KITTY LENSMAN: Hi, I'm Kitty Lensman, president and CEO of CET and ThinkTV.

Welcome to Plant the Seed, our virtual estate planning seminar.

Ten years ago CET and ThinkTV were part of a small consortium of PBS stations who were asked to help others in the PBS family to establish or grow their planned giving programs.

We were asked partly because of the extraordinary dedication of members in the community who formed the CET Planned Giving Committee.

This group, led by Chris Buttress of Bricker Graydon for nearly 17 years, has helped the station establish a number of community resources.

We are grateful for their time and talent.

Nonprofits like CET and ThinkTV have benefited from planned gifts.

We have seen a tremendous increase in gift notifications and realized bequests over the years.

All planned gifts, unless noted by the donor, go to our endowment so that our work continues for the future.

We are delighted to be with a live studio audience at CET, as well as over 120 attendees online for today's program.

So here is Plant the Seed; A Discussion About Estate Planning.

MIKE MILLER: Thank you, Kitty.

Good afternoon and welcome to our Estate Planning seminar and panel discussion.

I'm Mike Miller, Chief Wealth Officer of LCNB National Bank, live from the CET studios.

With me are my fellow members of the CET/ThinkTV Planned Giving Committee: Shiri Ayalon of Ameriprise Financial Services, David Bross of True Point Wealth Counsel, Kristin Lenhart of Dinsmore and Shohl, and Jamie Vallandingham of Von Lehman, CPA and Advisory Firm.

We're pleased to be joined by a live studio audience, as well as guests joining us online.

We'll be happy to take your questions following our panel discussion.

If you're joining us online, use the box below this video to ask your question.

Let's get started.

Kristin, what exactly is estate planning?

KRISTIN LENHART: Sure.

Well, as we'll probably hear several times today, you know, it kind of can kind of depend on your situation and it can encompass many things.

But generally think about it, I think of it when I talk to clients as kind of two things.

One being all of your assets, all of your stuff, whether that's real estate, financial assets, personal property, that kind of thing.

Like at your passing, what -- how do you want those things to pass, or what do you want to have happen with that, what we call as someone's estate.

So that's sort of one piece of it.

And then estate planning also encompasses, if you become incapacitated during your lifetime, documents in place so that you have decision makers for you financially, health care, things like that to make those decisions if you become, you know, incapacitated or in a position where you can't do that yourself.

So it sort of encompasses that, and again, can also encompass many other things depending on your situation.

MIKE MILLER: So help me out here because estate planning sounds like something that's beneficial for someone.

But a lot of people don't like talking about estate planning.

Why is that?

SHIRI AYALON: Well, I'd say for a couple of reasons.

First of all, people don't like to talk about death or illness.

Of course, the older that people get, the more they're willing to talk about it.

And this is really the second reason, which is we all live with this mentality that nothing's going to happen to me.

We watch this stuff on TV, we hear about accidents, we hear about people dropping dead, but we think, "Oh, that's true for other people.

This is never going to happen to me."

So we just push that, we're going to do that tomorrow.

It's all going to be okay.

I would also say that the 2nd, or the 3rd reason maybe, is that we don't understand what would happen if we don't have it.

People just believe that things will happen the way that they want them to happen.

People think that their loved one could go into the hospital and get information about them when in reality that's not the case.

MILLER: So what you're saying is if the right decisions, the right choices haven't been made, the family, the loved ones, whoever is cleaning up the mess, so to speak, might have a problem.

David, what are some of the decisions that do need to be made for a proper estate plan?

DAVID BROSS: Yeah.

So, you know, going back to what Kristin said, you know, decisions with respect to estate planning, decisions need to be made with respect to things that might happen during your life, like incapacity or incompetency.

So, you want to make sure you have somebody in place that can continue on with your financial decision making or your health care decisions if you can't do so for yourself.

Secondly, you know, death, how are your assets going to pass?

To whom do you want them to pass?

When do you want them to pass?

Who is going to be that executor, that quarterback of that estate administration process?

Who's going to be that trustee that's going to manage those assets for the benefit of a loved one?

All things that are important to make during your life so that when you do pass away, you know, there's not a chaotic moment for the rest of your family trying to deal with all that after the fact.

MILLER: Jami, I have a friend of mine who has three kids and has told me that his three kids are going to be the executor and the trustee and they're going to have all the decision making power.

How bad of an idea is that?

JAMI VALLANDINGHAM: Horrible.

MIKE MILLER: And why is that a horrible idea?

[laughter] He's a nice guy, but.

JAMI VALLANDINGHAM: Uh-huh, but, yeah, so when you look at who you're going to appoint for that, that's not necessarily an easy position for anyone to be in.

And then you throw on top of that the siblings and how they interact, everyone usually has a little different agenda.

It sounds great that all three of my kids are going to be hunky-dory forever.

That's not the case.

Often it -- more often than not it's not the case.

MIKE MILLER: So, any validity to thinking about who might have the best emotional IQ for the health care powers and who might have the best financial IQ for the power of attorney?

JAMI VALLANDINGHAM: Absolutely.

Absolutely.

Because you do want to consider who's going to be able to make the right decisions when it comes to those types of things.

Because you can get yourself in a situation that you are unaware of, but is creating a lot of problems otherwise.

MILLER: It can cause more stress for the peopleleft behind.

JAMI VALLANDINGHAM: Absolutely, that are still there.

MIKE MILLER: Kristin, speaking of power of attorney, what documents might there be in a proper estate plan?

KRISTIN LENHART: Sure.

You're usually going to have a will, of course, if you should need it, and we'll probably get into this in a minute.

But if you should need to go through probate, that's the document that governs that.

Depending on your situation, you may need to trust, that could be one or more trusts, which again, we'll probably talk a little bit further about later.

But it is a document that can hold assets, doesn't have to be distributed immediately.

You can hold it until your kids or your beneficiaries reach a certain age of maturity or different things and then you have a trustee sort of overseeing those assets in the meantime.

And then you're usually going to want to have a financial power of attorney, which, as we said, was making -- having an agent designated to make financial decisions for you if you become incapacitated or out of town or for some reason can't do something financial for yourself that you need to.

And then also typically on the health care side, often a living will, which is sort of your wishes if you're in certain very specific end of life situations, what you would or would not want.

And then a health care power of attorney to make health care decisions for you if you can't make those decisions yourself.

MIKE MILLER: Okay.

And in this day and age, too, there's also the organ donor registry documents, which might be important, and the HIPAA authorization, correct?

KRISTIN LENHART: Yeah, the financial -- excuse me, the health care power of attorney, the sort of standard one, at least in Ohio, has sort of encompassed some of that HIPAA stuff now.

