Administering an Ohio estate can be challenging for personal representatives, and there is usually a sense of relief and satisfaction when the process is successfully completed. But what happens when an estate is closed, and it is later discovered that the state of Ohio was holding unclaimed funds for the deceased? Does the estate need to be reopened?
Historically, the answer to that question has been yes, resulting in additional paperwork, effort and expense, sometimes to recover only a relatively small amount of money. Fortunately, House Bill 270, which was passed unanimously by the Ohio House, may change all that, making the process of reclaiming previously unclaimed funds on behalf of an estate much more straightforward.
The bill, which makes multiple changes to the Unclaimed Funds Act of Ohio, creates a procedure that streamlines the process for small or closed estates to claim funds that belonged to a decedent and which lay unclaimed with the state. The proposed Ohio Revised Code 169.052 is expected to pass the Senate without difficul… Read More
If you were suddenly to become so ill that you couldn’t make healthcare decisions for yourself, who would make them on your behalf? This question has taken on a greater urgency than usual during the COVID-19 pandemic, in which people who have no symptoms on one day can be grievously ill less than a week later.
Many people assume that their next of kin, such as a spouse or an adult child, would make important healthcare decisions for them if the need arose. But what if you are in a blended family? Or if a spouse and adult child disagree, who takes priority?
Unfortunately, this is not an uncommon scenario, especially in second or subsequent marriages when the patient’s spouse is not the parent of the patient’s adult children. In that case, the question of who gets to make a decision about a patient’s health can be a thorny one. The consequences may literally be life-and-death; even if not, the dispute can cause a permanent rift in a family.
Any family can have conflicts over healthcare dec… Read More
Families are constantly changing—sometimes through joyful events like marriages, births, and adoptions, and sometimes less happy ones, like a death or dissolution of a marriage. But too often, people plan for the future as if it will only contain happy events. Even when people do make an estate plan, they tend to ignore the very real possibility of a divorce down the road: either theirs, or their child’s.
Of course, unlike death, divorce isn’t inevitable. Even so, failing to take into account that a divorce could happen could have disastrous outcomes for family wealth. Our firm talks about inheritance and divorce in Ohio, and what you can do to protect your assets for the people you want to inherit them.
As you know, in a divorce, the court divides up the couple’s marital property between them. But unless you have actually gotten divorced, you may not have thought much about what “marital property” is. In essence, “marital property” is any property that either spouse acquires during the marriage, with limited exceptions. In Ohio, one of th… Read More
The tasks involved in probating an estate can be daunting, especially for those who have never been through it before. We are committed to relieving anxiety around the probate process and to helping Ohioans through an often-challenging time in their lives.
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