3 Individuals in a wealthy CT suburb who had started their own money management firm bought a $1 ticket for the lottery and appeared with their attorney to announce they won a $254 million dollar power ball. They created a trust and are going to distribute a large portion of the money to various charities. A video and article about their win can be seen by clicking here.
Picture of 3 winners from Fox CT
The Administration on Aging reports that JFK while President declared the month of May Senior Citizens month. At the time there were just 17 million living seniors that had made it to 65 and a third lived in poverty. In 1980 Jimmy Carter changed the name to Older Americans month but it has continued to be celebrated with events and themes each year since it began nearly 50 years ago.
althy Baby Boomers keeping Inheritance for themselves.
A US Trust survey of 457 high-net-wealth individuals with at least $3 million in assets they could invest released Tuesday found 51 percent said it is not important to leave their kids an inheritance.
"These are mainly self-made people," 50 percent of whom said they paid a price in personal relationships and possibly their own health when they made their wealth, US Trust President Keith Banks told CNBC. So they think "I’m going to get a return on that investment for myself, number one, and maybe my children down the road."
Among the study's other findings: 75 percent said their wealth is the result of their own focus and hard work, 52 percent have not fully disclosed their wealth to their children and 55 percent intend to actively volunteer after retirement.
"This is the 'forever young' generation. So they don’t think like our parents did" that when you hit 65 you relax in Florida, he said. "These are people that are serial entrepreneurs, they’re looking forward to starting new businesses, they want to volunteer, they want leisure time, they want to travel. It’s almost a new beginning for a lot of them. It’s also a way, in their minds, to stay young and feel young."
While nearly all had at least a minimal plan in place most were far from comprehsive planning that they should have been doing to help protect for the long term care of their finances and values.
Only 3% of the business owners in the survey had a succession plan in place.
Also interesting that of the ultra wealthy Bill Gates and Warren Buffet are recruiting to give at least half of their wealth to charity. The article does not really address the issue but it can be more helpful to provide less for the children of the very wealthy. If they have too much they will not feel the need to be productive and work for themselves. Ivanka Trump for example went to a top school and has worked in professional capacity and not merely earned money from being famous or partying. This point is made in the movie Arthur. Although he is wealthy it delays his growing up and he relies to heavily on the family and others to care for him. Funny for a movie but for real life it is sad when a child's ambition is taken away by never needing to work.
U.S. Trust found that many children of these first-generation wealthy families are not receiving the guidance and support they need to handle either the emotional aspects or financial responsibilities associated with family wealth. Among wealthy parents surveyed:
Other reasons cited were fear that their children would become lazy (24 percent); would make poor decisions (20 percent); would squander money (20 percent); or would be taken advantage of by other people (13 percent).
Though 84 percent of parents think their children would benefit from discussions with a financial professional, nearly six in 10 (59 percent) have never introduced their children to the professionals managing their financial affairs.
See Margo Beller - CNBC April 19 Boomer Wealthy saving for themselves
See also Business Wire.com Info re the US Trust Survey
Probate Attorney Blog recently reported how GE despite making tens of billions the past couple years has paid no taxes and even received money back by using tax loopholes, keeping earnings over seas and using losses from when they were bailed out by the government during the financial collapse.
This probate blog is intended to entertain as well as inform so here is a link to an amusing / interesting segment about the subject from commedian Jon Stewart. Click here.
She is in good health, walking and talking and went to a celebration. The woman only takes a few supplements and no medicines. She is now living with her grandson as she outlived her children.
Too see the video of the 119 year old woman from Yahoo News click here.
The next nominee for the US Supreme Court Will be solicitor general and former Harvard Law School Dean Elena Kagan.
If the Anna Nicole Smith Probate Litigation and Trust Dispute case returns to the Supreme Court next term or any other contested estate related claim reaches the Supreme Court if confirmed she would be one of the 9 justices presiding over the case. The court does not receive many trust and estate cases although a related one is likely to come before the court in what would be her lifetime tenure regarding whether there is a constitutional right to gay marriage. If there was a person who died intestate while with their partner would pass as if they were married in the same way that an estate now passes when a typical spouse passes away. Florida law does not recognize gay marriages from an inheritance rights perspective or for Florida intestate succession although if the Supreme Court found that there was a federal legal right and states could not prevent that it would have a significant impact on estate planning and probate estates in Florida and throughout the country.
As a 50 year old woman when she likely is appointed it will be a lifetime appointment so she could serve up to 4 decades on the court so there would be trust and estate disputes which come before her during that time and other estate related issues. One other related issue which may arise in the near future would be whether the estate tax could be retroactively revised for 2010 if the government sought to do so. As the year progresses without action it is appearing less likely it will occur although it has been a hotly discussed issue of whether is no tax as there currently is none for estate tax whether it could be revived retroactively.
For a Wall Street Journal article about her with her voicing her opinions on the issues see Ashby Jones May 10 Elana Kagan, in her own words.
Here is a link to a 2 minute video and article of various news stations discussing the selection from Politico.com Click the video button on the left of the screen to see the video.
Picture by Stephen Scott $1.148m home in South Carolina.
As CNBC reports foreclosure on homes with heated pools, ocean views and other high end features and who are worth over a million dollars or in some cases multi millions have been increasing over the past year just as the more modestly value homes are slowing in their foreclosure rates.