But the organ donor is something you can do at the BMV when you get your license renewed.

They typically will ask you if you want to be in that registry.

MIKE MILLER: And the health care documents, those can be gotten from the state of Ohio, I believe.

Is that right?

KRISTIN LENHART: Yes, for Ohio, sort of the attorneys, the medical profession, sort of everyone kind of got together and promulgated a living will and a health care power of attorney form.

So those are available.

MIKE MILLER: Okay.

Shiri, I have a house that's in joint name with my wife, but my will will take care of that, right, when I die?

SHIRI AYALON: Maybe.

It depends.

MIKE MILLER: It depends.

Okay.

SHIRI AYALON: It really depends.

You know?

And really, when I say it depends, it depends on your situation.

So if this is -- if your kids are kids of both yours and your wife, as opposed to a blended family, might be a little bit more complex situation.

I had some clients that really believed that when the husband passed away, the wife was going to live in the house until she passed away and then it was going to go to his kids.

Unless it's in writing, none of that is necessarily going to happen, and it's governed by the laws of the state.

But if you really want to make sure that what you want done gets done, then you need to have it in writing.

MIKE MILLER: Well, then how important if I have a will, how important are the beneficiary designations that I have on my life insurance or my retirement plan, David?

DAVID BROSS: They're extremely important.

What people don't really understand is that the beneficiary designation is a contract between you and that financial provider of whatever account that might be.

And when you pass away, that is what controls.

So if you do not update that beneficiary form to be consistent with your existing & current estate plan, then it's possible your assets might flow to beneficiaries that you may not want them to flow to when you pass away.

So that is just as crucial as putting a good estate plan in place.

JAMI VALLANDINGHAM: And I would say even from my perspective of seeing tax forms come through, a lot of times I will see the ex-spouses name still showing up on various 1099 forms.

And I usually try to say, "Hey, you need to think about, maybe that's where you want it to go, you know, that's fine."

But just to make sure that you have on there what you really want, whether it's on the face of the account itself or within the beneficiary designations.

SHIRI AYALON: And also with beneficiaries, beneficiaries get addressed before probate.

So, things like IRA or life insurance don't actually go through your probate or through your estate.

MIKE MILLER: So they're not controlled by the will?

SHIRI AYALON: Exactly, they're not controlled by the will, unless you leave something to the estate.

So, you can actually have your IRA distributed to beneficiaries basically as soon as you get a death certificate and it does not have to go to probate court.

MIKE MILLER: So what happens if I have an IRA or I have an insurance policy but I don't have a designated beneficiary on that account?

SHIRI AYALON: It would usually go to your estate.

MIKE MILLER: Then the will would control who got that property?

SHIRI AYALON: Correct, but then, again, it all -- there's always one more step.

Then you run into situations, for example, with IRAs, if they're left to an estate, they may need to be distributed quicker than if they go to an individual based on the secure act that was passed in [indiscernible].

MIKE MILLER: So what you're saying, in essence, is there are a lot of important decisions that have to be made.

So we really need to have the right professionals in place.

Kristin, who are the right professionals to be involved in estate planning.

KRISTIN LENHART: Sure.

And typically, you know, sort of all of us here.

Ideally if you have an accountant, your accountant or your CPA, if you have a financial advisor, your financial advisor, your attorney obviously, you know, all of those people together.

MIKE MILLER: Don't forget corporate trustees.

Go ahead.

LENHART: Yes, your corporate trustee, corporate fiduciary.

And then, you know, certain, like, financial advisory firms will have sort of planners, like David is, that are also typically involved in that process just depending on your situation.

But it's best to have a team approach so that everyone's on the same page, you know, maybe one person sort of is quarterbacking that mostly, but you've got all of your advisors together.

MIKE MILLER: And David, how do you find the right advisor?

If I don't have an attorney, if I don't have a financial planner, if I don't have an accountant, if I've basically been living in my basement and don't have anybody, what do I do?

Who do I call?

DAVID BROSS: Well, if you have none of the above, we need to talk.

MIKE MILLER: Okay.

DAVID BROSS: But, you know, I think it might just start with friends and family members, to be honest.

You know, who are they using?

Who's their accountant or who's their financial planner?

What's their experience with that financial planner or that accountant or that attorney?

That's a great place to start.

If you do have one of the mentioned areas, that's a great place to start as well.

All of us are very much interconnected.

We know a lot about each other.

We know how each of each of us work, how we treat clients, how we serve clients.

And I think if you just have one of those professionals, that's the best place to start because they're going to have a variety of different people that can help you.

And then interview them, compare them, you know, don't just go to one, go to three.

Not all of them are going to be the best fit or the right fit.

And ultimately, it's going to be your gut decision on which one you move forward with.

MIKE MILLER: So we have professionals in place.

We've talked with the professionals, but don't we have a responsibility to make sure the professionals have all the information they need, Shiri?

SHIRI AYALON: Yeah, absolutely, and as myself, I'm a certified financial planner.

And one of the first things that we do is make sure that we collect a lot of information from you and we interview you as much as you interview us to get everything, get documents and statements and things like that.

I had a boss once that said, in God we trust, the rest we verify.

MIKE MILLER: In God we trust, everybody else pays cash, right?

Yes.

Jean Shepard said that.

So, Jami, as we're meeting with our professional, we need to tell them everything, right?

The assets, the family relationships, the family dynamics.

Why?

Why is that important?

Why is it important to disclose as much information to your professional advisor as possible?

JAMI VALLANDINGHAM: Right.

And when you have multiple, and that also is another reason why everyone needs to kind of work together.

Because you may think to tell someone something and not think to tell the other.

There are so many things that have an impact on what those final decisions are.

And if you're not providing all the information to your team, what ends up happening is something gets lost.

There's -- you could have a decision made that, or someone kind of make a suggestion, that is nowhere close to what it should be had all the facts been known.

And the the family dynamics are huge.

What you have is huge, all that full disclosure, you know?

If someone drafts a will for you and leaves out half of your assets, then what?

You know, it's left to the state then for the most part to decide what's going to happen to that.

So you want to make sure that you are telling everyone everything.

And honestly, from our perspectives, you really can't tell us anything that we probably haven't already heard.

Whether you think it's embarrassing or not or you really don't want to let that skeleton out, I can bet you between us, we've all heard it.

MIKE MILLER: Probably true.

So we disclose everything to our professional advisors.

How much should we talk to our family about our estate plan, about our ideas and goals and what we want to do, Kristin?

KRISTIN LENHART: I think, and I feel like I keep saying this, but I mean, I think that can kind of depend on your situation.

