Take-Away: A court recently refused the beneficiaries’ petition to remove the acting trustee. The court’s denial was because the trustee’s removal would be inconsistent with what the court perceived to be the trust’s material purposes. Once again, a court is guided by, or limited in the modification of, an irrevocable trust by the material purpose […]

Take-Away: The IRS just published proposed Regulations to update the Life Expectancy and Distribution Tables that are used to calculate an individual’s required minimum distribution (RMD) from his or her retirement plan account. Assuming these proposed Regulations are adopted, they will apply to calculate RMDs beginning on January 1, 2021, (coincidently) the same time the […]

Take-Away: An in terrorem or no-contest clause is enforceable in Michigan, unless the challenger to the Will or trust has probable cause to initiate the challenge. Much less clear is the enforceability of a no-contest clause’s expansive scope that seeks to prevent any challenges by a beneficiary to the actions or decisions made by the […]

Take-Away: We have yet another example of the IRS’s apparent move towards leniency in addressing IRA distribution ‘mistakes’ in a recent private letter ruling (PLR), where the IRS accepted a court order that changed the decedent’s IRA beneficiary from his children to his surviving spouse. Private Letter Ruling: No. 201934006, Dated May 30, 2019, released […]

Take-Away: Several states now permit individuals to use gender-neutral ‘X’ markers on their state driver’s licenses, identification cards, and other official documents. This third gender option is prevalent in the European Union, and it appears to be gaining traction in the U.S. Background: A 2016 study at UCLA found that the percentage of trans adults, […]

Take-Away: An intra-family loan is a simple and understandable way to shift wealth from an individual in a high income tax bracket to an individual in a lower income tax bracket. Structuring that loan,  however, is critical in order to avoid an implied gift under the Tax Code. Background: We know that funding a grantor […]

Take-Away: The Supreme Court’s decision in Kaestner this past June held that a state could not impose an income tax on accumulated income in an irrevocable trust if the sole basis to impose the state’s income tax was the state residence of a trust beneficiary. While that was good news, the Supreme Court made it […]

Take-Away: A recent article noted the dramatic change in the longevity of individuals with reference to their income levels. The import of that study is that current life expectancy tables understate the actual life expectancy of wealthy individuals, which disparity should lead them to plan more aggressively for their longer life expectancies, and before the […]

Take-Away: Some qualified plans permit plan participants to take loans from their retirement account. If the participant fails to repay an installment in a timely manner, the loan will be treated as a taxable distribution of the loan balance and possibly trigger the 10% penalty for an early distribution. Background: Amounts distributed to a plan […]

Take-Away: The Uniform Law Commission approved a year ago the Uniform Fiduciary Income and Principal Act. This Act, if adopted by Michigan, makes some important changes to the 1994 and 1997 versions Uniform Principal and Income Act (UPIA). The earlier UPIA Acts tended to create some dilemmas for a trustee that is charged with prudent […]