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Effective estate planning is more than creating a will. As part of the process, it is essential to examine beneficiary designations on accounts such as life insurance policies and retirement accounts. Generally, these beneficiary designations will override any provisions in a will or a trust.
For example, John married Jane twenty years ago when John first started working at BigCorp where he opted into a generous employer sponsored retirement plan. Jane was named as the sole beneficiary of John’s retirement. After fifteen years, John and Jane divorced. John later married Joanna and created a will that named Joanna as the sole beneficiary of all of his assets. However, John forgot to update his retirement plan’s beneficiary designation. Upon John’s death, the retirement account’s beneficiary designation overrode his will and the proceeds were distributed to Jane and not John’s intended beneficiary, his second wife Joanna. Unless Joanna can convince Jane to send her the proceeds, Jane is going to have to go to court and pursue potentially costly litigation to fight this distribution. A simple change of beneficiary form was all that was needed to avoid this situation. When creating an estate plan, these types of issues need to be examined. To discuss an estate plan to ensure that your assets go to who you intend, contact Jesse Bowman at the law office of Alexander, Wagner & Kinman (513-228-1100). This information is intended to provide broad, general information about the law and is not intended to be legal advice. Before applying this information to a specific legal problem, readers are urged to seek advice from a licensed attorney Computers and smart phones play a critical role in most of our lives. Many of us have a tremendous amount of accounts and assets on these devices such as credit cards, bank accounts, social media, email, and photos. Collectively, all of these things are commonly referred to as "digital assets." With digital assets, an important issue to consider is what will happen to all of these things when you die. The answer is that without proper estate planning, the people intended to have access will have great difficulty, if not completely blocked access. There is a simple solution to this problem courtesy of a recently enacted Ohio law.
In 2017, Ohio enacted House Bill 432 which included the Ohio Revised Uniform Fiduciary Access to Digital Assets Act (RUFADAA). Under RUFADAA, it is now possible to give your executor the authority to access and distribute your digital assets just like any other tangible property, such as cars, houses, or artwork. Due to privacy acts, many of these assets might be lost forever without proper planning. To discuss an estate plan that incorporates all of your property, including digital assets, contact Jesse Bowman at the law office of Alexander, Wagner & Kinman (513-228-1100). This information is intended to provide broad, general information about the law and is not intended to be legal advice. Before applying this information to a specific legal problem, readers are urged to seek advice from a licensed attorney The best definition that I have found for a trust is from the Ohio State Bar Association: “a trust exists when one person gives property to another person (called the trustee) to hold and manage for one or more other persons (called the beneficiaries).” Although there are many different types of trusts, the most common, and what people generally obtain from estate planning, is the Revocable (“Living”) Trust. A Living Trust is one that can be changed or revoked during the lifetime of the person(s) that created the trust. It is common for the person that created the trust to also be the trustee until his or her death.
Although there are many benefits to having a Living Trust, a common benefit that you frequently hear about is that it helps avoid probate. This is true. Probate deals with property that the deceased (“decedent”) owns personally, in his or her name, upon their death. When you create a Living Trust, the asset is re-titled into the name of the trust, so the trustee “owns” the property. Therefore, upon death, probate is avoided because the decedent does not own the property personally in his or her name. For example, John Doe creates a Living Trust and wants to put his house into it to avoid probate. He does this by re-titling the house into the name of the trust. As trustee, he can sell or give away the property during his lifetime. Upon his death, because the house is in the trust, John Doe does not own the property in his name. Thus, no need to probate the house. John’s family avoids the time and expense to transfer the house through the probate court. Despite common, hard sells by some attorneys, Living Trusts are not for everyone and there are probate avoidance techniques that can be equally effective. These techniques should be part of the conversation. To discuss whether a trust is right for you, contact Jesse Bowman at the law office of Alexander, Wagner & Kinman (513-228-1100). This information is intended to provide broad, general information about the law and is not intended to be legal advice. Before applying this information to a specific legal problem, readers are urged to seek advice from a licensed attorney For better or worse, living in a neighborhood with a Homeowners' Association (“HOA”) is becoming a way of life for many Americans. While there are some perks, there are also drawbacks. When my wife and I moved into our new home, we decided to bring with us our playset from our previous home. I knew in the back of my mind that our new neighborhood had an HOA and that we probably needed approval to have this in our backyard, but we proceeded anyways. The letter from the HOA arrived about two weeks later. Indeed, we needed board approval. Not sure who ratted us out on this one. I submitted the application replete with distances from property lines, photos, and descriptions and eagerly awaited the result. It was approved, but what a pain.
