Next Asset Protection Society Meeting

A reminder that the next meeting of the Asset Protection society in Orange County will be on Tuesday, September 22 at 7:00 PM. We have had an overwhelming response to this event and we have had to change the location of the event due to that response. We currently have over forty certified public accountants, financial advisors, insurance agents, attorneys and other advisors who will be attending this event. If you are interested in attending, we do have a few more spots open so contact me to RSVP.

The speaker will be David Shaver of Ferruzzo and Ferruzzo, LLP. David Shaver's bio can be found here: ( http://www.ferruzzo.com/staff/dshaver.asp ). David is the partner in the firm that handles all of our trust, estate, and fiduciary litigation and he will be speaking to the CPA's, Financial advisors, and any other advisor who regularly works with trustees and others who are in fiduciary roles such as these about common mistakes that people in these positions make that generate liability not only for the trust, estate, or other entity, but also for the person individually and possibly for the other advisors.

If you advise fiduciaries, trustees, executors, administrators, conservators, guardians, or anyone else who has these increased duties, then you will not want to miss this presentation. Individuals who are acting in these capacities for family members may also want to attend as there will be a time for questions and answers on what they should and should not be doing in these roles. If you are interested in attending, please feel free to contact me at mziebold@ferruzzo.com to RSVP for this event. IF YOU DO NOT KNOW OF THE NEW LOCATION OF THIS EVENT, CONTACT ME FOR THE NEW ADDRESS.

Premium Financed Life Insurance Programs

A client recently asked me about his options for paying for life insurance. His agent told him that he should not own the policy as the death benefit would be included in his taxable estate, so he should have his children purchase the life insurance on his life and be the beneficiaries of the policy. His concern was over the method to transfer enough to the children to pay for the premiums without gift taxes. I told him that gift taxes in that context would be a concern but from an asset protection perspective he probably would not want the children to own the policy outright. If the death benefit paid out directly to them, then they would be open to lawsuits, transmuting the separate property gift to community property (and leaving it open to divorces), etc.

The conversation then turned to using an Irrevocable Life Insurance Trust (ILIT) but the same concerns arose regarding the gift tax consequences of funding the trust with enough assets to pay for the premiums on the life insurance. With the withdrawal notices that most estate planners draft into ILITs, the annual gift tax exclusion gifts can be used to place a certain level of assets into the trust, but otherwise (especially if a client has a small amount of heirs or beneficiaries) the gifts will be taxable or use up some of their lifetime gift tax exemption amount (currently 1.0 Million per person). We then had a discussion on premium financed life insurance and the client both enjoyed the idea and decided to move forward with implementing this strategy.

Premium Financed Life Insurance is a planning strategy that uses third party financing to pay for the premiums. Usually the Life Insurance Policy is used as the primary collateral and the lender will credit a portion of the cash value of the policy against the overall collateral requirement. Any shortfall in the collateral position must be made up by someone, either the trustee of the trust or the insured or a beneficiary. By borrowing the premiums, the Trustee can enter into a variety of strategies to fund the insurance policy, such as:

1) Using Equity Indexed Universal Life policies to attempt to grow the cash value faster than the loan.

2) Having the insured gift an amount of funds to the trust on an annual basis to cover the interest payments on the loan.

3) Do one of the above and enter into other advanced estate planning such as a rolling GRAT (Grantor Retained Annuity Trust) strategy to place other assets inside of the trust on a tax efficient basis.

4) One of the other various programs that are out in the marketplace today.

Some of the important issues to keep your eye on with regard to premium financed life insurance strategies is the management of the third party loan (ensuring that the LIBOR or other interest rate is kept as low as possible throughout the term of the loan), the growth of the policy (if using a cash value strategy), and the requirements to either pay interest or to manage those interest payments during the lifetime of the loan.

I have reviewed many of the premium financed life insurance programs that are out in the marketplace and have an opinion on the best strategies from the legal perspective (as I am not insurance licensed and do not share in any of the commissions paid on any of these insurance products). If it has ever been suggested that you enter into a premium financed life insurance program and it did not make sense to you or there was something about the program that you did not like, then you may have been told about some of the inferior programs that are out in the marketplace. I advise many clients about the proper use of life insurance in their comprehensive estate plans for the payment of taxes, replacement of income of a deceased spouse, for charitable gifting after death, or for other reasons. All of these can be met with a premium financed life insurance program if the plan makes sense for you and your situation. If you have questions about this or would like to talk further about what planning options are available for you, do not hesitate to contact me at mziebold@ferruzzo.com or 949-608-6900.

