Live Stream: How To Settle a Client's Estate
323 | Livestream | Basic | Scheduled
Description
Federal estate and gift taxes currently affect few clients, but there are many other issues involved in settling an estate or administering a trust. Clients who are beneficiaries of a trust or estate often turn to their financial advisors to understand the administrative process and its effect on their interests. This course enables the accountant to cut through the jargon to understand the legal concepts, communicate a real-world explanation to clients, and serve, in some instances, as an advisor to them. After taking this course, practitioners will feel more confident to serve in a fiduciary capacity. Updated for developments relative to estate taxation.
Credits
| Number of Credits | Type of Credits |
|---|---|
| 8.00 | Taxes |
| 8.00 | CFP |
| 6.75 | CLE |
Designed For
Accounting and financial professionals who wish to assist in settlement of an estate, regardless of size
Highlights
- Issues involved when settling an estate: marshaling of assets, payment of creditors, and distribution and accounting to beneficiaries
- Explaining the needs and limitations of durable powers of attorney, health care directives and living wills
- Why a will is probated and on what grounds it may be challenged
- Comprehensive checklists on how to read a will, duties of an executor and trustee, and much more
- Identification and report of estate assets
- What to do and what not to do as a fiduciary, executor or trustee: duty of care, investment, informing, payment of debts and taxes, and defending a will contest
- How executors and trustees interact with beneficiaries
- Elective shares and when a spouse might make that choice
- What a trustee needs to know about incompetents and minors
- Rights of creditors, third parties and beneficiaries
- Key issues in transferring property to a trust and from a trust or estate to a beneficiary
- Identifying income, estate and inheritance taxes
- Fiduciary accounting: principal and income concepts
- An introduction to drafting an account and why it is relevant
- Administration of revocable trusts
- Estate basis reporting
Objectives
- Understand how creditors' claims impact a beneficiary's claims
- Understand the key provisions in a will or trust
- Understand the duties of an executor or trustee in relation to beneficiaries and other third parties
- Identify trusts, wills and other documents encountered and their uses
- Understand the stages of an estate administration, including costs, collections, payment of debts/taxes, and distribution to beneficiaries
- Be aware of the duties a fiduciary and members of the estate-planning team owe to creditors, beneficiaries and the courts
Prices
- Member (Early Bird)
- $309.00
- Non-Member (Early Bird)
- $429.00
- Member
- $309.00
- Non-Member
- $429.00
Instructors
Don P. Cochran, CPA, JD, CFP, CRC
Don has practiced law in both Iowa and Minnesota for over 38 years. He is currently in solo practice of law in Apple Valley, Minnesota, focusing on tax, estate planning, and small business organization and management. He was a CPA with the Small and Emerging Business practice of then-Big 8 accounting firm, Touche Ross, in Bloomington, Minnesota, and has served as the Vice President of Tax and CFO with various privately and publicly held companies. He also served as an advanced sales consultant with Securian Financial, Nationwide Financial, and Pacific Life Insurance Company's Annuity and Mutual Fund division, providing advanced planning support for financial advisors on topics of financial and estate planning for small to medium-size businesses and wealthy individuals.
Don is actively involved in continuing education and other seminars for financial professionals and accountants, on topics related to tax issues for individuals and small businesses; current financial planning and asset transfer; and preparing for and living through retirement. Don is much sought after as a presenter of CPE for seminars sponsored by state societies of CPAs, CPA firms, and other providers of continuing education for financial professionals, and is a featured speaker at several national tax conferences.
Don earned a Bachelor of Science in General Science from the University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa, and graduated from the University of Iowa College of Law with his Juris Doctorate. In addition to being a licensed attorney in Minnesota and Iowa, he maintains his license as a Certified Public Accountant. He has also attained the designation of Certified Financial Planner® and Certified Retirement Consultant.
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