Take-Away:  An overlooked change in the 2017 Tax Act is a change to the understatement of income tax penalty. The normal threshold for a taxpayer to become exposed to the understatement penalty is when the tax on the 1040 return is understated by greater than  10% of the reported tax. However, if the taxpayer claims […]

Take-Away: Apparently there is a lot of chatter these days that professionals need to quickly become independent contractors to position themselves to to claim the 20% deduction from their ‘pass-through’ entity or sole proprietor profits under the new IRC 199A. Before everyone jumps on the independent contractor bandwagon remember that there is no guarantee that […]

Take-Away: Michigan has two trust decanting statutes where trustees can transfer assets to a ‘new’ trust created by the trustee. One statute deals with changes to a trust’s administrative provisions. Another statute deals with changes to a trust’s dispositive provisions. As more clients use irrevocable dynasty-type trusts or spousal lifetime access trusts [SLATs] to exploit […]

Take-Away: A “minor’s trust” is a statutory exception to the normal gift tax annual exclusion rules. Annual Exclusion Rule: For a gift to qualify for the federal gift tax annual exclusion [$15,000 per donee starting this year] the subject of the gift must be a present interest. A present interest  is one that is available […]

Take-Away: Greenleaf Trust recently obtained trust powers in Delaware, leading many to ask the question ‘Why?’ A recent survey of all 50 states that focused on the ‘best place’ to situs an irrevocable trust named Delaware as one of four states in its ‘top tier’ for a trust. These ‘winning’ states are: South Dakota, Alaska, […]

Take-Away: When you meet with your clients this year for their annual review, it is wise to strongly suggest to them that they have their estate planning documents reviewed by their attorney. Not only many the changes brought about by the 2017 Tax Act impact their existing instruments, several reported cases during the past year […]

Take-Away: A Roth IRA is more valuable than a regular or traditional IRA to its owner and to the owner’s designated beneficiaries. This enhanced value is due primarily to the tax-free accumulation and tax-free distribution of income earned by a Roth IRA and the absence of any required minimum distributions (RMD) from the Roth IRA […]

Take-Away: Despite an optional provision of the Uniform Trust Code, upon which much of the Michigan Trust Code is based, a spendthrift provision  in an irrevocable trust is treated, unless the trust instrument expresses a contrary intent, as a material purpose of that trust. Consequently, the presence of a spendthrift provision in an irrevocable trust […]

Take-Away: The use of limited powers of appointment is increasing these days as individuals attempt to build flexibility into their estate plans while avoiding transfer taxation of their heirs. Conferring a limited power of appointment on a dynasty trust beneficiary is an excellent way to avoid estate taxes on the beneficiary’s death, yet give the […]

Take-Away: Despite some blunt court decisions from the past, some courts may not view a fiduciary as having an ongoing duty to ascertain a beneficiary’s eligibility status under a trust. At best, the law remains unsettled as to a trustee’s continuing duty to follow up to ascertain a beneficiary’s entitlement to receive distributions from a […]