You know, if it's a blended family, a second marriage with children from the first marriage, that type of a thing.

I mean, it can really just depend on your comfort level.

I mean, I certainly have clients who are in favor of sort of the more disclosure, the better.

A number of years ago, I had a client that it was a second marriage.

He had a number of children from his first marriage.

She had a number of children from her first marriage.

He had benefited his children quite a bit during his life.

And so he basically is leaving everything to the spouse and then ultimately her children.

And he sat everybody down in a big meeting and said, "I feel I've benefited you guys enough.

This is what I'm doing.

This is why I'm doing it."

Et cetera.

And when he passed away, there was no issues.

And I think that was a case where that communication really, really served a valid purpose.

Of course, there are other people who don't feel comfortable and don't want to have those conversations.

And they take the approach of, "Well, I'll be gone.

So I, you know, I'll leave it it for everyone else to deal with."

MIKE MILLER: Which is true, but.

KRISTIN LENHART: In situations can also be valid and things.

So it can really, just you got to just kind of get a feel for the family and sort of their comfort level and their situation and sort of what might be appropriate.

MIKE MILLER: Okay.

AYALON: But I would say, and say this to my clients all the time, I have never seen anything that ruins families more than people not disclosing, not talking about this ahead of time, and then everybody just bickers over stuff.

But also to another part of your question is I think it's also important to talk to the person that you want to be your agent after you pass and make sure that they understand what your expectations are, and make sure that they're okay with that.

MIKE MILLER: I think that goes back to the point of the emotional IQ or the financial IQ.

I mean, different people have different levels of responsibility that they can assume.

And you certainly don't want the wrong sibling involved taking care of the other siblings financially if that's going to be a problem for the relationship.

I think that's true.

You know, we're talking about estate planning, but part of a proper estate planning process is financial planning, too.

And that's kind of your bailiwick, isn't it?

So, how important is proper financial planning?

SHIRI AYALON: Oh, it's paramount.

It's one of these -- we have -- we always say the taxes are the tail that wags the dog, but so much, this is kind of the endgame, right?

Is we want to make sure that you know what you want your money to do for you, but what do you want your money to do after you're gone, whether it's to benefit a charity or whether all of it is going to go to your family.

And so it's really important part of the conversation.

But, you know, and different people have different goals.

Not everybody wants to benefit their kids, for example, or in the same way.

So it's definitely an important part of the whole conversation.

MIKE MILLER: When you mentioned taxes, Jami's eyes lit up.

JAMI VALLANDINGHAM: Yeah.

You saw that.

MIKE MILLER: So, yeah, I did.

I did.

What taxes or what tax issues are there involved in estate planning?

JAMI VALLANDINGHAM: So, on the estate side, you can certainly have a taxable estate, which some of the financial planning, some of the estate planning that can be done can maybe eliminate that, or you could do gifting during lifetime, things like that, that would help maybe get rid of that or at least try to control some of that.

You also have some filing requirements, potentially, from some gifting that can be done.

There may not be tax associated, but there may just be disclosure information.

You could have some tax deductions that are also available if you're doing some of the charitable donations up front now.

So there are quite a few things that do interweave between the financial planning, estate planning piece of it into the tax world.

MIKE MILLER: And income taxes obviously play into that, too.

JAMI VALLANDINGHAM: Absolutely.

MIKE MILLER: I've known spouses who are not aware that they still have responsibility to file income taxes for their deceased spouse, and that can be that can be an issue.

And not only that, but estates and trusts have responsibility for filing income tax returns.

JAMI VALLANDINGHAM: And I would also say that one of the things that from our perspective, it's also nice when you can get both spouses to understand.

Because so often you have one spouse that is always taking care of everything on the financial end, and that person seems to be the one that goes first.

So then you have the one that's left and they are beside themselves, "I don't know what to do."

You know, I've opened mail for people before because they just couldn't.

They didn't even know what to do with that.

It was, "This is a financial statement.

This is coming from my investments.

I'm not sure what to do.

Help me."

And, you know, it's -- I feel very bad for that situation.

So any time that we can make sure that both spouses are educated and know what's going on, it's very helpful.

MILLER: You know personally, my wife's an interior designer and she actually is very good with color, but she hates math.

And in our relationship, she wants me to handle the finances, which may or may not be a good idea.

But we take the time, even though she doesn't really, and she's a smart woman, she knows how to do it, but we take the time to go through everything.

So she's aware of the financial decisions, she's part of the financial decisions.

And I think if you do more of that, then your estate will be in much better shape because there'll be more awareness of those that are left.

VALLANDINGHAM: My husband loves it when I lay the financial statement on him at the end of the year.

"This is what you spent?"

MIKE MILLER: Yeah.

JAMI VALLANDINGHAM: He loves that.

I do the same thing.

MIKE MILLER: I do that.

I do that too, but with Mary, it has to be in color.

Okay.

So, but anyway, I digress.

JAMI VALLANDINGHAM: Yes.

MIKE MILLER: So, we talked about estate planning.

We're talking about wills.

You mentioned trusts before.

Let's talk about trusts because everybody hears about trusts.

There are people out there that say, "Oh, everybody needs a trust," which we know it depends, right?

Not true necessarily.

David, talk about, for example, the difference between a -- Backup, I'm sorry, what is a trust?

DAVID BROSS: Well, I mean, a trust is a document.

It's essentially a contract between yourself and your beneficiary, the trustee who manages the assets on behalf of the beneficiaries.

That trust will then own assets.

And that trust outlines what happens with those assets.

Who are the beneficiaries going to be?

How will they pass down, under what kind of distribution standard, when that might occur?

Who is the trustee of that, the governing person who will manage that?

And the trust, there are so many different types of trusts out there that they're not going to apply to everybody.

There's trust out there that you're going to use to minimize the impact of estate taxes.

There's a trust out there just to pass assets down to children so that they're creditor and divorce exempt.

There are trusts out there to hold life insurance so it's not includable in your gross estate.

There are so many out there, but that's where good professionals come in.

Because we can take a look at your goals and your wishes.

We can look at your financial situation and we can say, "This trust would be very beneficial.

This trust may be not so much."

MIKE MILLER: How about a special needs trust?

How would you look at something like that?

DAVID BROSS: Well, that's key.

So, you know, that's really intended for individuals who have, and I really hate the term special needs, but, you know, individuals who aren't going to be really able to financially support themselves in the future and they might be supported by governmental assistance.

And those trusts are set up to receive assets via some sort of a gift or inheritance so that they are exempt from that calculation that the government makes in order to determine the governmental assistance.

So if you have any family members that might be receiving that or need that governmental assistance, special needs trust is absolutely essential to the estate planning.

