News & Articles

Why do otherwise doting pet parents fail to make such plans? Most people assume they’ll outlive their pets, says Barry Seltzer, a Toronto-based estate lawyer and co-author of Fat Cats & Lucky Dogs: How to Leave (Some of) Your Estate to Your Pet… Read More

In family businesses, there are two main ways stock gets diluted: it gets passed on to employees or it’s passed down through the generations.  We often see the first situation occur in families when owners give out shares to non-family executi… Read More

How do children nudge often-reluctant parents toward making sound and fiscally smart decisions about the future of the family home? The family home is more than likely the most important or valuable asset in one’s estate.  So it makes sense to… Read More

The Uniform Gifts to Minors Act (UGMA) and the Uniform Transfers to Minors Act (UTMA) are sometimes called the “granddaddies” of college savings accounts. Both allow parents to establish custodial accounts for a minor child, and a grandparent can… Read More

“The whole issue of measuring and metrics and trying to have impact data is, I think, a very contemporary part of philanthropy,” said Thomas E. K. Cerruti, former personal lawyer to Sam Skaggs, a billionaire philanthropist who made his fortune in… Read More

When Juliann Reynolds' husband died of cancer in 1992, she had to decide how to plan her own estate … Reynolds is one of a growing number of parents who are requiring their heirs to wait until they are older before they can collect their inher… Read More

Here is some background on what is known as the "annual gift-tax exclusion." You can give away as much as $14,000 this year to anyone you want—or to each of as many people as you wish—without any tax considerations or burdensome paperwo… Read More

In 2012, I earned only $25,000, but I have $300,000 in stocks. I have individual health insurance. Will I be ineligible for a subsidy beginning in January because I am presently insured, or because I have large assets? If you have not heard, there st… Read More