It is not uncommon for an HOA agreement with accompanying declarations, amendments, and exhibits to run over the one-hundred page mark. These documents, chockful of awful legalese, are perfect for lulling you to sleep, but are a contract nonetheless. If you have issue with an HOA, like putting a playset on your property, contacting an attorney to help you analyze the agreement might be your best course of action. It could be the difference between a delightful time or an empty yard with heartbroken children. The new medical marijuana rules set to take effect in 2018 present interesting challenges for Ohio business owners and individual users. While medical marijuana use will soon be legal, it is important for individuals to understand that the law, as currently written, does not protect employees from employment matters related to its usage. For example, employers will not have to accommodate employees that use medical marijuana, can still make employment decisions (hiring, firing, and discipline) based upon marijuana use, and can still drug test employees.
Another important consideration is that marijuana, even for medicinal purposes, is still illegal under federal law. As the law is implemented in Ohio, medical marijuana is certain to present a wide variety of legal issues in the courts. Both individual users and employers will need to remain up to date on the law which will certainly evolve once implemented. This information is intended to provide broad, general information about the law and is not intended to be legal advice. Before applying this information to a specific legal problem, readers are urged to seek advice from a licensed attorney Attorney Max Kinman is dedicated to helping veterans and their families. His experience is highlighted in this feature article on the Ohio State Bar Association’s website.
Cincinnati Attorney Fights for Veterans and Their Families This is a good question that does not have a mysterious answer. In Ohio, the requirements are listed in ORC 2107.02 and comprise only one sentence: “A person who is eighteen years of age or older, of sound mind and memory, and not under restraint may make a will.” That is it.
Although this sentence is short, there is a mountain of case law concerning the individual elements; but, for most people and most situations, are not a barrier to making a will. The experienced attorneys at AWK Legal will guide you through the process and make sure that your will is both legally valid, and effectuates your wishes. Contact Jesse Bowman for a free consultation. This information is intended to provide broad, general information about the law and is not intended to be legal advice. Before applying this information to a specific legal problem, readers are urged to seek advice from a licensed attorney Very interesting NPR article about a man in Miami that came into an emergency room unconscious with "Do Not Resuscitate" tattooed on his chest. This led to a dilemma for the doctors to figure out if the man truly wanted this outcome. A living will, providing for end of life wishes, is the better way to go:
NPR when-a-tattoo-means-life-or-death-literally It is December in Ohio, and naturally the snow is starting to fall. Many homeowners, myself included, are thinking to themselves “do I really need to shovel the sidewalk”? As you can imagine, this issue has been litigated and surprisingly the Supreme Court of Ohio has dealt with this issue head on.
In Brinkman v. Ross, 1993-Ohio-72, (1993) the Court held “that a homeowner has no common-law duty to remove or make less hazardous a natural accumulation of ice and snow on private sidewalks or walkways on the homeowner's premises, or to warn those who enter upon the premises of the inherent dangers presented by natural accumulations of ice and snow.” There is actually an impetus here not to shovel- note the use of the term “natural accumulation.” Arguably, if you shovel you might create an unnatural accumulation that could open you up to a negligence claim. In plain English, if you don’t shovel at all and someone falls on your property, you are probably not going to be found negligent for the fall. However, in the court of public opinion, your neighbors are probably going to think you're a jerk. There is a caveat here- depending on where you live, your city might have an ordinance requiring you to shovel and if you don’t, then you might get a fine. You’ve got to love the law. This information is intended to provide broad, general information about the law and is not intended to be legal advice. Before applying this information to a specific legal problem, readers are urged to seek advice from a licensed attorney. It is not often that you put together the words “Walmart” and “Good” with employee relations; however, a recent company policy appears to bring those two words together. Walmart, the largest public employer in the United States, recently announced the implementation of an app to allows its workers the ability to access a portion of their wages for hours they have already worked prior to payday. The ramifications of this change are huge because this policy will prevent many of employees from having to take “Payday Loans” and other debt traps to pay for essentials such as housing and food.
Payday Loans, and their astronomical annual percentage rates, hit Ohioans especially hard. The Pew Charitable Trusts published a 2016 Fact Sheet (available here www.pewtrusts.org) that provides that Ohio has the highest Payday Loan prices in the United States with an average annual percentage rate of 591%. Yes, that is not a typo. To discuss employment or consumer protection issues, contact Jesse Bowman at the law office of Alexander, Webb & Kinman (513-228-1100). |
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Attorneys Jesse Bowman; Max Kinman; Chris Alexander: David Wagner Archives
February 2020
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