Wednesday,
September 27, 2000
NOEL C. ICE METRO
LINE 429-3815
ATTORNEY’S Web Site FAX
817/877-2807
www.TrustsAndEstates.net TELEX
75-8631
BOARD CERTIFIED ESTATE PLANNING AND PROBATE LAW FRONT
DESK
TEXAS BOARD OF LEGAL SPECIALIZATION (817)
877-2800
ATTORNEY'S DIRECT DIAL SECRETARY’S
DIRECT DIAL
(817) 877-2885 (817)
878-2944
ATTORNEY'S DIRECT FAX
(817) 878-6085
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SENT BY FAX ([FAXPHONEFIELD]) AND BY
MAIL
[TOWHOM]
[HOMESTREETFIELD]
[HOMECITYFIELD], [HOMESTATEFIELD] [HOMEZIPFIELD]
[PHONEBUSMAINFIELD] (Business)
[MAINPHONEFIELD] (Home)
[FAXPHONEFIELD] (FAX)
[EMAILADDRESSFIELD]
RE: Estate Planning Disclosure and Engagement Letter
Dear [SALUTATION]:
BodyOfLetterPursuant
to firm policy, and because I also think
it is in your best interest, I am sending you this engagement letter. The
principal reason for the letter is the need for full disclosure in an area as sensitive as estate planning,
particularly where I may be representing a husband and wife.
It is not necessary to sign this engagement letter in
advance of our initial meeting, but
if you would like, you can bring it with you and give it to me then, or you may
wait until after the meeting to make up your mind.
This letter is designed to set forth the terms of our engagement to perform estate planning for you. This engagement letter is designed to benefit us both. Among other things, it sets forth the scope of our mutual involvement in the estate planning process, so that neither of us will be undertaking obligations to each other that we did not intend to assume.
Scope of Involvement And Terms of Engagement
When signed by you, this letter is a contract. Further, even if this letter is not signed —through oversight, or because it is misplaced, or other reason— you should understand that unless we otherwise agree in writing, any work I do for you will have to be subject to the terms set forth in this letter. The following is a list of what you and I agree to do and what we do not agree to do.
The Firm is hereby engaged by you to provide advice and consultation, as and when specifically requested, regarding legal matters associated with estate planning. and specifically with reagrd to the drafting of an irrevocable trust designed to be able to invest in life insurance and to receive contributions that will qualify, within applicable limits, for the annual gift tax exclusion. Our engagement does not guaranty that the fiduciary can properly invest in life insurance, or that contributions to the trust will qualify for the annual exclusion, or that the assets in the trust will not be includable in your estate for estate tax purposes, given the inherent complexity of a trust of this nature, the uncertainties of the tax laws, and the fact that the IRS is not overly sympathetic towards this technique. Nevertheless, I will take such steps as I believe prudent and reasonable under the circumstances to achieve the desired ends, taking into account all of your intentions as expressed to me and the degree of risk you are willing to assume.
This contract may be terminated by either Attorney or Client at any time, without penalty. There is no implied representation that we can or will provide any further service beyond the engagement period and scope of service without first negotiating a new contract in writing. However, this agreement will control all future work except to the extent we have otherwise agreed in writing. As a general rule, the “engagement period” will end at the latest when the estate planning documents you ask us to draft have been signed, and, if applicable and if later, when any other undertaking we have specifically agreed to perform (e.g., beneficiary designation work, funding of trusts, etc.) has been completed to your satisfaction. (It is my general practice to send a letter signaling the completion of the initial undertaking and end of the engagement period.)
Unless otherwise agreed, all services will be billed at an hourly rate. Attorney time for a partner is generally between $200 and $400 an hour, or less. My hourly rate usually does not exceed $350 an hour. Associate rates are less than partners, and generally range between $130 and $190 an hour, depending on the experience level of the associate and the nature of the work being done. Paralegal time is billed at approximately $90 an hour. Ordinarily fees and expenses are billed monthly and are due within 30 days of receipt.
I want to emphasize that these rates vary in the discretion of the billing attorney, with the intent that you not be charged more than a reasonable fee for the services received. It is unusual for the costs of administering an estate to exceed 3% of the value of a large estate, and it will usually be much less, depending on the amount of work requested. Percentage fee billing, however, is likely to be an inaccurate basis for assessing the value of the legal services performed, and it is for this reason that we will not directly tie our legal bill to the size of the Estate.