MIKE MILLER: And then, Kristin, what's the difference between a revocable trust and an irrevocable trust?

KRISTIN LENHART: Sure, so when we're talking about, like, someone's kind of what I call core documents or foundational documents, we're typically talking about what we call a revocable trust, meaning it can be changed at any time while you're alive.

Often times you are both the person creating the trust or what we call the settlor or grantor, if you've heard those terms.

And also often times you are your own trustee while you're alive.

And you can change it at any point, you can take things in and out.

You basically have free reign over that, over that trust.

So that's a revocable, again, can be changed, also sometimes called inter vivos or there are a few other terms for that.

That sort of is the type of trust that you're typically doing when you're doing sort of that core set of documents we mentioned earlier.

An irrevocable trust or irrevocable trust, by contrast, is something that typically cannot be changed.

And that's often something that is being used to make a gift to, you know, get that out of your estate or to, you know, for some other purpose.

But typically, by and large, and again, you can always do certain things.

And I always tell people what's really irrevocable really isn't because you can still do things to make changes and revisions if everyone's in agreement in certain situations.

But just on a broad sense, that's basically one that cannot be changed, or once you've set that up, it's, you know, you can't make changes to that.

MIKE MILLER: How important is having the right trustee, Shiri?

SHIRI AYALON: Once again, not having the right trustee that has the emotional intelligence can be really detrimental.

You can, because it is a legal document, it is a legal contract and it is important the beneficiaries would hold the trustee responsible, could hold the trustee responsible for following the trust and distributing the assets when and how the original grantor intended.

So you want to have someone that has attention to details maybe, would keep good records, is honest, et cetera.

MIKE MILLER: So it's a bad idea to have all three of your kids be the trustee?

SHIRI AYALON: Oh, absolutely.

MIKE MILLER: Okay.

Just want to make sure we're clear on that.

And purposes of a trust.

You know, of course, we've all seen trusts too, that try to modify behavior.

If Joe graduates from college, he'll get the money.

If Joe doesn't use drugs, he'll get the money.

If Joe does this, he'll get the money.

How do you feel about trust that try to control too much?

SHIRI AYALON: It's something that I personally try to soften when people think about it.

But at the same time, I also do the opposite.

I discourage people from necessarily leaving everything for their kids when they turn 21, because we've all been there.

I think we've all made some bad decisions, maybe, potentially.

But you do want to have some kind of an endpoint maybe, where at that point maybe they receive it.

But I would say unless there is a really big known problem, one of your children is addicted to drugs and you know that this is an issue.

And then I would mostly encourage people to have an equal distribution between, especially if it's kids.

Again, because otherwise you're you're creating a riff between siblings or potential rift between siblings down the road.

KRISTIN LENHART: And Mike, I think that also goes back to your point about selecting the right trustee.

I mean, I will often encourage clients, you know, maybe don't get into quite so much detail in the trust document so that you kind of hamstring your trustee down the line.

But have conversations with your trustees or your successors as to, here's the situation, here's what I as the person setting this up would sort of how I would want to handle this.

And some of that you can handle outside of the trust document itself.

MIKE MILLER: In other words, allow appropriate flexibility within the document for the situation that may change down the road.

SHIRI AYALON: Also in trust language a lot of times we use, attorneys use language that is not quite so exact and allow the trustee to interpret that.

So if you have that communication with the trustee and you have to pick someone that would understand, maybe you don't say, "Oh, as long as my child doesn't do drugs."

But you put something that is a little bit softer language in there and let the trustee interpret that down the road.

MILLER: Because that document's going to last long after you're gone.

Right?

SHIRI AYALON: Much longer than you even think sometimes.

MIKE MILLER: So, before we take some questions, I do want to talk about one more thing, and that's a legacy.

People talk about estate planning, but they also use the phrase legacy planning.

And we all know that legacy can be a financial legacy, legacy can be a personal values legacy, but a legacy can also be a charitable legacy.

And talk about some of the ways we can leave a community a charitable legacy for the benefit of those that come after us.

Jami.

JAMI VALLANDINGHAM: I would say where I see the conversation happening quite a bit is through, like, the donor advised funds where the families establish that and they want to get their children involved to try to teach them some of those things, how they think about the charities that they're going to advise that the donations be made to.

And so it kind of -- it kind of sets them up for, "Hey, here's how we have lived and this is what we believe in."

So that really kind of just exposes them and allows them to get their feet wet without really getting themselves in too deep and getting in trouble.

So, since it's just an advisory role.

But that can also be very generational, you know, not only your kids, but your grandkids, you can bring those in as well.

MILLER: A good way to get them involved in the community.

Kristin, do you have some thoughts on that?

LENHART: Yeah, there's many ways to get charities involved.

You know, you can make them the direct beneficiary of IRAs, 401ks, those types of deferred retirement assets.

Those are often great vehicles if you do have charitable intent because when those monies come out of those types of assets, they are income taxable to your beneficiary, but they're not going to be income taxable to the charity.

So I will often have conversations with families, "Hey, if you use this bucket for your charitable intent, they're not going to pay taxes and you're going to save more of this other bucket that won't have the income tax effects for your family, which is kind of a win-win.

So that's another way.

MIKE MILLER: I was talking to somebody who said, "My financial advisor talks in terms of buckets.

I don't have that."

[laughter] Anyway, QCDs.

Yes, QCDs, what are they and how can that work?

DAVID BROSS: So at a certain age, and it changes so many times now, but I think it's what, 73 now?

Yeah.

So at 73, if you have an IRA, a traditional IRA, you have to start taking something called a required minimum distribution each year and it's based on your life expectancy in that given year and it's a distribution you have to make.

So what the IRS has basically said is instead of taking that and giving it to yourself and reporting it as income, well, just direct it to a charity directly and it's not treated as income to you, but it's treated as a charitable deduction to the charity.

So it's a great way if you don't need to take that RMD or that required minimum distribution, it's a great and easy way just to pay it straight to the charity.

Make it easy on you.

MILLER: It can benefit the community that way.

BROSS: Absolutely.

Yeah.

VALLANDINGHAM: And there's tax benefits for that.

You know, when you start looking at taxability of Social Security, the net investment tax, if you can bring your adjusted gross income down, then potentially your taxes are decreasing on an annual basis because of those gifts that you're doing direct.

MIKE MILLER: Yeah, I knew we needed an accountant on this.

Let's open it up for questions from anybody in the audience.

If you'd like to come up and introduce yourself and let us know what's on your minds.

LINDA PLEVYAK: My name is Linda Plevyak.

I'm a faculty member at UC and I'm going to retire soon.

And that means that I need to start to figure out how, like, what -- What kind of money?

