Wills, Trusts & Estates

At Young & Maslowski, LLC, we will personally design an estate plan that fulfills your intentions.

Trusts and estates can be complex areas of law. Mistakes can often lead to disastrous results for both you and your family. As a result, it is imperative that you have an experienced lawyer who has extensive and up-to-date knowledge of estate planning laws and practices.

At Young & Maslowski, LLC, we have considerable experience in representing a broad range of clients with their estate planning needs. We will take the time to discuss all of the available estate planning options with you and personally design an estate plan that fulfills your intentions.

Wills

A Last Will and Testament (“Will”) is a legal document that gives instruction on how you would like your assets divided, who shall take care of minor children, and who you want put in charge of distributing your assets. If you die without leaving a valid Will, the Courts will make these important decisions for you.

Trusts

Revocable Trust

A Revocable Trust, sometimes referred to as a Living Trust, can be used to avoid the probate process, provide privacy regarding your assets, and also provides tax benefits. Creating a Revocable trust allows you to make plans for your estate after your death, while still allowing you to make changes while you are living. Because it is Revocable, you are able to reclaim property that was transferred into the Revocable Trust, should the need arise.
Unlike a Will, a Revocable Trust dictates how your property will be handled while you are living, as well as how your assets will be distributed after you die without having to go through probate. The probate process used to determine how to distribute your assets can be lengthy. Probate allows public access to the assets of the deceased person’s estate. By creating a Revocable Trust, the probate process is avoided and the administration remains private. The successor Trustee handles the administration of the Trust, including the distribution of any of its assets in a private fashion removed from public record.
Many families use Revocable Trusts to minimize the inheritance taxes associated with the transfer of assets from parents to their children or grandchildren. Using a Revocable Trust allows parents to remain in control of their assets, as well as designate distribution amounts and place age restrictions on when beneficiaries may receive the assets.

Irrevocable Trust

Unlike a Revocable Trust, an Irrevocable Trust is a trust that cannot be modified or terminated without the permission of the Grantor and the beneficiary. By transferring assets into the Irrevocable Trust, the grantor terminates all of his or her rights of ownership to the assets and the trust. Unlike a Revocable Trust, the grantor is unable to modify the trust.
The main reason for setting up an Irrevocable Trust is for estate and tax reasons. The benefit of an Irrevocable Trust for estate assets is that it terminates ownership by the grantor, removing the assets of the Irrevocable Trust from the grantor’s taxable estate. The grantor also gets rid of any tax liability on the income generated by the assets transferred to the Irrevocable Trust. In most cases, the grantor cannot receive these benefits if he or she is the trustee of the trust.

Marital Property Agreements

Under the Wisconsin Marital Property Act, all income earned or received after January 1, 1986, as well as property acquired with such income, is considered marital property. Each spouse is deemed to own an undivided one-half interest in such property, regardless of how such property is titled.

Property acquired by gift or inheritance, on the other hand, is considered to be the individual property ofthe titled spouse. Property acquired prior to January 1, 1986, during your marriage is called “deferred marital property” and is treated as individual property during your lifetimes. At death, however, the non-titled spouse has certain elective rights, which may become effective in the event the titled spouse leaves his or her deferred marital property to someone else.

Classifying property as marital property provides an added income tax advantage resulting from the “double” step-up in cost basis for capital gain income tax purposes that marital property receives after the death of the first spouse. At death, assets in a decedent’s estate receive a step-up in cost basis equal to their fair market value as of date of death. With regard to marital property, however, both the decedent’s one-half interest in the property and the one-half interest owned by the surviving spouse receives such a step-up.

The step-up is especially beneficial if the surviving spouse decides to sell all or a portion of the property, since he or she will recognize little or no capital gains tax as a result of such sale. Classifying assets as marital property is particularly advantageous if you have assets with a low-cost basis.

Estate and Gift Tax Planning

A comprehensive estate plan not only outlines your wishes but also protects your beneficiaries from facing unnecessary estate taxes. After working hard to amass your assets, the last thing you want is to have the government take a significant or even small amount of it unnecessarily through estate taxes.

Transferring wealth from generation to generation can be very complex and confusing. To help ensure that your estate taxes are kept to a minimum, there are numerous tools that can be utilized including Generation-Skipping Trusts, Family Limited Partnerships, Charitable Remainder Trusts, Intentionally Defective Grantor Trusts, or Irrevocable Life Insurance Trusts. Young & Maslowski, LLC, can help to develop a personalized plan for you by taking into account your goals and interests.

Business Succession Planning

Business succession planning is a process of preparing to hand over control of the business to others ina way that will minimize the disruption and negative impact to the operations and value of the business. Having a formal, written business succession plan helps to achieve these goals. Business succession planning should be a priority for every business, especially businesses held by a family or families.

A few questions to consider include:

Who’s going to manage the business when you no longer work the business?
How will ownership be transferred?
Will your business even carry on or will you sell it?
What happens if a partner wants out of the business?

Business succession planning helps to manage these issues by setting up a smooth transition between you and the future managers and owners of your business. There are asset transfer tax strategies that help you minimize taxes upon death. Business succession planning should certainly be considered when establishing one’s overall estate planning, as many of the moving parts overlap.

For many family businesses, it is the “family” that is the primary emphasis of and motivator for succession planning. Whether you’re thinking about the future management of your business, how ownership is going to be passed down, or the potential impact of taxes on a transfer of ownership, the decisions you make now (or fail to make) will affect your family. A good succession plan ensures that you have the funds you need to retire and that the business you have built continues to thrive in the hands of the next group of managers and owners.