It is unusual for the costs of implementing a basic estate plan to exceed $15,000, and a basic estate plan for a husband and wife with a taxable estate will often be under $5000, depending on the amount of work requested. My fee for an irrevocable annual withdrawal trust will usually run between $2500 and $3000. In order that you will have some rough idea of what various estate planning documents costs, and the amount of work involved, I am attaching a very approximate fee schedule. I am doing this in an attempt to be helpful, but at the risk that you will think estate-planning documents are a commodity, which they are not.
I estimate that the total legal fees involved will not exceed $5000, barring anything extraordinary.
Costs, travel, delivery, filing fees, etc., and other reimbursable expenses will be billed separately as accrued. Please note that any estimate of total costs or legal fees does not include these items, whether such estimate is listed here or in any schedule or separate document I give you that relates to fees or cost.
Nonprobate assets are
assets that do not pass under a Will. Examples would include life insurance,
joint tenancy bank accounts, IRAs and deferred compensation arrangements (such
as a benefit under a qualified plan).
Planning for these assets
may be incidental in some cases, and of primary importance in others. Life
insurance proceeds are generally includible in the estate of the owner and
insured no matter who is the beneficiary (unless special measures are
undertaken to divest the insured of all incidents of ownership during life).
Since the proceeds are includible in the estate, they are subject to estate
tax. The same is true of IRA and qualified plan benefits. And if the benefits
are community property, a spouse will have an interest that must also be
considered and coordinated. The proper coordination of nonprobate assets can be
particularly important in order to take full advantage of the marital deduction
and to shelter the unified credit.[1]
Unfortunately, the proper
coordination of nonprobate assets can be the most expensive part of an estate
plan, and many clients are not willing to pay a lawyer to make sure that all of
the beneficiary designations are properly coordinated and that all changes have
been properly recorded and accepted by the company or other institution
providing the benefits. Further, we do not usually know in advance how much
time will be required. In the case of IRA and employee benefit plans
especially, we are not even sure whether a beneficiary designation will be
effective, even if accepted, and this is particularly true with respect to the
community property interest of a nonparticipant spouse. The tax effects
attendant to a distribution under an IRA or employee benefit plan are often
unsettled and uncertain, under the present state of the law, and again, this is
particularly true with respect to the community property interest of a
nonparticipant spouse. For these reasons and others we are forced to limit the
scope of our involvement, and we cannot guaranty results.
We will not attempt to coordinate the
beneficiary of your nonprobate assets with your overall estate plan, to the
extent set forth below, unless you give us the information set forth below, and
request such assistance in writing. However, even if you request our help, this is one area where the scope of our
involvement is definitely limited and in which we cannot guaranty results.
If you either do not get written confirmation from the insurance company or
other institution that the change of beneficiary with respect to a particular
policy or benefit has been made, or if you do not receive a copy of our letter
attempting to make the change, it may be that the change has not been made,
and, unless we hear from you in writing to the contrary, we will assume in that
case that you do not wish for us to pursue the matter further on your behalf.
Because nonprobate assets
can be an important part of the estate, our preference, but only if you request
it in writing, is to handle these items as follows:
a. Financial
Accounts. If you will provide us with
a copy of the last monthly or other periodic statement from each institution in
which you have an account (bank, savings and loan, brokerage firm, etc.) we
will prepare a form letter for you to sign instructing the institution as to
the preferred disposition of the account at death.
b. Life
Insurance. If you will provide us
with (i) a copy of each life insurance policy on your life, (ii) a copy of the
last statement from the company showing current death benefits, cash values,
etc., and (iii) a current beneficiary designation form, we will prepare the
beneficiary designation for you to sign.
c. IRAs
and Employee Benefits. If you will
provide us with (i) a copy of the underlying document establishing each IRA or
employee benefit plan in which you have an interest, (ii) a copy of the last
statement or valuation showing your current benefit and (iii) a current
beneficiary designation form, we will prepare the beneficiary designation for
you to sign.
In each case (a), (b) and (c), if you request it in writing, we may agree to forward
that letter or beneficiary designation to the institution on your behalf, via
certified mail, under our letterhead. If you do not receive a copy of such a
letter, you should assume that we have not agreed to perform this service. Most
beneficiary designation forms are woefully inadequate for proper estate
planning, and so our practice is often (but not always) to prepare a form of
our own and attach it to the company form. If you do not bring us an approved
form, we will prepare our own form and submit it to the company, if you
request. In either case, it is sometimes difficult to tell whether or not the
company or institution has accepted the change. It can sometimes take hours of
work and months of time to get these matters resolved satisfactorily, since
large institutions often have the traditional mentality and resistance to
change usually associated with large bureaucracies.