Where is it?

First, what's the best account to take it from, IRA, or like state retirement or I have TIA and then deferred comp.

You know, there's lots of buckets that I have.

So which account would be the best one to take it from?

And then how do I -- how do I know how much I need on a yearly basis?

MIKE MILLER: Okay.

You know, before I turn it over to Shiri, I'm going to quote Kristin, "It depends."

Shiri.

SHIRI AYALON: Yeah, it's a great question.

So, and this is exactly the kind of work that I personally do.

So we would talk about, first of all, what are your goals?

And then we would talk about how much money do you spend now?

We will figure that out because research shows that whatever we spend before retirement is basically what we're going to spend after retirement, even though people think it's not going to be the same.

And then you work through a process.

And every advisor has their own process of figuring out what's the most tax efficient way to do that, but which would also depend on your goals.

Together you can, you and your advisor can come up with a plan to figure out how to do that, which will change over time as the RMD age comes, as your pension changes, things like that.

But best solution I would say is to hire someone that can help you figure that out.

MILLER: It sounds like a good candidate for a financial plan?

SHIRI AYALON: Yeah, and I'll give you my card after.

MILLER: Isn't it more of a three step where it's what I have, what I want to do, and what I can do, you know?

And then there might be a little bit of what I should do.

But, you know, and that reminds me, too, that I don't think we really hit on this, but estate planning, financial planning, it's really what you want.

You know?

There's a right way to do it.

There are there are proper steps for the planning, but it all ends up being what the individual wants to accomplish, be that for their family, for their community, or personally.

So there really are no wrong answers when it comes to my plan.

SHIRI AYALON: And it's not a one size fits all for sure.

MILLER: It depends, right?

AYALON: It definitely depends.

MIKE MILLER: So the question is: I'm about to become a grandparent -- congratulations - - for the first time.

What is the first thing I should do to modify my plans to include this new family member?

Other than renovating your house and putting -- I have two grandchildren, trust me.

[laughter] What is the first step for a new grandparent?

David.

DAVID BROSS: Well, I mean, what are your goals with respect to that grandchild?

You know, do you want to start an annual gifting plan?

Do you want to start putting money into a 529 plan for a college education?

Do you want to make a substantial large scale gift?

You know, what's the best approach to doing that?

I think the first thing is just how do you want to contribute to that grandchild?

And that's a conversation that starts with any one of your professionals, your financial planner, your attorney, your accountant.

Any one of us up here can initiate that conversation and then start helping you decide what those goals are and how you want, what's the best way to accomplish that.

MIKE MILLER: You mentioned 529 plans, and I know some people get confused because there are so many of them out there.

What's the benefit of a state specific 529 plan?

DAVID BROSS: Yeah, so Ohio has a great 529 plan system.

Essentially, it's for college saving, or not even college anymore.

They've opened it up to almost any kind of education savings.

But it's an after tax contribution that grows tax free over time.

So as long as you use it for an education related expense, there's no tax or income tax on that when it's withdrawn and used to pay whatever education expense that might be.

JAMI VALLANDINGHAM: And not to be the tax dork of the panel, but there's also a $4,000 per beneficiary deduction in Ohio for those contributions into the 529.

And they carry over, so if you were to do $10,000, you would get four this year, four next year, and two the following year.

SHIRI AYALON: And starting in 2024, you would be allowed to convert some of the 529 into Roth IRAs, if you have any funds left over.

So you can even help your child, your grandchild, start their retirement funds.

MIKE MILLER: Yeah, I think I want to help myself.

No.

Let's take an online question.

Kelly sent one in and it says: How would you maximize your assets and property for those people and institutions who will inherit the majority of the estate doesn't go to taxes first?

What's the tax, and you mentioned estate taxes, what is the estate tax limit right now?

JAMI VALLANDINGHAM: $12,920,000, and that gets into -- MILLER: Per person.

JAMI VALLANDINGHAM: Per person, and that gets indexed a little bit every year, have actually got indexed a lot for this year, but that's looking to sunset in 2025.

So that is yet to be determined what we're looking at here in -- it's not too far off at this point.

But so there will be some changes coming.

Who knows what that is, but we'll see that number definitely change.

MIKE MILLER: And depending on the value of your estate, you mentioned some trust alternatives that can help people either avoid or defer the estate taxes that may be applicable.

Sure.

BROSS: Sure, yeah.

And so just to complete what Jami was saying was sunsetting means that that exemption level will go down.

MIKE MILLER: Right, back to what it was.

BROSS: Yeah, I mean, it's the way the law is written, but what's going to happen?

Yeah, I think there's a lot to be said on that in the next couple of years.

But yeah, so you know, you don't have an estate tax issue until you have north of that $12.92 million.

Okay?

So you know, the answer to this question here is, you know, there's nothing really you need to do if you're underneath that threshold.

But going back to your question about tax planning, so you can use some of that exemption today to make gifts to other individuals, and you would do that inside of an irrevocable trust that is set up to hold those assets.

And by making that gift, not only do you get that gift out of your own personal estate, which reduces, but any of that appreciation is also not taxed at all in the future.

So that is one way of minimizing the impact of that.

MIKE MILLER: Let's take another online question that says: How does one recreate their financial history?

SHIRI AYALON: It's funny, I've actually done that just twice in the last few weeks.

[laughter] So you're not the only one, apparently, viewer who sent that in.

And there's a -- I would say you would need to somewhat rely on your memory and start digging up some papers and we'll just have to follow the trail of all those papers.

MIKE MILLER: Okay.

JAMI VALLANDINGHAM: I'm sorry.

SHIRI AYALON: A lot of things are now done digitally, so but if you have older documents, then sometimes you do have to dig up the old statements and start following the following the money.

MIKE MILLER: And so that point too, it can be a lot worse if you're not the individual, if you leave that mess for someone.

SHIRI AYALON: Absolutely.

MIKE MILLER: It can be that much more problematic, right?

SHIRI AYALON: Yeah, and to that point, I would really say that that's probably, I don't know, I don't think we've said this yet, that this is one of the most loving things that you can do for your beneficiaries as they're dealing with the emotional loss of a father or spouse or sibling that they don't have to also on top of that deal with all of that mess of trying to find all the documents.

You just you left them a binder.

MILLER: And I should mention here that CET has put together a really nice personal estate planning guide that is being revised as we speak.

But it's a great resource to include your assets, your personal individuals who are involved in the plan, beneficiaries, that kind of thing.

As I say, it's being revised.

It will be made available after today.

So just something to think about, but it's good to get organized as best you can.

Another online -- DAVID BROSS: Just a couple more comments on that.

