The Law Office of Hyatt & Hanington

05/31/2023

EXCITING NEWS FROM OUR OFFICE

Dear Clients and Friends:

I am pleased to announce that MaKayla Hanington, who joined my firm as an Associate Attorney in 2020, has now become a partner in the firm. The firm will now be operating as HYATT & HANINGTON, LLC.

All aspects of our practice will continue as before – our physical address, email addresses and website address (www.estateplanningmatters.com) will not change.

MaKayla shares my passion for assisting clients and their families in preparing and executing estate plans that provide the best protection against the dangers and challenges that can result from disability and death. Those of our clients who have been in contact with us over the past three years have no doubt gotten to know MaKayla and have seen how much she contributes to our success.

I can’t tell you what a comfort it is to me to know that the firm I started in 1986 will be able to continue well beyond the day that I will no longer be able to provide service to my clients. Please note that I am still very much alive and well, and I don’t plan on leaving the scene any time soon. Nonetheless, I hope that the steps I have taken to ensure the continuance of my practice may provide my clients with additional peace of mind.

For our past clients, if it has been a while since you reviewed and updated your estate plan, then this would be a great time to do so, as it would give me an opportunity to introduce you to MaKayla and show you that you and your family can continue to place your trust and confidence in our firm.

Best wishes to you and your family for a safe and enjoyable summer!

Jim Hyatt

04/12/2022

THE IMPORTANCE OF KEEPING YOUR ESTATE PLAN UP TO DATE

Your estate plan is not something you can ever “finish.” Your circumstances may change in the future, as well as tax laws or other laws that may affect your estate plan, and often these changes can come with both opportunities and pitfalls. It is best if your estate plan is reviewed regularly and updated to maintain your goals and address any changes in the law. Here are some circumstances in which you should consider a review and update of your estate plan:

1. Tax law changes – for example, the recently enacted SECURE Act drastically changed the way retirement accounts are paid out upon the account owner’s death. With some exceptions, most payouts are required to occur within ten years of the account owner’s death. Such changes often require a reconsideration of various elements of the estate plan.

2. Other law changes – another law that changed in the last few years was the Spousal Elective Share Law. This law provides that a person may make an election against his or her spouse’s estate whether they are named as a beneficiary in the estate plan or not named at all. Its main goal is to avoid a spouse being disinherited without the spouse’s knowledge. There are many facets to this issue that may require an update to your plan, especially if you have a blended family.

3. Growth in the value of your taxable estate – the state and federal estate tax exemption amounts are significantly higher than they have been in the past. Unfortunately, these amounts are always subject to change. As your wealth grows, the value of your taxable estate will grow, and you may be affected by estate tax laws. You may be due for a review in this situation as we can include some tax planning provisions in your documents to provide flexibility and account for these fluctuations.

4. Children become adults – this may require a few changes. One change you may want to consider as your children get older is that you might want them named in the roles of Trustee, Personal Representative, Power of Attorney Agent, etc., as they become more responsible. Another change may be how your children receive their inheritances. When your children were minors, you may have included trusts for their benefit to receive the inheritances until they reached a certain age. However, as they become more financially responsible, you may want to consider leaving their inheritances to them outright or even in a lifetime trust for some divorce and asset protection.

5. New family members or loss of family members – with a change in family members, you may want to update your documents to change your named beneficiaries. As an example, if your children get older and have children of their own, you may want to add a provision with a distribution to your grandchildren.

6. It’s been a while; or your goals have changed – clients may put an estate plan in place that they are comfortable with, but after some time passes, they remember it differently or their goals have changed and the estate plan is no longer in line with how they want their estate to be administered. With that, a change will be warranted.

There are possible consequences if you do not update your estate planning documents, such as unintentional tax consequences, beneficiaries not being included, or even someone being named in a role who you believe should no longer serve in that capacity. Your estate plan should say what you want it to say now – not back when you put it in place.

To make sure your estate plan is up to date with your wishes while naming the appropriate fiduciaries and beneficiaries, you should review your estate plan every 3-5 years unless there is a circumstance change that requires a sooner review. If you are interested in a review with one of our attorneys so we can advise on any recommended updates to your current estate plan, please give our office a call to schedule a meeting.

© 2022 The Law Office of James A. Hyatt
13220 Executive Park Terrace, Germantown, MD 20874
(301) 540-3300
www.estateplanningmatters.com

James A. Hyatt & Associates provides innovative estate planning, attorney assistance with last wills and testaments and living trusts in Germantown MD.

03/10/2022

WILL YOUR ESTATE PASS TO YOUR SPOUSE?

Many of our prospective clients who are married come into our office and believe that upon one spouse’s death, all of their assets will automatically be transferred to the surviving spouse. Though this may be true in some situations, it may not be true in all. How assets are transferred upon the owner’s death really depends on how the assets are titled. For example, anything that is jointly held with another person with a right of survivorship will automatically pass to the surviving owner upon one owner’s death. In the case of a bank account, the surviving owner would just bring a death certificate to the bank to prove the death of the deceased owner and they can take the money and do with it what they want.