Estate planning can be a
time consuming and expensive process. No estate plan is bullet proof or fail
safe. Few clients can afford to pay a lawyer to cover absolutely every
contingency that could conceivably be addressed. There are practical limits.
And yet, there is a foreseeable statistical likelihood that some clients or
their beneficiaries will incur taxes or otherwise have their interests
adversely affected because of circumstances, law, or language in a Will or
trust. With the benefit of hindsight or otherwise, it will often be true that
such outcome could have been avoided by more elaborate or different planning.
Because the variety of events that could affect your estate plan is virtually
without limit, whereas the time and cost that can reasonably be expended to
plan for such events is definitely limited, the scope of our involvement cannot
be open ended, and we expressly do not undertake to cover every issue that
could affect your estate plan. Our commitment is to produce the documents that
you actually sign. We do not commit to go beyond that, even if it turns out
later that it would have been better if more work was done.
Unless otherwise clearly indicated by the context, the
words “Attorney,” “the Firm,” and all first person pronouns (“I”, “we”, etc.)
used in this letter, refer to
The term “Client” or “you”
refers to [MFULLNAMEFIELD] and [SPFULLNAMEFIELD], unless only one of you sign
this engagement contract, in which case the term “Client” will refer solely to
the person signing. We will assume no duty whatsoever to any other person or
enterprise, nor any other member of your family, not identified as the Client
above.
We will not disclose any
information whatsoever to anyone other than you except as specifically
permitted by you or impliedly authorized in order to fulfill representation. We
reserve the right to refuse disclosure of confidential and privileged
information under any condition or circumstance.
It is my understanding that you would like for
us to send copies of correspondence to you to the following, though, we reserve
the right not to do so, if we think the communication is sensitive and
otherwise privileged, or if to do so seem to us to possibly be inappropriate or
contrary to your wishes:
[CCFIELD]
Our engagement to do estate planning for you is not for the benefit of third parties and is not a third party beneficiary contract, in favor of your descendants, beneficiaries, or anyone else. We will be working for you alone.
Prior to our next meeting, I
recommend that you deliver to me a copy of each of the following:
1. A copy of the last monthly or other periodic statement from each institution in which you have an account (bank,
savings and loan, brokerage firm, etc.).
2. Each life insurance
policy on your life, and a copy of the last summary statement of the life
insurance account from the insurance company respecting any such policy. Such
statements will ordinarily reflect the present owner of the policy on the books
and records of the insurance company, whether the policy is term or not, and if
not term, the cash value and the status of any outstanding loans.
3. A copy of each outstanding beneficiary designation for all life insurance, bank and brokerage
accounts, IRA and qualified plan benefits, and all other arrangements paying
death benefits that allow for the designation of a death beneficiary.
4. A copy of any plan of
deferred compensation (profit sharing plan, 401(k) plan, defined benefit
plan, nonqualified plan, etc.) in which you have an interest, and a copy of the
Summary Plan Description and latest Individual Benefit Statement.
5. A copy of each IRA
(including SEP-IRAs) in which you have an interest. There should be both an
adoption agreement and a copy of the IRA itself, so be sure to send me both.
6. A copy of the deeds
to any real estate that you own.
7. A copy of each buy-sell
agreement, partnership or joint venture agreement to which you are a party.
8. A copy of all prior
gift tax returns ever filed by you.
9. A copy of your last
two year’s income tax returns.
10. A copy of any existing
trusts of which you are the beneficiary or grantor.
11. A copy of your prior
wills.
If
you have already given me the copies requested, then you may ignore this letter
to that extent and send me what I do not have. When you feel sure that I have
everything on the list, please call my secretary at 878-2944 and tell her.
As soon as you receive this
letter, please call my Secretary at (817) 878-2944, and give her
the following information:
• Full names and familiar
names of you and your spouse.
• Name at birth of you and
your spouse.
• Date and place of birth
of you and your spouse.
• Social security numbers
of you and your spouse.
• Date and place of
marriage.
• Names, dates of birth,
addresses, telephone numbers and social security numbers of your children and
step-children (separately identified), if any
• Names, dates of birth,
addresses, telephone numbers and social security numbers of anyone among the
class of persons or individuals whom you might wish to appoint as a fiduciary,
co-fiduciary or successor fiduciary.[2]
(We can decide at the meeting who among this class to appoint, and in what
order.)