So to help, I think, tax returns, too, right?

JAMI VALLANDINGHAM: Yes.

DAVID BROSS: Look at tax returns and see what kind of reporting was done on old tax returns.

And then the other thing is, you know, just talk about estate planning in general, how difficult it is after the fact.

It's also far more expensive.

SHIRI AYALON: Yes.

BROSS: So one of the things I think we didn't cover early on of why people don't do this is because it's expensive, right?

You got to hire an attorney, you hire an accountant.

You know, there's some expenses to do an estate plan, but it is far more expensive if somebody passes away and they haven't done this planning, and all of that just reduces the amount of money that's going to go to your loved ones.

JAMI VALLANDINGHAM: And I will say part of secure 2.0, there was some language in there about creating a database for these missing retirement, which there's unclaimed funds that's already out there per state.

But there was to be this other sort -- I'm sure there's more information coming at some point, but there is also supposed to be a new database created tracking some of these things to try to help in that situation.

MIKE MILLER: Yvonne wants to know, and I'm going to give this to Kristin.

What do you think of websites such as freewill.com?

LENHART: Of course I think they're terrible.

No.

You know, I think in general, you know, often times they're not necessarily state law specific.

Now, maybe some of them are improving, but a few years ago they used to all be a lot of times based off California law.

And then also you answer some questions and it kind of spits out something.

And sometimes it's not at all what you think.

Like, I had a couple come in a number of years ago that left everything to one child and they said, "Well, that's not what we meant."

And I said, "Well, that's what this says."

So like, I think you can get into that too, where you're inadvertently doing something that you did not intend.

And so I would encourage people, and obviously, you know, there can be situations where I think that might be appropriate if you've got, like, a kid going to college and you want to do something before they go and it's, you know.

But if you've got any substantial assets, I really would encourage you to invest the, you know, make the investment with a professional you can meet with, talk to and do all the things we've been talking about today, versus, because because to David's point, I mean, you are going to save so much in the long run.

I mean, it's a little bit more upfront cost now, but you're really saving so much in the long run.

BROSS: And the word of the day here is it depends, right?

I mean, estate planning truly is it depends.

A lot of these online things, it's a straight path.

Right?

And if there's any kind of deviating question, it does not recognize that.

Whereas any one of us up here would be able to say, "Okay, there's this other question we need to ask which could completely change the original plan of attack."

And so it just doesn't replace a professional who has experience at all.

MIKE MILLER: Good point.

Maureen wants to know: LENHART: What I typically tell clients is, you know, those documents should still be valid in Ohio if they were done validly under another state's laws.

Each state, often times, and Ohio is one that has, like we talked earlier, has the the health care documents that they've sort of put forth.

So I do tell people if this is a permanent move, you know, I would at least encourage you to get those updated sooner rather than later.

If you were to go into the hospital unexpectedly and hand them the Ohio form, they're going to glance at it in one second and be like, "Yep, this is your agent.

We're good."

If you hand them a Wisconsin form or a Florida form, they might say, "We think this looks okay, but let us have an attorney, one of our attorneys take a look and make sure it's valid."

And that might just slow down things in an emergency type of situation.

But in general, your will, your trust may not need to immediately be completely redone under Ohio.

Again, it's still valid.

So I usually tell people if you are making enough changes that we're doing a fairly lengthy amendment or something anyway then I might say, "You know, if you're permanently here, let's amend and restate and make this an Ohio document at this point."

But, you know, you don't have to necessarily run out and do that.

MIKE MILLER: Okay.

Next question: What is the benefit of a trust?

We talked a little bit about that.

I think we're getting into some Medicaid planning, maybe kind of want to go over a general idea of what that entails?

KRISTIN LENHART: Want me to?

BROSS: Go for it.

LENHART: That's fine.

So yeah, this is exactly, this is getting to Medicaid planning where there is a five year look back in general.

So when an individual goes to apply for Medicaid benefits, which are needs based, so you have to have only a very small amount of assets at that point, a small amount of income in order to qualify.

They will look back over a five year period.

So it's not a situation where you can have, you know, $1 million, and you give it to your son or daughter, and then the next day you say, "Oh, I need Medicaid because I have nothing now."

So they're going to look back over the transfers you've made over that period.

And so again, there can be certain trusts and certain types of planning that are done for Medicaid purposes that can help with some of that.

But the, again, the type of sort of core or the type of revocable trust that we talked about here in general is not that type of trust.

So if you have assets in that trust, that is not going to be a Medicaid planning vehicle.

And that's a very specific type of planning that only a few attorneys in the city, I would say, really specialize in that.

So that's also important.

I usually refer to one of three or four people who really that's what they do, because it is very specific.

MIKE MILLER: Right, because that can come to bite the family after the fact, absolutely.

One thing while we wait for the next online question, is there anybody in the audience that anything has gotten up and you want to ask a question?

Well, okay.

I want to talk real quickly.

I've seen parents who say, "Well, I don't need a will because I'm going to put my house in joint name with my son.

Not going to tell my daughter, but I'm going to put it with my son."

Why should you never, and I'm going to say that, why should you never include one of your children as a joint owner on an asset?

Anybody?

BROSS: You're disinheriting the other children.

[laughter] MIKE MILLER: Okay.

Not to mention the fact you've subjected that asset to their creditors.

Correct?

DAVID BROSS: True.

MIKE MILLER: Okay.

And the emotional toll might be tough.

KRISTIN LENHART: So, I assume are you -- are you saying, like, if you expect that child that you had on there to sell it and share it with the siblings or that type of a situation?

MIKE MILLER: That's part of it too, but again, they're not -- they might be responsible, but they're not legally responsible to do something like that.

KRISTIN LENHART: Right.

MILLER: I think people get hung up on when you can use a power of attorney designation or a TOD designation to do effectively what you want to do, which is pass the real estate.

Okay.

DAVID BROSS: This comes up a lot with, like, bank accounts, like, checking, savings accounts with clients.

They come in and they say, "Hey, I've put my daughter on as joint on my check account so that she can just write checks."

Okay, well, you don't have to put her on as a joint owner.

You can use your financial power of attorney, which would give her authorization.

You could go to the bank and have her as an authorized user and that would take care of that as well.

The legal impact of being a joint owner is that you become the sole owner of that account when one owner passes away.

So just kind of be thoughtful of that.

If that's a situation that you want to give a child some ability to assist you with things, there's other avenues besides adding them as a co-owner.

MILLER: Start with what do you want to accomplish.

DAVID BROSS: Right.

MILLER: And try to figure out the best way to do it.

I think we've got another online question.

We did talk about trustees.

I'm going to ask somebody to advocate for corporate trustees here.

