Iowa Estate Plan

A popular blog post that I had on a different site in my pre-solo days dealt with an overview of the probate process in Iowa.  As it has been a few years since that post, and I'd like to have this post under this blog "roof", I'm going to recycle it here. The probate process in Iowa can be broken down into essentially 5 general steps: Initial opening of the estate - this is the filing of the initial paperwork to get a docket number and the formal appointment of a personal representative. Notification period - legal publication in the newspaper is arranged, heirs/beneficiaries are given notice, and creditors are given notice of probate. Report and Inventory - Within 90 days of opening the estate, the personal representative is required to file a document with the court listing the decedent's assets and their values, in addition to the information on the heirs/beneficiaries. Tax Filings - The other sure thing in life, besides death, is taxes and it doesn...

Gardner Law Firm, P.C. has its fully completed website up and operational at this point.  Want to know more about me?  Now you can find out.  Thanks to LawPromo for their good work!

A local news story helps provide another sad example of why it is important to establish some basic estate planning, regardless of your age.  A young lady was involved in an automobile accident that has left her in a coma and unable to deal with her personal affairs.  As a result, her friends and family are struggling with the financial restrictions of getting access to her accounts to deal with various matters. Two relatively simple documents- Financial Power of Attorney and Medical Power of Attorney -would have made this job much easier and cheaper.  The cost for getting these basic and essential documents in place is minuscule when compared to having to go to court to establish a guardianship and/or conservatorship for someone in this situation.  Commonly younger individuals don't realize the need or importance for such documents as they are young and immortal, or believed to be less likely to have a need for these provisions.  Unfortunately,...

Cemetery of Chettle parish church ( Johan Doe ) / CC BY-SA 3.0 The Iowa Supreme Court issued an interesting ruling today on the disposition of one's bodily remains.  Short summary: Wife dies.  Husband and wife were "on a long break" after 43 years of marriage, but had never formally divorced or filed for a legal separation.  Wife had given instructions in her Last Will as to where she wanted to be buried, verbally told her family members (10 kids!!) and wrote a letter to her son, that was shared with her sister, the executor and the kids about her final wishes.  Husband didn't want wife to be buried in Montana, as she desired and expressed to everyone, so he went ahead and buried her here in Heaven  a/k/a Iowa.  Royal rumble in the courts ensued. Think you have the right to determine what happens to your body after you have "departed planet Earth"?  Unless you take your body with you, guess again.  In the Court's ruling, you have no right...

powered by Fotopedia With today's medical bio-technology, it is not unusual for a couple to "store an embryo", or other "genetic material" for future use.  Perhaps they had multiple embryo's created, or they are going through a medical treatment which may affect their reproductive capabilities, or heading to war.  Regardless of the reason, the legal issues that can be raised with such foundations of life are interesting. For example, if a baby is eventually born as a result of the "stored genetic material" and the parent dies before they are born, what rights as a child/heir do they have? The Iowa Code was modified  in 2011 to provide a window of opportunity for an unborn to have rights of inheritance following the death of the parent.  Essentially, if a child is born within two (2) years after the death of a parent, they can inherit from that parent just as if they had been born prior to the parent's death.  If a deceased has left any gen...

" Faith is taking the first step even when you don't see the whole staircase ."    Martin Luther King, Jr. Well, it was 15 years in the making but the time has come...Gardner Law Firm, PC, located in Urbandale, Iowa, is created, established and the doors open (except I close for lunch and occasional golf).  While the struggles that I will likely have as a solo attorney pale in comparison to those of Martin Luther King, Jr., I find his quote inspirational as I open the door on the day we celebrate his birthday.  I will be doing the same work that I did previously at my previous firm: estate planning (wills/trusts), probate administration (handling final matters for deceased people), real estate, and business planning (setting up business entities, helping individuals buy or sell businesses, succession planning, etc.)  Check out www.gardnerlawpc.com for more information (when the site is completed).  

Almost exactly 2 years ago, I blogged on the updated federal estate taxes for 2011 and 2012 and noted that the rules put in place then were just punted down the road.  That "punt" finally landed when the "Fiscal Cliff" doomsday of 1-1-13 approached. Finally , today we received some updated rules on the federal estate tax system for 2013 and beyond.  (Can I say "permanent"?).  I'll update more on the details of the statute after it is digested, but essentially most of the rules from 2012 will remain in place.  (Slightly more than $5 million exemption per person and continued portability options for spouses.) The Iowa Academy of Trust and Estate Counsel have a quick summary of the tax bill here . I expected this to happen, but I'm often wrong when it comes to predicting what Congress will do.  At least we have a better set of rules to work with and estate planners will know what to tell clients for the future.

In a ruling issued today by the Iowa Supreme Court, the Court ruled that a spouse can be cut out of an elective share by utilizing a non-probate transfer.  In the Myers case, the decedent had placed beneficiary designations on a checking account, CD and an annuity to her children and not her husband.  The trial court initially had ruled that those assets, despite the beneficiary designation, were still subject to the spousal elective share based on earlier court rulings. However, on appeal, the Iowa Supreme Court determined that the statutory language of the spousal elective share provisions (Iowa Code § 633.238) specifically limits the elective share to ONLY the probate property.  Thus, payable on death (POD), transferable on death (TOD), or any other account that has beneficiaries listed upon death could be passed on to other beneficiaries and exclude the spouse.  In other words, if you want to disinherit your spouse, this is how you accomplish that result. T...

The rights of a surviving spouse (male or female) in Iowa are not exactly "clear cut".  When you have numerous methods on how property can pass at death (named beneficiary, joint ownership, will, trust, intestate) and sprinkle in second marriage situations with kids from an earlier relationship, you can create a minefield of problems.  I have written previously on a court's allowance of the disinheritance of a spouse  in a December 2009 district court case.  In a different district court, another court has taken a different approach. Betty Rich was the surviving spouse of William Rich.  William Rich had three daughters from a prior marriage and none from his marriage with Betty.  Mr. Rich's will & trust combo created the standard AB trust with the QTIP provisions.  (Another future blog post.)  Betty wasn't thrilled with what she was receiving under her husband's estate plan (or from the insurance policies) so she proceeded to opt for her e...

The Iowa Court of Appeals issued a ruling today affirming a ruling of an appeal in a will contest case.  The contestants to the will were basing their argument that the testator (decedent) lacked sufficient capacity to execute her will as she suffered from certain delusions as to certain family members/beneficiaries.  According to the ruling, certain medical evidence was properly excluded as the proposed evidence related to medical information after the execution of the will, and not during the time period the will was executed.  In other words, any evidence concerning the testator AFTER the signing of the will may not be relevant in determining capacity at the time of signing the will.  In this case, the testator was diagnosed with cancer after signing the will and was under medication for that treatment.  The contestants also objected to the jury instructions used in referring to the delusions.  The Court rejected the appeal and affirmed the findings of t...