Business Killers Presentation

For those of you who are business owners, you will not want to miss these upcoming presentations. I will be speaking at several upcoming events that will highlight many of the issues that face business owners in regard to current and future planning. The presentation is named "Business Killers" as it deals with several topics that I see in my practice quite often that are very important but often neglected such as buy/sell agreements, key person insurance, valuations of businesses, business succession planning, and many others. If you are interested in learning more, then you can read about the presentation here: ( http://www.businesskillers.com ). If I can answer any questions about these topics or if you would like to attend this presentation, feel free to email me at mziebold@ferruzzo.com. The next upcoming presentation will be held on Wednesday, September 30, from noon to 1:30.

Estate tax savings with a Trust under the current law

The question regularly comes up as to why a married couple should create a trust that splits into one or more subtrusts on the death of the first individual. While this discussion can be a rather lengthy one, the answer is that the internal revenue code does not currently allow the first spouse's estate tax exemption amount to be added to the surviving spouse's exemption amount for purposes of calculating the estate tax liability of the estate. Therefore, if a family wants to use both spouse's estate tax exemptions, they must create one or more irrevocable trusts on the first individual's death to use that person's exemption, and then on the surviving spouse's death, they may use their exemption amount on the remaining property that is contained in their taxable estate. If a family does not have an estate that is greater than one spouse's estate tax exemption amount (currently 3.5 million per person), then a trust can be set up that gives the surviving spouse access to and absolute control over all of the assets held in the estate. However, if the estate is greater than 3.5 million, then the splitting of the trust into two or three trusts on the death of the first person is necessary to maximize the two exemptions that are available to them.

One other reason that will also be investigated in a future post is that if the trust does not split into different trusts, then the surviving spouse may change the disposition plan over all of the assets. This often occurs when the surviving spouse remarries and there may be other children or beneficiaries that become people to whom the survivor wants to distribute assets to. By setting up a trust that becomes partially irrevocable on the death of the first spouse, there is certainty that the deceased spouse's wishes will be fulfilled with at least half of the estate.

In summary, if you have an estate that is worth over 3.5 million in 2009, then you should consult with your attorney to determine if you have an appropriate level of tax planning built into your revocable trust. More will be written on this topic in the future as we see what changes to the estate tax law the Federal Government makes.

New Location for Next Month's Asset Protection Society Meeting

For those of you who have contacted me about the next Asset Protection Society meeting, here is an update. We have had such a large response that we are going to change the location of the meeting. If you would like to attend and have not yet RSVP'd with me, please contact me to do so. I will then provide you with the new location and answer any questions that you may have.

Next Asset Protection Society Meeting

The next meeting of the Asset Protection society in Orange County will be on Tuesday, September 22 at 7:00 PM. The speaker will be David Shaver of Ferruzzo and Ferruzzo, LLP. David Shaver's bio can be found here: ( http://www.ferruzzo.com/staff/dshaver.asp ). David is the partner in the firm that handles all of our trust, estate, and fiduciary litigation and he will be speaking to the CPA's, Financial advisors, and any other advisor who regularly works with trustees and others who are in fiduciary roles such as these about common mistakes that people in these positions make that generate liability not only for the trust, estate, or other entity, but also for the person individually and possibly for the other advisors.

If you advise fiduciaries, trustees, executors, administrators, conservators, guardians, or anyone else who has these increased duties, then you will not want to miss this presentation. Individuals who are acting in these capacities for family members may also want to attend as there will be a time for questions and answers on what they should and should not be doing in these roles. If you are interested in attending, please feel free to contact me at mziebold@ferruzzo.com to RSVP for this event.

Speaking at NBI Seminar in Irvine on December 9, 2009

I have been asked to speak at a continuing education event on December 9, 2009, in Irvine, California on the Top Ten Estate Planning Techniques. This is held by National Business Institute (www.nbi-sems.com) and it should be a good event. I will be speaking on Charitable Giving and Grantor Retained Annuity Trusts. More information on this event will be published later as I am told where it will be held.