The Caldwell Trust Company Blog

If you already have your will, trust, and other estate planning documents in place, congratulations. You’ve taken an important step toward ensuring your wishes will be carried out when you die, or during periods of lifetime incapacity. However, don’t make the mistake of thinking your documents are carved in stone; they’re not. In fact, you should review them every three years or even more frequently, such as when reviewing your financial plan. Several types of life events could necessitate changes to your existing estate planning documents:

We are always looking to add value to client relationships. One way to achieve this is to make our clients aware of potentialities that have a decent chance of becoming reality. Along these lines we want to give everyone a “heads up” on talk of additional tax stimulus which is gaining traction in political circles in D.C.

While attending an annual economic conference in Washington this spring the idea of indexing capital gains for inflation was brought up. Subsequently, a number of articles have appeared in the financial press, and of late an Op-Ed piece in the Wall Street Journal.

When most people are ready to develop their estate plan, they want to develop a strong plan for the future and ensure that all of their assets and property go to the right people. Yet many times, they forget about the online assets they use each and every day. That’s because it’s easy to overlook just how much these assets are worth and what happens to these assets when you go. For one thing, there’s the emotional value; your online activity is an extension of yourself. For another, there’s real monetary value — depending on the source, the average American has between $35,000 and $55,000 in digital assets.

When it comes to estate planning, there is no shortage of good information available if you know where to look for it. However, there are also several common misconceptions people have that need to be dispelled.

Here are the top four worst assumptions you can make about estate planning:

Estate planning involves more than simply identifying what will happen to your assets when you die; it also encompasses planning for periods of lifetime incapacity. A living will and a health care power of attorney are both documents designed to give you peace of mind, knowing your health care wishes will be honored and your loved ones will not need to deal with the stress of trying to determine what your wishes are, if you reach a point where you cannot speak for yourself to make your own wishes known.

Planning for the distribution of your assets after death can be a valuable gift to your loved ones and it can give you much-needed peace of mind. But, should you use a will or a trust as your primary estate planning document? Which is best? As you evaluate your options, it can help to understand the benefits and potential drawbacks of each approach.

Most people think of estate planning as the process of having a will and/or trust prepared. While that's an important component of the process, estate planning also involves planning for periods of lifetime incapacity. A living will is an important legal document that should be a part of everyone's estate plan. In this blog post, we will explore what a living will is, who needs one, and what to consider when documenting your health care wishes with a living will.

We often get questions about legal wills and estate plans. We hope to help clarify the difference between a legal will and an estate plan and will take a look at what each provides.

When it comes to tax preparation you want to find and use all the appropriate avenues that help you pay out less and keep more of your income.  To do this, it’s important to pay attention to tax planning all year round. Most tax-saving strategies must be implemented no later than December 31 of that tax year, and often well before that.

When developing an estate plan, there are so many elements to worry about that many people end of forgetting a whole category of assets: digital. Digital (especially social media) has become such a nuanced and integral part of our lives in such a short period of time that it becomes a blind spot. However, your digital legacy is just as important as the rest of your assets. In today’s post, we’ll give you a rundown of what you need to know before you start digital estate planning, how digital assets should be integrated into your estate plan, and why this process matters in the first place.