• Business address and
telephone no. of you and your spouse.
• Name, address and
telephone no. of C.P.A.
• Year
• Whether or not you or
your spouse have any deceased children.
• Prior marital status of
you and your spouse.
• If divorced, date and
place of divorce.
• If widow(er), name and
date of death of deceased spouse.
• Whether or not you or
your spouse would like for us to prepare an Anatomical Gift form.
• Whether or not you or
your spouse would like for us to prepare a Directive to Physicians (a so-called
“Living Will”).
Upon receipt of the items
listed above (if received timely), and after any conferences that we schedule,
I will prepare drafts of the estate planning documents that we have agreed
upon, and will mail them to you for your review. I will try to have the
documents completed and mailed to you within 3 weeks after our last conference
or the signing of this letter, or the date you supply me with the information
requested above, whichever is later, but I cannot promise you an exact date,
and you agree that if the work is not done timely, the sole remedy will be a
rebate of the bill, if any, rather than liability for any other consequences.
It will be your affirmative duty to give all documents
prepared by us a comprehensive review both before and after they have been
signed and before the engagement ends,
and to visit with me as to any document or provision you do not understand. You will review the documents carefully and thoroughly
and will call me with any changes to make within a few weeks of receipt. If you wish to schedule an
appointment to discuss the documents prior to the date of execution, we should
meet within that period. I will make any changes that you request within 2-3 weeks of your request if at all
possible. (But again, I cannot promise you an exact time, and you agree that if
the work is not done timely, the sole remedy will be a rebate of the bill, if
any, rather than liability for any other consequences.) You will schedule an
appointment or appointments through my secretary[3]
to discuss the documents with me and to have them signed by you after they meet
your satisfaction.
Some of the documents we prepare may be complex to read
and understand. Again, by signing this engagement letter, you promise that you
will read and review the documents thoroughly before they are signed. No
attorney is error-proof. Your thorough review of the documents is important to
insure that I have followed your directions and objectives and that we have properly recorded all essential information.
Any changes made due to our error will be made without cost to you.
At your request, your papers and property given by you to us will be returned to you promptly upon receipt of payment for outstanding fees and costs. We will see to it that you have copies of all relevant correspondence and final legal documents that are connected with our representation of you. We will nevertheless, supply you with additional copies of correspondence and other documents previously given to you in the course of our representation, provided you reimburse us for the copying charges. It is agreed, however, that our own files, including notes, drafts, research materials, internal memoranda, and other lawyer work product, whether or not created during the course of our representation of you, will belong to the firm, and will not be subject to copying or delivery to you.
Any documents retained by the firm will be transferred to the person responsible for administering our records retention program. For various reasons, including the minimization of unnecessary storage expenses, we reserve the right to destroy or otherwise dispose of any such documents or other materials retained by us within a reasonable time after the termination of the engagement.
At the conclusion of our initial representation period, we will discuss with you whether you prefer for us to retain any original estate planning documents. It is commonly the case that we will retain the original of your wills, for example. If you are retaining the originals, then they will be delivered to you at the conclusion of our initial representation period. If we retain any original documents, we will reserve the right to return them to you by delivering them to your last known address. In this regard, you should be sure to provide us with a current address where you may be reached in case we are no longer able to keep the documents. We may destroy any originals after ten years if we do not know of a mailing address where the documents may be returned at that time. We will retain photocopies of everything for at least five years. Although we may be retaining originals, we cannot assume responsibility for finding out whether or not there is a need to probate a will, deliver a document, etc., unless someone gives us actual notice of the need.
In beginning and completing your work, we will assume that the family and financial information you provide is complete and correct. We will assume that there are no conflicts of interest, and you affirmatively promise to disclose any conflicts that develop during the course of our representation.
There is a brochure prepared by the State Bar of Texas that answers some of the common questions about the duties that an attorney has to a client and about what a client can do if a rule of professional conduct has been violated. Copies of this brochure are freely available at the front desk of our office.
Rule 1.06(b) of the Texas
Disciplinary Rules of Professional Conduct provides that as a general rule “a
lawyer shall not represent a person if the representation of that person (1)
involves a substantially related matter in which that person’s interests are
materially and directly adverse to the interests of another client of the
lawyer or the lawyer’s firm; or (2) reasonably appears to be or become
adversely limited by the lawyer’s or law firm’s responsibilities to another
client or to a third person or by the lawyer’s or law firm’s own interests.”
