Tanya is Retiring May 31st marks the last day for our longtime employee, Tanya Steil, who is retiring. She has been with the office for thirteen years, and has served as an able legal assistant with her primary role being client relations coordinator. Quite a run! Those of you who know Tanya will remember her…
Details
Coping with a Terminal Diagnosis: Getting Your Affairs in Order, Living Your Life A terminal illness diagnosis is always devastating, whether it’s you or a loved one receiving the sad news. It changes your priorities overnight, and initiates a flurry of activity as you work to get your affairs in order. It’s a profoundly emotional…
Details
All Natural Ways To Cope With Grief & Loss Unfortunately, loss is a part of life, and something that everyone will experience at some point — and usually more than once. Grief is a natural response to losing someone that is important to you. During the grief process, you may have feelings of loneliness, hopelessness,…
Details
Federal Estate Tax Portability This is a written summary of the availability of “portability” under the federal estate tax laws. “Portability” refers to the process of transferring a deceased spouse’s unused federal estate tax exclusion or exemption to the surviving spouse. This allows the surviving spouse to add the deceased spouse’s unused exclusion to their…
Details
The “Death” Tax that Applies to Gifts In the “old days” people made annual gifts to minimize taxes. Today, that’s probably going to increase taxes for most families. Lifetime gifting may be a good strategy to minimize estate tax, but it can have just the opposite result as to income tax. With the high estate…
Details
What are your options to pay for long-term care? There are several common approaches for dealing with future long-term care expenses: (1) do nothing; (2) assume Medicare or Medicaid will pay for it; or (3) Insurance or other benefits to offset the costs. For risk of being the bearer of bad news, the first two…
Details
A Checklist for Family of Immediate Tasks After the Death of a loved One (Originally posted May 16, 2014) With my mother’s recent passing and helping my siblings identify and deal with matters as they came up, I was reminded of the checklist that I posted about 5 years ago. Because it still has relevancy…
Details
Consider using a limited liability company in succession planning for your cabin or vacation home? People who own cabins or vacation homes or other recreational property typically want to pass these often long-time family-owned treasures on to the next generation and beyond. The thought is that through the years family members have gathered together frequently…
Details
Who can make burial or cremation arrangements in Montana? One question our office occasionally is asked is who can make burial or cremation arrangements in Montana when the decedent has made no prior arrangements or had not preauthorized another person to make arrangements. Montana law has tried to clear up any burial or cremation issues…
Details
The Lighter Side–Everyone’s Life is a Story Worth Sharing, Even if Make-believe A couple of weeks ago, I came across a touching news item in the Washington Post that I think you may enjoy as much as I did. The link to the piece is as follows: https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/2018/10/11/daughters-hilarious-obituary-unravels-her-fathers-mysterious-life-you-have-read-end-get-it/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.dfc4cebfd0c3. You’ll want to follow the link above and…
Details