RealtyTrac reports that in February of homes worth over a million there were 4169 of them that were somewhere in the Foreclosure process a 121% increase from the prior year.
Nationwide of the single family homes selling for over a million dollars between January to April 37 of 295 of them were either in foreclosure or sold as part of a short sale while just 10 of 231 the prior year were in a similar situation.
Also the number of properties who are significantly late in paying their mortgages as defined by 90 days or greater behind 13.3% is among the properties that are over a million dollar loans while the overall rate is at just 8.6% in the U.S.
The article discusses how some areas such as Florida have properties which rarely have foreclosures but now have properties worth multi millions now being impacted by that.
The explanation for the delay in the higher end homes is that the owners had more cash and were not impacted as quickly as the more modestly valued homes but they are feeling the impact of the bad economy and real estate dropping significantly in value. Although the data mentioned in the article was not broken down geographically Florida is one of the worst hit states as far as the value of real estate dropping and foreclosures having occurred partly to correct for the skyrocketing values that lead to the bubble bursting.
Monica Burgos Beresford Redman the wife of a guy who had been a producer for the show Survivor and other shows her will has now been filed with California probate court as TMZ reports. Link for a copy of her will. It leaves all her property to her husband and names him as the personal representative. It also mentions one child as it was prepared in 2004 although they had 2 children at the time of her passing.
This raises the issue of a pre termitted child. Most states have a statute which states what would happen if a child is born after the will is prepared. Since I am not a California Probate Attorney and this blog focuses on Florida Probate Law and Florida Will Law I will mention that in Florida it is Florida statute 732.302 which would control. Basically the child gets an intestate share regardless of what the will says unless it appears that it was intentional they were not provided for or there were one or more children at the time of the will and substantially all of the property was left to the parent of the pre termitted child. Although she had left all her property to the father of such child it will be interesting to see as they may receive everything. If he were to be convicted of killing his wife he would not be entitled to receive anything and would be treated as pre deceased so it would all pass to the children with her someone else looking out for the children's property while they are minors.
Currently he is a "person of interest" and has not been charged or arrested with anything. However she was found in a sewer nearby where they were staying on their vacation having appeared to have been strangled. Emails that a close friend of his wife sold to an online website Radar Online and which had been given to authorities by her mom purport to show that he was having a long term affair and that he was only happy with his mistress so he would leave the family for her. Another website reported that she had taken out a lot of money from joint bank accounts shortly before the trip. While entitled to presumption of innocence authorities had prevented him from leaving the country for a while and have been closely investigating his involvement the kids had been staying with her sister but then were temporarily given to his parents.
As the LA Times mentions he seen violently and loudly arguing with his wife shortly prior to her death then had scratch marks on his arms when seen just after she was found strangled during which she likely would have scratched the attacker.
An interesting distinction in California Probate Law code section 250 it says A person who feloniously and intentionally kills the decedent is not entitled to any property interest or benefit under a will of the decedent. The code also prohibits any killer to serve as executor or personal representative as they are known for Florida probate purposes or as a trustee. For this case the California statute will apply. Unless he were convicted of a felony he will receive his share of the probate estate and any survivorship rights pursuant to California law.
For Florida Probate cases however section 732.802 of the Florida Probate Code would control.
Unlike in California a felony is not required. It merely requires a finding that by a greater weight of the evidence the person unlawfully and intentionally killed or participated in procuring the death of decedent. If so they are treated as pre deceased and not entitled to anything under of the will or trust or anything that would pass by right of survivorship or similar manner.
AOL news reported of the out of work guy in LA coming home from a day of California jury duty and stopping at a restaurant to get some lottery tickets as well. His wife working the overnight shift at NBC news in LA was given a news alert saying that the winning ticket was bought in her hometown at 2am and she called her husband to wake him up and find out they had won $266 million dollar lottery. She does not plan to quit her job though despite the win.
See Mark Kennedy Despite $266 winning million woman vows to keep working.
Video from MSNBC of the winning couple who will now need a lot more estate planning and investment advice to plan their much larger estates can be seen by clicking here.
As Yahoo reported Wade Mcgilbery won a million dollars the night of Take 2 Interactive Active Software Inc Major League Baseball 2k10 had a midnight launch with a promotion that the first person to pitch a perfect game in the software. He had just gotten home from work as a 401k records keeper then started playing after having bought the game in order to win the contest.
His wife had encouraged him to even take the day off of work to get a head start. They are now going to pay off their mortgage and start a family with their winnings.
The first baseball perfect game was pitched in 1880 and the most recent was in 2009 by Mark Buehrle of the Chicago White Sox. To watch a video of the 9th inning of the game click here.
According to the article it took just around 90 minutes to win a million dollars playing the video game on his day of purchase. The company said that it was a good promotion which helped sales of the video game.
See Barbara Ortutay AP Tech writer 23 year old wins $1 million dollars playing video game.
Frances Lasker Brody estate just sold a 1932 Picasso painting of his mistress titled Nude Green Leaves and Bust which set a record for most expensive work of art ever sold at $106.5 million.
See Ula lnyzky Picasso Painting sells for record $106.5 Million.
Also sold at an auction was another rarely seen Picasso sold by an estate. Patricia Kennedy Lawford the sister of former President John F. Kennedy her estate sold a painting named Woman in a Hat that was one of Picasso's later pieces and it also sold for $8-12 million reports indicate.