[indiscernible crosstalk] As the moderator, I'm not allowed to have an opinion.

So no.

Corporate trustees are a good way, and bank trust companies because banks and trust companies that have trust departments have expertise in handling trusts and handling multiple family situations.

And so a corporate trustee is a good alternative.

Absolutely.

Donna wants to know: Again, I would say corporate trustee or corporate fiduciary as the executor, and some corporate fiduciaries will also act under certain circumstances as a financial power of attorney, depending on the relationship, depending on the language involved in the power of attorney.

I don't know if you've seen situations like that.

LENHART: Yeah, I think it's important to talk to someone who does this, and I think we can help you explore options.

And, you know, to your point, I do know of some more corporate solutions that will even serve as power of attorney.

MIKE MILLER: Ram wants to know: [stumbles over words] [laughter] So that didn't come out very well, did it?

Sorry.

Will they talk to my family for me?

AYALON: So I would say maybe they wouldn't talk for you, but they will talk with you to your family.

And something that is actually fascinating to be a part of that family conversation and to help you have that conversation with your family.

MILLER: It's really about passing on the knowledge.

And a lot of the situations I've seen over the years that cause people problems after mom or dad are gone is because they don't understand why mom or dad did what they did.

"You know, it's not fair.

It's not what I wanted.

It's it's not what I expected."

And when you have those conversations, and professional advisors can help those conversations, it does make that transition and it makes that legacy better.

So to that point, it's good to talk with the professionals.

JAMI VALLANDINGHAM: I think also, you know, kind of as we get older and our parents get older, we should start kind of pushing some of these conversations as well.

A lot of times they just don't want to say, "Hey, this is what I have."

You know, they just -- they're very private about it.

I think the younger generation than us, they don't care.

They'll tell you how much money they have in their wallet and their savings and their 401k.

MILLER: Since they don't have any money in their wallets.

JAMI VALLANDINGHAM: But, you know, as people do get older, they don't necessarily want to talk about this stuff.

So if you can, even from our side, you know, as the children to start pushing some of that and try to get some of this stuff on the table so that you hear it and it is discussed.

MIKE MILLER: Some of that is how you have dialog with different generations.

VALLANDINGHAM: Very true.

MIKE MILLER: And it's also how you approach it, you know, going in and saying, "Mom, dad, I need to know how much money you have so I know what kind of house I can buy," is not the right approach.

It's more, "Here's what's going to happen.

Here's what the alternatives might be.

Here's what we can avoid having dysfunction among the family or acrimony among the family if we have a conversation."

And you don't have to have the whole conversation all at once, piece it.

"We'd just really like to sit down and talk about what do you want to do, what's your plan?"

And then you go into the specifics at a later point.

That can really make a smooth transition from one generation to the next.

BROSS: It's also more than just financial and estate planning as well.

One thing at Trupoint we do, we do life planning with clients.

So we talk about, you know, the aging process.

You know, what are your goals for aging?

You know, do you want to age in place?

Is there a specific retirement community you want to go live?

And is there a certain part of the country you want to go live in?

And then we help, we do family meetings where then we help communicate that down to children or other individuals that they want to communicate that to so that there is an understanding between everybody what are the parents' goals and wishes and how they want to ultimately live the rest of their lives.

MILLER: So how do you deal with the situation where, you know, let's say there are three kids, two of them understand will be actively involved.

The third, who could be by distance or, you know, occupation doesn't want to be.

How do you broach that subject with a family?

DAVID BROSS: Well, so the third doesn't want to be?

MIKE MILLER: Doesn't want to be.

Has no interest, except at the end of the day, they're going to have their hand out.

DAVID BROSS: Yeah, so, I mean, we don't -- I mean, I don't know specific, I don't think I've ever had that particular issue, but I think we would encourage that particular child to be involved in the process.

And then we would work with our client to try and get that child involved in the process.

If there's one child just not participating, but the other two are and ultimately, when these things come up, that's going to be a detriment and that's going to create some confusion.

That's going to create some animosity between the other children.

So recommend, you know, try and get that child to be part of the process.

Can't force them to be unfortunately, though.

MIKE MILLER: I think -- LENHART: Go ahead.

MILLER: No, after you.

LENHART: I was just going to say, sometimes we will see situations where, you know, everyone sort of acknowledges, "Hey, there's three siblings, but my sister has basically handled helping mom and dad for the last ten years."

Then maybe parents are saying and they acknowledge that, and then they want to do like maybe a little bit extra for rather than a perfectly even split, they want to sort of acknowledge, you know, this child's real contributions towards the end of their life.

So they might do a little something more for that particular child.

MIKE MILLER: Right, right.

That makes sense.

SHIRI AYALON: I would also say sometimes the conversation is understanding what might be the reason behind it, right?

Because we talked about financial and legal decisions, but at the core of all of that are emotional needs and fears.

And sometimes it is just asking, for us at least, asking the next question of trying to understand what, maybe, what's really going on here?

And sometimes that opens that channel of conversation.

MILLER: That's good, because communication is important.

And money does strange things to people, even siblings who get along really well.

If mom and dad don't do what they think is the right thing, then there's some acrimony among the siblings.

I've seen that, and that's unfortunate, but it happens.

Next question from online: MILLER: Kristin.

LENHART: Yeah, I mean it certainly can affect how you structure your estate plan.

I mean, you know, if he's going to be over there.

I mean for monetary type assets, a bank account, a brokerage or something like that, if he's a US citizen living over there, you probably don't have a ton of extra issues to navigate.

Now, he may have some issues, you know, depending on his status in the UK and that kind of a thing.

And sometimes you just will say, "Hey, he needs to engage counsel or we need to talk to someone over there."

But it certainly can affect, you know, if they're not going to be involved, then, you know, maybe you will decide not to give real property or something, or you'll divide things differently since that son or daughter is really out of the picture as far as being able to -- You know, they're not going to be over here going through your house and deciding dispose or donate or whatever, you know, that type of thing.

So that might, that may affect it, I mean, certainly it could.

MIKE MILLER: To to that point, has anybody here ever read Grandma's Yellow Pie Plate, the book?

It's an estate planning based book and it's about the fact that mom was so sure that her daughter would like grandma's yellow pie plate, because she always mentioned it when she came to the house that she left it to her after her death.

Well, she really didn't want it.

The other daughter, who had actually helped grandma cook with the pie plate or bake with the pie plate, actually was sick because she didn't get it.

Point being, have the conversations.

Talk to people about what your expectations are, but what are their expectations?

What are their wishes?

What are their desires?

That kind of thing.

You were going to say something.

