It’s a Small World After All
If you have ever gone to Disney World or Land, you most certainly have taken a ride on “It’s a Small World.” The ride is full of nostalgia and whimsy. The same song plays on loop, in different languages and with different voices, while you slowly make your way through the globe. Nearly every culture and region is depicted, and the artistry is impeccable. It’s a Small World is on the Mount Rushmore of Disney attractions, and it symbolizes, quite literally, that there is more that we have in common than we don’t. Since the internet, I would say the ride also takes on a meaning that the world is not as large as it used to be. The distance between different parts of the world is just a few moments into the next room away.
As I sat on the ride with my family last week in a quite cold Disney World, mesmerized by the beautiful surroundings (and serenaded by the woman behind me on the ride who decided it was her time to sing, non-stop and out of tune, the lyrics to “It’s a Small World”), my thoughts were more about the little things in life that matter. I thought about how the ride is perfect because of the details. As my colleague and partner at the firm, Phil Vacchio, commented to me later, “there isn’t a chip in any paint or item out of place.”
Details matter.
That is particularly true in the world of estate planning and elder law. Perhaps my thoughts shifting to work instead of just enjoying the ride with my family came from the seemingly daily conversations we have with clients about how particular the law is and how every fact matters when dealing with my areas of expertise. And it’s not just relevant information I am talking about. Sometimes the smallest details will determine how successful our clients are (or aren’t) in accomplishing their goals of leaving money to the right people, avoiding probate, protecting their hard-earned assets, and still keeping control of their assets.
The difference between a trust that accomplishes ALL of those goals and a trust that doesn’t could be a single phrase or even a single word. We have seen dozens upon dozens of trusts, signed elsewhere years ago, that, because of the wrong language, do not protect that family’s assets like they thought they did. Those are not the best conversations. The worst meetings we have stem from false senses of security and hearing from an attorney that the planning you previously did was all for naught.
We have seen deeds that may help avoid probate but do so in a way that creates tax havoc down the road, all because of the way that the deed transferred title. We have seen “Medicaid Asset Protection Trusts,” one of the most important ways to accomplish all of those goals above, that mistakenly name the client as their own trustee, almost certainly making that trust defective for its intended purposes of asset protection.
The truth is that there are ways that our clients can avoid probate and protect money and still have capital C “Control” of their assets, but that requires that you play by the rules that New York State has set forth. Using an attorney who specializes in estate planning and elder law is a good start.
Details matter.
If and when you start kicking the tires on creating that updated estate plan and giving more attention to your long-term care exposure, realize that there are ground rules for how this game works. And like all games, if you don’t play by the rules, you lose.
David A. Kubikian, Esq., is a Principal at Herzog Law Firm, P.C., where he focuses his practice on estate planning, elder law, Medicaid planning, and related matters. Visit https://www.herzoglaw.com/ for more information.