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Special Needs Trusts 101: Protecting Benefits While Funding a Loved One’s Future
Families do extraordinary things for loved ones with disabilities. The law will meet you halfway—if you use the right tools in the right order. A Special Needs Trust (SNT) can hold money for a beneficiary with a disability without costing
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Beneficiary Designations: The Most Overlooked (and Most Dangerous) Part of Your Plan
Everyone obsesses over the will or trust. Fewer people review the boring one-page forms that actually move the money. Beneficiary designations—on retirement plans, IRAs, life insurance, brokerage accounts (TOD), and bank accounts (POD)—are contracts that usually control who gets paid,
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The 2026 Estate-Tax Sunset Explained: Exemptions, Gifting Now, and Portability
When Congress doubled the federal estate and gift tax exemption for 2018–2025, it set a timer. Absent new legislation, that higher “basic exclusion amount” sunsets after December 31, 2025 and reverts on January 1, 2026 to the pre-2018 level of
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Avoiding Probate: 9 Legal Tools That Keep Your Family Out of Court
If you’ve seen probate up close, you know the drill: public filings, waiting periods, creditor notices, and the creeping sense that this could have been simpler. The good news is that, in most states, an organized plan can move a
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Will vs. Trust in Plain English: Which One Do You Actually Need?
If you’ve ever wondered whether you need a will or a revocable living trust, you’re not alone. Both documents direct who inherits your property, yet they work in different ways at different times. In plain English: a will speaks only
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Monthly Legal Headlines — February 2026
Date Published: February 8, 2026 FTC Issues Second Report to Congress on its Work to Fight Ransomware and other Cyberattacks Date: February 6, 2026 Source: FTC Press Releases The Federal Trade Commission issued a second report to Congress detailing the
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Monthly Legal Headlines — December 2025
Date Published: December 19, 2025 Federal Reserve Board publishes its biennial report on debit card transactions, which summarizes information collected from large debit card issuers and payment card networks Date: December 19, 2025 Source: Federal Reserve Press Releases Federal Reserve
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Top U.S. Legal Headlines — October 27, 2025
Date Published: October 27, 2025 Federal Reserve Board requests comment on proposals to enhance the transparency and public accountability of its annual stress test Date: October 24, 2025 Source: Federal Reserve Press Releases Federal Reserve Board requests comment on proposals