AYALON: I was going to say I actually had a situation where a beneficiary who lives in Australia inherited assets, including an IRA that has to be distributed within ten years.

And what I found working with her is that she needed to hire someone there that understood what that meant.

She still has to comply with the laws of this country, but she had to have someone over there that would understand what that meant from a taxation point of view, legal point of view, income point of view, and things like that.

MIKE MILLER: Okay.

Next question from Elaine: And again, I might suggest starting with a corporate fiduciary.

I do know that there are some lawyers that do that as a service.

I mean, there have been in the past.

Is that still a thing?

LENHART: Yeah, I mean, I think in certain situations lawyers will certainly function as an executor, as a successor trustee, maybe not as much as a financial power of attorney, but certainly some of those other roles in certain situations.

MIKE MILLER: Okay.

Next question.

And we know the answer to that, it depends.

KRISTIN LENHART: Yeah, exactly.

I mean, you know, and often times the substantive portion of a will is such that if you were making a couple changes, sometimes I just tell people it's going to be just as fast to just like do a new one than it is to do a codicil with several.

MILLER: And the same would apply to a trust too, depending on the nature of the revision and the changes that you want to make and the time period.

How often should somebody revisit an estate plan, though?

KRISTIN LENHART: I tell people, you know, pull it out every 3 to 5 years.

That doesn't mean you're going to need to make updates every 3 to 5 years, but just go through it.

See that your agents are still who they want, that kind of thing.

Obviously, if a major life event happens, you know, when your spouse passes away or, you know, a child marries someone that you aren't as fond of or, you know, something happens in your life that might necessitate you to sort of pull it out and take a second look at it there, too.

Yeah, I mean, a rule of thumb I'd say is every 3 to 5 years, again, not saying you're going to make major changes that frequently, but.

MIKE MILLER: Okay.

Next question.

After we say it depends, David, what do you think?

BROSS: It just depends on your goals and wishes for that particular grandson, how much you're going to contribute to that particular trust.

MILLER: The purpose of -- BROSS: What's that?

MILLER: The purpose of the trust is?

BROSS: The purpose of the trust.

You know, what?

You know, is there a certain age you feel like that that grandchild can be their own trustee?

You know, there's a lot just decision making that go into it.

And it really stems around how much and what are the goals.

MIKE MILLER: Let's take a poll real quick.

So I have two kids, neither of them was competent before the age of 30.

No.

But at what age do you really believe that a normal run of the mill person is financially competent?

Now, I know it's not 18.

21 is probably stretching it.

But is it 25?

Is it 30?

Is there some number?

Where do we all fall?

SHIRI AYALON: 40.

MIKE MILLER: 40?

Okay.

DAVID BROSS: I think I have my trust, my kids become their own trustee of half at 30 and then the balance at 40.

MIKE MILLER: Okay.

KRISTIN LENHART: I would say 35, if I had to just put a number on it.

JAMI VALLANDINGHAM: Yeah.

I was thinking in the 30s.

MIKE MILLER: Okay.

And if my kids are listening, I said 25, so.

[laughter] DAVID BROSS: But I'll say this though, that's the beauty of doing your review every so many years, right?

Because these documents can, for the most part, be revised for that perspective.

So if you see a kid that's financially becoming more and more responsible as they get older, maybe that age comes down.

But if you see a kid that's becoming less and less and less responsible financially, maybe that age goes up.

When I was practicing law, I had one client at the age of 65 and he was like, "I don't want them having anything to do with this."

And I thought that was crazy, but at the same time, he knew his kids.

MILLER: Kids can be treated differently for that reason.

BROSS: Yeah, exactly.

MIKE MILLER: Okay, Kevin wants to know: KRISTIN LENHART: Yes, you typically can add what would be called a TOD or a transfer on death designation onto a joint account that would handle that situation.

MILLER: And to that point, too, we should we should talk, or not talk, we just need to mention that when you have insurance, you do want to have a named beneficiary, having a contingent beneficiary is absolutely.

IRA accounts, qualified plan accounts, whatever it might be, you absolutely want to have more than one level of beneficiary just in case, because you never know what happens.

DAVID BROSS: You can do that with real estate too.

MIKE MILLER: What's that?

DAVID BROSS: You can do that with real estate as well.

MIKE MILLER: Yes.

SHIRI AYALON: Yeah, and I would say the same 3 to 5 years when you look at your estate planning, you also want to review your beneficiaries.

MIKE MILLER: That's a great point.

Absolutely.

Kelly wants to know: I think we talked about that a little bit.

And it's going to depend on what you have, what you need, and what you want to do.

Right.

Okay.

Question: The answer is yes.

And why?

SHIRI AYALON: For one thing, there may be some things that you're missing.

You know, for one thing, I know one of the things that people a lot of times miss is cars.

The State of Ohio does allow you to pass cars between spouses without a will, without probate.

But I know people that have multiple cars.

I think the state of Ohio limits it to two cars.

So a lot of times there are those things that we don't necessarily think about.

So it's just good to have everything cleaned up the way you want it to, because otherwise probate court is going to decide for you.

KRISTIN LENHART: And I usually tell people it's almost like an insurance policy.

If you do have something that you forgot, there was an old retirement or an old life insurance policy or something, it's a lot easier and less expensive to go through the probate process with a will than without.

BROSS: When we say the probate court will determine it for you, there's actually a statute in the State of Ohio, and really every other state for that matter, that outlines if you have done zero estate planning, you do not have a will in place, there are no beneficiary designations, then it lays out to whom and what amounts will receive your estate.

It starts with spouses and kids.

And if you're a blended family, good luck.

Nieces and nephews, and then if there's just nobody left, you know, it would go to the State of Ohio completely.

So you don't necessarily want that because it's probably not going to be.

MILLER: Of course a will you also want to have because you might want to leave a charitable legacy, too.

Right.

So anyway, last question, Elizabeth would like to know: I can answer that.

As a corporate fiduciary, we charge based on the percentage of the asset value when we're doing investment management.

Hourly fees can be charged for special projects.

And then estates, you said trustees for estates, but if you have an executor, there's a statute in the State of Ohio that outlines the amount of the fee subject to probate court approval.

But generally, if you're actually a trustee doing investment management, you want to charge by the value of the assets.

As the asset value goes up, the benefit to the client goes up, the fees go up, which is kind of the way it should be, I think.

And I believe that was the the last question.

And that concludes our estate planning discussion.

Hopefully it was good.

Thank you, Jami, Kristin, Shiri and David for your time and expertise.

And thank you all for joining us in the studio as well as online.

For additional information on planned giving, please visit CETconnect.org or thinktv.org.

We hope you plant the seed for you, your family and your legacy.

Thank you very much and take good care.

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