A special multi-part investigative series published by the Sarasota Herald-Tribune entitled Elder guardianship: A well-oiled machine, reported that while Florida has an efficient system of identifying and caring for fragile elders, “tapping their assets is a growth business.” Here’s …
Florida needs to adopt the Uniform Adult Guardianship and Protective Proceedings Jurisdiction Act
For those of you who do much guardianship work, you’ll be interested in a recently-published legislative summary from the American Bar Association’s Commission on Law and Aging. Entitled STATE ADULT GUARDIANSHIP LEGISLATION: DIRECTIONS OF REFORM – 2014, the report …
Downbeat Legacy for James Brown, Godfather of Soul: A Will in Dispute
James Brown died nearly eight years ago at the age of 73. He left an estate estimated to be worth anywhere from $5 million to over $100 million that’s been at the center of heated litigation ever since — in …
Lessons from “Clarity on Capacity”: A UK-law perspective on the unique ethical challenges faced by estate planners representing clients with diminished capacity
Florida ethics Rule 4-1.14 and its ABA model-rules counterpart, Rule 1.14, address the unique ethical challenges faced by attorneys representing clients with diminished capacity. To say this is a “thorny” situation is putting it mildly, especially for estate planners, …
Survey: top three reasons families engage in estate planning: (1) avoid probate (59%), (2) minimize discord among beneficiaries (57%), and (3) protect children from mismanaging their inheritances (39%).
WealthCounsel’s 7th Annual Industry Trends Survey looked at the business challenges faced by estate-planning professionals in 2013 and provided insight into what motivates clients to engage in planning.
According to the survey, the top two reasons families engage in …
Changing trustees can be contentious, but there are ways for beneficiaries to ease the process.
As a family trust moves into its second or third generation, it’s almost inevitable that someone’s going to be unhappy with the trustee. The good news is that most well-drafted trust agreements include a mechanism for replacing trustees as and …
“Roughly 70% of families lose a chunk of their inherited wealth, mostly due to estate battles.” How to manage estate litigation risk? Think “process” . . . then think “mandatory arbitration”
Accenture estimates that $30 trillion will pass from Boomers to Millennials over the next 30 years. Will this intergenerational wealth transfer actually happen? Who knows? At one time Boomers were expected to benefit from a similar windfall of equally gargantuan …
How much money do trust funders inherit?
If you earn your living as an attorney working with and around private and charitable trusts, it’s probably a good idea to have some sense of how large the “market” is for what you do and what your future prospects …
2012-13 Probate Court Filing Statistics
If you make your living in and around our probate courts you’ll find the FY 2012-13 Probate Court Statistical Reference Guide interesting reading. Below I’ve charted the “cases filed” data for three of our largest circuits/counties: Miami-Dade (11th Cir), Broward …
What litigators can learn from the OCC’s “Comptroller’s Handbook for Fiduciary Activities”
The fiduciary duty of care sets the minimum level of diligence and competence we expect of trustees, objectively measured by reference to what a “reasonable” or “prudent” person would do in like circumstances, and informed by industry norms and practices. …