Assets such as retirement accounts or life insurance policies allow for a beneficiary to be named so that the benefits will be transferred to the named beneficiary upon the owner’s death. We have seen cases where there is no beneficiary named and the institution does not have a “next of kin” succession in place, so the account is then payable to the deceased owner’s estate. This can not only cause tax implications with retirement accounts specifically, but also requires the administration of the estate through probate to occur before the beneficiary of the estate can gain access to the account.

The remaining assets that are in a person’s sole name (without a beneficiary or joint owner) are required to go through the probate process. Probate is an administrative process that requires certain filings with the Register of Wills, which include a Petition for Probate for a Personal Representative to be appointed, an Inventory of all assets showing appraisals and other proof of valuations, and an Accounting of how the assets were liquidated and distributed after expenses were paid. As long as one spouse has assets in his or her sole name, the probate process is required before the surviving spouse can take ownership of them.

A common misconception is that even if the assets have to go through probate, they will all automatically be distributed to the surviving spouse when the process is complete. This is not true unless the deceased spouse has a Will that distributes the estate in such a way.

Maryland has laws of intestacy that govern who become the beneficiaries of an estate if a person does not have a Will. For example, if a married couple has minor children and one spouse dies without a Will, the surviving spouse would only receive one-half of the probated assets while the minor child or children receive one-half of the probated assets. Even if a married couple has adult children, there is still a split of the probated assets between the surviving spouse and children. This can especially become a problem when the family residence is titled only in the deceased spouse’s name and by law, the house would need to be re-titled in the surviving spouse and children’s names. A deceased spouse’s living parents may even share in the estate if the marriage was less than five years long and there were no children born or adopted to the couple.

When preparing estate plans for married couples, we consider the titling and beneficiary designations for all assets so that we are confident in saying that the estate plan was created the way our clients want. If you are unsure how your assets will be distributed upon your death and want to consider your estate planning options, please contact our office for a free initial consultation.

02/08/2022

PREPARE YOUR HEIRS

So, you have succeeded in putting your estate plan together – you have your Will, Trust, Powers of Attorney, and Medical Directives in place. The beneficiary designations for your life insurance policies and retirement accounts are in place. You review your estate plan periodically to make sure it continues to reflect your wishes and accomplish your goals. All the legal documents necessary to implement your estate plan are complete. But there is one further step you can take to make things easier for your loved ones if you die – prepare them for the eventuality.

Your legal documents all designate and appoint people you have chosen to fill important roles – Successor Trustee, Personal Representative, and Agent under a Power of Attorney. Often it is your adult child or children filling these roles. If your children are younger, perhaps it is a sibling or close friend assigned the role. In either case, they will find the job a lot less daunting with a little “training” ahead of time.

At a minimum, these “go-to-persons” should know: (1) that you have done your estate planning and designated a role for them to play; (2) where the original documents that make up your plan can be found; and (3) the name and contact information of the attorney who helped implement your estate plan.

Another important step you should take is to make sure you keep some type of financial spreadsheet that contains relevant information on your bank accounts, investment accounts, real estate interests, life insurance policies, retirement accounts (IRAs, 401k, etc.) and any other property that your estate administrator/trustee will need to deal with. It is much easier for you to compile this information now than for your successors to go through the “sleuthing process” they will be confronted with otherwise.

But if you really want to make sure things will be handled with the minimum amount of pain, aggravation, delay and expense, you should do what you can to prepare your “go-to-persons”. Review the documents with them and explain the elements of your plan. Better yet, arrange for them to meet with you and your estate planning attorney, so the attorney can walk them through the documents, anticipate potential issues they may be faced with, give them pointers and discuss the process they will confront, and answer their questions.

When it comes to dealing with a disability or death, a little preparation and training on the part of the person(s) responsible for handling the situation can go a long way.

If you are a client of our office and would like to discuss a “training session” for your “go-to-person” give us a call.

01/06/2022

We would like to extend our best wishes to all our clients and friends for a Happy and Healthy New Year.

And while we know life with COVID presents many challenges and disruptions for us all, we hope you are coping as well as possible.

Our office continues to serve our new and existing clients. We are currently conducting meetings (masked) in our (sanitized) conference room for all document signings. Depending on our clients’ preferences, other meetings can also be held in person, via Zoom or by telephone. Given the fluid state of the virus, we are being as flexible as possible in accommodating our clients’ needs and comfort level.

We recognize that there are some clients who may need to review or modify their estate plan but have put off making an appointment during the two years of pandemic. Or, there may be nagging questions or concerns that we may be able to address without the need for an in-office meeting. If so, we would encourage you to just give us a call and see if we can help.

In the meantime, please stay safe and healthy.

Best regards,

Jim, MaKayla and Amy

01/14/2020

https://mailchi.mp/d417e74316c3/welcoming-our-new-attorney-6278317

01/17/2018

See our recent article "Do I Still Need a Living Trust?" at our website:

Most of my clients have a Revocable Living Trust as the centerpiece of their estate plan. For many of them, a major reason they created the trust may have been the significant estate tax benefits it provided. But as you may have heard, recent tax law changes have essentially eliminated the danger of...

03/22/2017

See our recent article on "A Word of Caution - Don't Let Your Estate Plan's Wires Get Crossed" at our website: http://www.estateplanningmatters.com/new-notable/

There’s a lot more to an estate plan than the legal documents – the Will, Trust and Powers of Attorney. In fact, there are other things that are even more important.