This rule poses a nagging problem for the estate planning attorney, and experts
have been agonizing for years over the resolution to the issue.
An argument can be made
that in today’s litigious society —where lawsuits are frequent and where it is
assumed that if anything in life goes wrong someone must be sued— that every
husband and wife have an inherent conflict of interest in estate planning for
their family. This argument strikes some (including me) as extremely cynical;
but you must remember that court cases are argued by litigation attorneys, and
their perspective of as well as their monetary interest in our system of
justice is different from those of us with an office practice. We deal with
real people in day to day situations where, unlike the litigation attorney, the
exception is not the rule.
Are your interests
materially and directly adverse to one another? They could be; it depends on
your circumstances and your attitudes, as much or more than on the law. You
must help me make this determination, and in many ways you are in a better
position than I am to decide this issue. Although there are a number of
property law and other legal issues involved in estate planning, the question
of whether the interest of a husband and wife are materially adverse to one
another is primarily one of common sense for which you, in many respects, are
perhaps better qualified than I to evaluate. If you feel that your interests
are “materially and directly adverse” to one another then you must disclose
this to me and only one of you should sign this letter, because in that case, I
will decline to undertake the joint representation of you both.
By both of you signing this
letter you will be representing to me that your interests are not “materially
and directly adverse.” If you are wrong in your conclusion regarding this
issue, then by signing this letter you will be consenting to my joint
representation of you both even if your interests are in fact materially and
directly adverse.
1.06(c) reads: “A lawyer
may represent a client in the circumstances described in (b) if: (1) the lawyer
reasonably believes the representation of each client will not be materially
affected; and (2) each affected or potentially affected client consents to such
representation after full disclosure of the existence, nature, implications,
and possible adverse consequences of the common representation and the
advantages involved, if any.”
If I undertake to represent
you jointly it is because I reasonably believe my representation of each of you
will not be materially affected by the conflict, if any. But I want you both,
in any event, to be fully aware of the existence, nature, implication, and
possible adverse consequences of the common representation and the advantages
involved, if any. In this regard, I will send you, at the time I send the first
draft of the estate planning documents, a diagram and memo that explains how
property in
The advantages of joint
representation include economy and the ability to coordinate a plan that
obviously will affect you both but will also presumably be disclosed to each
other as well as to me as your joint counsel. The disadvantages include the
fact that by planning your estate jointly, one or both of you may feel
compelled to adopt a plan that is different from what you might otherwise
implement in the privacy that separate representation affords; and further, if
either of you owns separate property, an attorney that represents only you will
be in a better position to further your interests in the event of a dispute
over the proper characterization of the property as community or separate.
Moreover, if you have children by a prior marriage, your interests in benefiting
them may not be identical and could be affected by the estate plan of your
spouse.
I am enclosing along with
this letter a separate memorandum (entitled “Community Property Law in a
Nutshell”) that briefly describes some of the more important rules of community
and separate property law in Texas to help you to understand some of the issues
and potential conflicts that could affect your decision as to whether you feel
joint representation is appropriate. I think you will find it interesting and
informative, unless you are already aware of how the
Note that either of you may
ordinarily revoke or amend your Will or sign a new Will, without penalty or
obligation. Occasionally clients execute what are known as election Wills or
put provisions in a Will or trust for the benefit of a spouse contingent upon
what the other spouse has done in his or her Will. If that is the case in the
estate planning documents I prepare for you, I will take pains to make you
aware of it. Each of you must assume the risk that the other may secretly
revoke his or her Will or trust through the assistance of another lawyer, or
that the surviving spouse will alter his or her estate plan after your death.
By both of you signing this
letter each of you assumes the duty to report to me any fact or circumstance
which may affect my impartial representation of you both, and any fact or
circumstance that indicates that your interests are in conflict with one
another.
Each of you are advised of
the hazards of multi-party representation by one attorney. I cannot represent
you both and be an advocate for one of you to the exclusion of the other. An
attorney is required to be impartial, loyal, and to exercise independent
judgment with regard to the client group as a whole. If I represent you jointly
I may not promote the interest of one of you to the disadvantage of the other.
If I undertake to represent
you jointly, both of you will have free access to any documents I prepare for
either of you, and it must be understood that any communication that one of you
makes to me will not be confidential with respect to your spouse. This is a
condition of my undertaking joint representation.
