The U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas issued a nationwide preliminary injunction against the enforcement of the Corporate Transparency Act (CTA), questioning its constitutionality and its impact on small businesses. The CTA, enacted as part of broader anti-money laundering efforts, mandates companies to disclose their beneficial ownership information to a federal database maintained by the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN). The plaintiffs, including small business owners and a trade association, argued that the CTA compels speech and association, infringing on First Amendment protections. They also raised concerns about privacy violations under the Fourth Amendment, given the extensive personal information required.
Assess Reporting Requirements: Determine whether your entity falls within the scope of the CTA’s reporting obligations. This includes corporations, limited liability companies, and similar entities created or registered to do business in the United States.
Estate Administration is the process of transferring the ownership and control of your assets at your death. In some cases, where you owned the assets outright, the transfer is by your Will, which requires a probate procedure to be effective. For some, such as retirement accounts, life insurance policies, jointly owned property and trusts, not probate procedure is required. There is a short statute of limitations which applies to the creditors of a decedent so that any claims against the estate are barred after one year from the date of death. During that year, the following occurs.
Wills
+ What is probate? Probate is a court supervised procedure to identify all assets owned by a deceased person (a “decedent”), identify the decedent’s creditors and beneficiaries, and the distribution of assets accordingly. Probate is required whether you have a Last Will or not. Because probate is a formal court proceeding, with built-in waiting periods, a simple, uncontested probate can last 9-12 months or more and cost several thousands of dollars.
Trusts
A Revocable Trust, also called an inter vivos trust, a living trust, or a Grantor Trust, and is a trust over which the Grantor retains the right to revoke the transfer. As such they are not considered to be a completed gift and are disregarded for income tax purposes so long as the Grantor is alive. Once the Grantor gives up the right to revoke the trust, or dies, the gift is complete and the trust becomes an irrevocable trust.
Power of Attorney
It’s a common concern whether a parent, which through age or infirmity, is not getting bills paid. Worse yet is when they pay twice, pay incorrectly or are being scammed. For some clients, we use a financial power of attorney to have the ability to make financial decisions for a parent if he or she can’t. Day-to-day bills are equally important, maybe even more important than major financial decisions. You don’t want electricity, phone or cable has been turned off due to nonpayment, for example. Or that the rent or mortgage check hasn’t been sent.
Probate
The estate planning and execution area of practice includes evaluating the needs of all parties involved and creating documents and plans for assets, retirement, generational transfer, and wealth preservation. Sometimes known as probate law – the legal services we provide in this area – applies to Massachusetts.
Tax planning is often seen as a purely financial facet of planning your estate, leading to a great deal of difficulty in balancing your needs presently with saving in the future. Most financial planning firms and law offices tend to tip the scales in favor of savings, opting to minimize the tax impact of your estate at the expense of protecting control over your assets.