Articles Posted in Estate Planning

By Lane V. Erickson, Idaho Estate Planning Attorney

Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you’d be familiar with the biggest news story coming out of Idaho recently. This has to do with Chad Daybell and his new wife Lori Vallow. In addition to the two missing children, several mysterious deaths surround these two individuals including the death of Chad Daybell’s first wife Tammy. Though no details have been released to the public yet, Tammy Daybell’s body has been exhumed so that additional tests can be done to determine whether or not her death was due to natural causes as claimed by Chad.

Without getting into all the details having to do with Lori Vallow, Chad Daybell, and the missing children, we will simply focus on what will happen under Idaho’s inheritance laws if it is determined that Chad Daybell played a role in Tammy’ death.

By Lane V. Erickson, Idaho Estate Planning Attorney

For more than 20 years I’ve been an estate planning and probate attorney in Idaho. I love where I live, and I love the work I do! I find that I have an opportunity to help many people in creating their own customized written estate plan. I also get to work with these people to keep their plan updated whenever they go through a major life change. Additionally, I’m available to help the family members or loved ones of each of my clients when my clients pass away.

Whatever I tell someone that I’m an estate planning and probate attorney I usually get a series of questions. These questions can range all over the place from how do you start to get an estate plan done or what is it that you need to do after a loved one or family member has passed away. Recently, however, I was asked a question I’ve never been asked before. This question was, “What does executing a will mean?”

By Lane V. Erickson, Idaho Estate Planning Attorney

Estate planning is a unique and personal thing to complete. As an estate planning attorney for more than 20 years I’ve seen all kinds of ideas and goals that people have come up with as part of their estate planning. Really, an estate plan can be as unique as the individual who creates it.

One of the things I have found is that most people want to have a plan in place that doesn’t require a lot of time and maintenance to keep current. I completely understand this. I believe that getting a good estate plan done through a competent and qualified attorney is worth the money. However, I can understand that people don’t want to have to keep returning to the lawyer every time they want to give a specific gift through their written last will and testament. The good news is, they don’t need to use an attorney when this happens.

By Lane V. Erickson, Idaho Estate Planning Attorney

I love being an estate planning attorney. I’ve been involved in many other areas of the law but no other area has provided the same satisfaction to me that I get from helping my clients create a well-written and well-thought-out estate plan that provides protections for them while they are alive and allows them to plan for their family and loved ones after they are gone.

One of the areas that provides the most satisfaction to me is when I’m able to help parents who have young children. The reason I get so much satisfaction from this is because when we are done, I can see the relief my clients feel knowing they have a good plan in place that will take care of their children.

By Lane V. Erickson, Idaho Estate Planning Attorney

As an Idaho estate planning and probate attorney, I often meet with clients during a free 30-minute consultation to talk about probate. Many times, these clients have moved to Idaho from other states. Additionally, I often have clients who have lived in Idaho most of their lives but who have family members who live in other states. In both of these circumstances I have come across many individuals who have stated that they want to avoid probate in any way possible because they have heard how horrible, long and expensive probate can be.

I’ve always grateful whenever I have a client express these concerns to me because it gives me an opportunity to talk about the probate process in Idaho. Idaho is one of those unique states where probate is really not that bad. Because of this, unless there is a real compelling reason, which rarely exists, it is really not that bad for most families to complete the probate process when they have a loved one pass away.

By Lane V. Erickson, Idaho Estate Planning Attorney

The percentage of adults in Idaho who have actually taken any steps to complete their estate planning is abysmal. The most recent reports I have been able to study show that only 31% of adults in America have taken any actions towards completing their estate planning. The same percentage is similar in Idaho.

It’s important to understand however that not all the news is bad news. I’ve come to learn that most people don’t get their estate planning done because they don’t know how to start. Because of this, we’ve come up with an easy solution to help each individual who is interested in getting their estate planning get started with the process. Our solution is the easy Estate Planning Questionnaire that we offer to each of our clients. This questionnaire can be downloaded to your computer through the link above. So how exactly does our estate planning questionnaire help? I’m glad you asked this question.

By Lane V. Erickson, Idaho Estate Planning Attorney

I’ve been an Idaho estate planning and probate attorney now for nearly 20 years. During that time, I’ve received numerous phone calls from clients letting me know that a family member or loved one has passed away. Usually the purpose of this call is that the person doesn’t know what it is they need to do next and they want me to answer their questions.

I provide to these clients a free 30-minute consultation so I can learn about the situation of their family member or loved one. By doing this, I can answer their questions about the things that need to be done. Usually, the main questions people have is about the property, money, or assets the person has left behind as well as any debts that still exist.

By Lane V. Erickson, Idaho Estate Planning Attorney

Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you’ve likely heard about the SECURE Act that was recently signed into law by President Trump. This act provides a number of wonderful benefits to individuals who have qualified retirement plans such as 401ks, IRAs, Simple IRAs, and so forth. It is likely that these fantastic benefits will help millions of individuals better prepare for retirement.

However, not everything about the SECURE Act is golden. One of the items that most individuals overlook about the SECURE Act, that caught the attention of all estate planning attorneys, is the 10-year limitation on withdrawal of inherited retirement accounts such as IRAs or 401ks.

By Lane V. Erickson, Idaho Estate Planning Attorney

Both a new year and a new decade are upon us. Because of this, now is a great time to review your own written estate planning documents and make sure that they are valid, and more importantly that they accomplish what you want. Sometimes it’s difficult to understand what estate planning documents do. For this reason, I often work with my clients in reviewing their estate plan, discussing what their estate plan accomplishes, and then help them in making any updates or changes to the estate plan the client wants to get done for the new year. I’ve helped clients accomplish this for more than 20 years and I’m confident that I can help you too!

So, what are the biggest mistakes people make with their estate plan in a new year? Below are the four most common mistakes that are made. I list these to help you understand the things that you should be thinking about to make sure that your estate plan is updated and accomplishes what you want it to do.

By Lane V. Erickson, Idaho Estate Planning Attorney

Estate planning, and coming up with a written estate plan, doesn’t need to be difficult. When you have the right help, and you are doing it the right way, it can actually be a fairly simple process. However, many well-meaning individuals often seek to do their own estate plan or to have it done by individuals who are not experienced. When this happens, mistakes begin to occur that can have a big impact on how a person’s estate is distributed after they are gone.

One of the things that I’ve seen coming up more recently, is when a husband and wife do a joint last will and testament. In other words, rather than each of the spouses having their own separate last will and testament, they create a joint last will and testament that both of them sign, have witnessed, and then have notarized.