It is theoretically
possible for a lawyer to undertake the separate (as opposed to joint)
representation of a husband and wife after full disclosure and if consent is
obtained, but I have found that this is not only awkward but that it lacks some
of the principal advantages that joint representation offers, such as the
advantage offered by full disclosure of a commonly understood plan.
Each member of a family may
serve as the spokesman for all. I will assume in the absence of clear evidence
to the contrary that each of you is communicating to the other respecting any
conversations of a material nature that may occur between me and only one of
you.
It is not uncommon for
those who are passively involved in an estate planning endeavor to sign
documents without thoroughly reading or understanding what they have signed.
This cannot happen in this engagement. In signing this agreement, each of you
affirmatively represents and promises that you will read the documentation,
will ask questions when in doubt as to the meaning of any document or term, and
will not sign the documentation until you understand the documents and the
estate or business plan.
We require an initial retainer of $2000. This
retainer will be applied to the extent applicable and necessary for discharge
of the last statement of the Firm following completion of our engagement, with
any remaining amount of the retainer to be refunded to you immediately
following the closing of the Firm's representation of you and completion of the
billing and settlement of the account. However, a purpose of the deposited
amount is to have on hand funds available for the discharge of past due
You are advised that your
Certified Public Accountant should be involved in this planning. The failure to
involve the accountant could result in subsequent confusion, time and cost when
the accountant is asked to review your plan for the first time during tax
season and in the course of the preparation of the added income and gift tax
returns which may result from your planning. It will be your affirmative duty
to involve your accountant, whose services will be necessary to maintain the
plan, in the planning process.
We represent many, many, estate planning clients. It is virtually impossible to advise all of our clients of changes in the law, even if those changes directly affect an estate plan or the legality and effectiveness of any document that we may have prepared. Many years ago this may have been feasible, but in recent decades the Congressional penchant for spawning new legislation and changing old legislation makes this task simply too daunting. Nor can we assume responsibility for probating your Will if no one engages us and actually informs us of the need to do so. This is true whether or not we retain the original signed estate planning documents.
Although we may from time to time, voluntarily contact you regarding your estate plan or the legality or effectiveness of a document that we may have prepared for you, we do not undertake to be legally bound to do so. Therefore, after a document has been signed, we will assume no further obligation with respect to it, whether or not we retain the original. This means, for example, that it will be necessary for you to keep in touch with us from time to time, if you wish for us to continue to represent you and if you wish to be informed of changes in the law and related matters.
All of the enclosures, together with a copy of this
letter, are spiral bound and separated by index tabs. This is for your
convenience and future ready reference. The original of this letter is separate
from the attachments, in order that you may easily sign and return it in the
enclosed, stamped self-addressed envelope.
Yours very truly,
If you accept the terms of this engagement letter please sign the original where indicated below, and return it to me along with a $2000 retainer as soon as reasonably convenient. For your convenience in this regard, I am enclosing a stamped, self addressed, return envelope. The extra copy of the letter is spiral bound among the attachments and is marked by an index tab. Please retain the extra copy for your records.
Terms of Agreement Accepted By Client
Date Signed:
[MFULLNAMEFIELD], [SPHUSBANDWIFEFIELD]
Date Signed:
[SPFULLNAMEFIELD], [SPOUSEFIELD]
NCI/ice
Enclosures: Extra copy of this letter
Return envelope
Brochure: “What is an Estate Planning & Probate Law Board Certified
Attorney?”
Memo entitled “Community Property Law in a Nutshell”
Approximate Fee Schedule
cc: [CCFIELD]
[CCCFIELD]
[1]The exemption equivalent of the Unified Credit can be as much as $650,000 ($1 million in 2006) for each taxpayer under present law, if no adjusted taxable gifts have been made during lifetime. However, this amount is subject to change at any time by Congress and can also be reduced by lifetime gifts and tax elections made in the administration of an estate.
[2] A fiduciary is a person or institution that is in a special relationship of trust and confidence with another person. Because of that relationship the fiduciary has a duty to treat that person with the utmost fairness in all dealings between them. An executor is in a fiduciary relationship to the estate and the beneficiaries of the estate, and as such owes them special duties. A trustee is in a fiduciary relationship to the trust and the beneficiaries of the trust, and as such owes them special duties. A partner owes a fiduciary duty to the partnership and to each of the other partners. A person holding a power of attorney (the agent) owes a fiduciary duty to the person granting the power (the principal). These special duties are called “fiduciary duties.”
[3]My secretary is Stoney Nosal. Her direct line is 878-2944.