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
Here’s a riddle, and you may not find the answer funny: when does a beneficiary named in a will not get the assets left to them in a will? The answer is when the asset is payable on death to someone else. Ohio law authorizes individuals to enter into contracts with banks and other financial institutions to make the contents of a financial account payable to a designated beneficiary on the owner’s death. These are called “payable on death” or “POD” accounts if the funds are in a bank account. Brokerage accounts and other assets, like car titles and even real estate, may be “transfer on death” or “TOD.” POD and TOD assets operate similarly, with the same advantages and disadvantages.
At first glance, POD accounts appear to have a number of advantages. For one thing, they bypass probate court. Upon the death of an account holder, the designated beneficiary needs only to present… Read More
Nothing is certain except death and taxes—and the headaches that result when the two intersect. Rarely do people die with their finances neatly tied up, and one of the frequent issues that arises is the matter of the deceased person’s (decedent’s) last income tax refund.
If a person dies being owed an income tax refund (as thousands of people do every year), what happens to the money? Obviously, the decedent cannot cash a check made out to him or her. A refund in the sole name of the decedent is an asset of the decedent’s estate. Eventually, it will be distributed to the decedent’s heirs or beneficiaries (assuming there is money left in the estate after all legitimate debts are paid). But what happens in the meantime? And what if the tax refund is from a tax return jointly filed with a… 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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