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Strategies & Market Trends : Estate Planning -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Cisco who wrote (24)	1/16/2005 6:20:45 AM
From: redfish	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 79

You should confirm that state law allows an unrelated CPA to serve as trustee.

To: Cisco who wrote (24)	1/16/2005 4:54:07 PM
From: Lazarus_Long	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 79

Did I run into another lawyer here? :-) Can't swing a post around here without hitting 6 or 8.

To: Cisco who wrote (24)	1/17/2005 1:51:18 PM
From: redfish	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 79

"I firmly believe one can set up either a tax-saving AB trust" The "AB trust" is imo something that I think has been over-prescribed. It consists of what is generally referred to as a "family trust" to leverage the two spouses' unified credits against estate tax, and a "marital trust" to hold everything over and above that for the benefit of the surviving spouse. The "family trust" is a given if you are subject to the estate tax, you would be crazy not to create it. But if you trust your wife not to blow the money on a Ferrari or a toyboy, why not just leave the excess to her outright and avoid the expense of maintaining a separate marital trust? At the least the marital trust will require an annual federal tax return ($650 if prepared by a CPA), and trustee's commissions. So, unless you are worried that your wife won't be able to handle money responsibly, it seems to me you are better off eliminating the "b" portion of the ab trust. Also not creating the marital trust may help ensure marital harmony.