicon Valley and surrounds: drones, back-lit LED plasma TVs, hybrid and self-driving cars (!), streaming video, smart phones, life-saving pharmaceuticals, medical … Continued
In the alphabet soup of estate planning jargon, the acronym QPRT is one of the more familiar — if not fully understood — terms and it represents a popular and rather common technique for potentially passing significant wealth amongst generations using family homes with little or no gift or estate tax consequence. The letters stand … Continued
We have lost several well-known artists this past year: David Bowie; Alan Rickman; Glenn Fry; Harper Lee; Garry Shandling; Prince; Gene Wilder; George Michael; and most recently Carrie Fisher and her mother Debbie Reynolds. These names are a few among a long list of sports and political figures, writers, musicians, actors and otherwise well-known celebrities … Continued
In June of this year, Microsoft announced plans to acquire LinkedIn for $196 per share in an all cash deal. This is great news for LinkedIn shareholders and this is only one of 32,203 M & A deals announced during 2016 which total value estimated at $3.6 trillion¹. The shareholders of LinkedIn or many other … Continued
In late 2014 the Achieving a Better Life Experience Act (ABLE) was enacted to enable states to create tax-advantaged savings programs for young people with disabilities under section 529A of the Internal Revenue Code. By 2017 many states, including California, will roll out state sponsored 529A plans (or ABLE accounts) similar to existing 529 education … Continued
Even at the ripe old age of 100, the Federal Estate Tax – also affectionately known as the ‘death tax’ – is still steeped in controversy. When it was first instituted in 1916 during the height of World War I, it was seen by supporters as a reasonable way to enhance U.S. revenues in case America joined … Continued