Help Restore Music to Schools and to the Lives of Children – Support the Elville Center for the Creative Arts
By: Stephen R. Elville – President and Principal Attorney of Elville and Associates, P.C. and Founder of the Elville Center for the Creative Arts, Inc.
William and Jasmine are middle school-age children who live in central Maryland. They are brother and sister and each has a strong interest in music and the arts. Their school had a music program in years past but now that program has been largely defunded and is barely functional – it has all but stopped. There are available teachers willing to teach, and these teachers are so dedicated that they are willing to stay after school. Why? Because there are hundreds of children at the same school who, like William and Jasmine, want to participate in music and learn to play instruments. Yet there are few instruments available to the children at the school, and most of those instruments are either broken, are in a state of disrepair, or are otherwise unplayable.
At the same time, William and Jasmine, like nearly all these children, have no instrument of their own and no ability to obtain music lessons, with their parents unable to afford the $2,000-plus per-year expenditure necessary for instrument rental and lessons. Without access to music, music experience, and music-related cultural events, William and Jasmine, like thousands of children in Maryland, are languishing culturally and in their personal development. This is a Maryland (and American) tragedy that has unfolded slowly over the past 25 years and must be stopped. The Elville Center for The Creative Arts Is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization that is proactively addressing this problem head-on. The mission of the Elville Center for the Creative Arts is to provide children like William and Jasmine the opportunity to learn music theory and application, experience cultural events related to the musical and creative arts, and to use music and the promotion of music-related activities to transcend social and economic divisions. The Elville Center partners with local and regional businesses and school music programs to give the gift of music to children of all ages who want to participate in music but don’t have the means to do so on their own.
You can do something to help children and restore music to schools and to the lives of children across Maryland by supporting the Elville Center for The Creative Arts. The Elville Center needs monetary donations, pledges, volunteers to assist with fundraising and event planning, music instruments that can be refurbished, and more. If you have a strong desire to help children and an interest in music, the Elville Center needs your support. Help the Elville Center help children like WIlliam and Jasmine. For more information or to donate, visit www.elvillecenter.org, or please contact Stephen Elville or Jeffrey Stauffer at 443-393-7696, or via email at steve@elvilleassociates.com or jeff@elvillecenter.org.
A Time to Count Your Blessings
By: Grace Bailey – Elder Law Paralegal
In a time of hopelessness, adversity, and confusion, it is best to find the positive things during hard times. The gas prices are incredibly low, the spring buds are blooming, the weather is perfect for hiking or strolling, families are spending more time together, and the world is on pause. Take a walk and remember to count your blessings instead of your troubles. You’ll have a healthier outlook and a better composition afterwards.
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By: Stephen R. Elville – Managing Principal and Lead Attorney of Elville and Associates, P.C.
Many couples and individuals consider the support and guidance their chosen fiduciaries will need to receive and have access to from their estate planning attorney after their deaths for the administration of their trust or estate as the most important element of the attorney-client relationship in estate planning. Elville and Associates understands this fundamental concern and duty, and through its Waypoint Trust Group provides trustee services, trust and estate administration services, trustee assistance and support services, and trust protector services for new and existing trusts. Elville and Associates is committed to supporting surviving fiduciaries and beneficiaries, and to planning for the generations. What could be more important?
The Time to Think Blog – are you taking the time to think about this issue?
Stephen R. Elville is the managing principal and lead attorney of Elville & Associates, P.C., a leading estate planning, elder law, and special needs planning law firm in Maryland. Elville and Associates engages clients in a multi-step educational process to ensure that estate, elder law, and special needs planning works from inception, throughout lifetime, and at death. Clients are encouraged to take advantage of the Planning Team Concept for leading-edge, customized planning. The education of clients and their families through counseling and superior legal-technical knowledge is the practical mission of Elville and Associates. If you would like to set an appointment with Mr. Elville to discuss estate or elder law planning issues, you may contact him at 443-393-7696, or via email at steve@elvilleassociates.com. #elvilleeducation
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The Imperative Need to Update Your Estate Planning to Reflect Your Goals – with an Educational Component
By: Stephen R. Elville – Principal and Lead Attorney of Elville and Associates, P.C.
In yesterday’s Time to Think blog, we talked about providing for the possibility of a trust protector, a special fiduciary that adds dimension and flexibility to an estate plan. This brings to mind the issue of also providing for the possibility of other contemporary planning approaches into our estate planning and making sure we understand what those modern choices are. To relate a brief story, recently clients who we will anonymously call John and Mary, recently came in to update their estate planning documents due to a recent change in their life circumstances. They did the right thing and their instincts were correct. John and Mary’s wills, powers of attorney, and advance medical directives were from 2004, simple documents drafted by a local general practice lawyer. Upon review, analysis of the old estate planning documents compared to today’s more leading-edge contemporary estate planning documents showed that the older documents lacked at least 12 to 15 points worthy of potential revision and modernization, not only to keep pace with changes in the law, but for purposes of adding scope, dimension, and flexibility to the planning. Through this process, John and Mary were able to educate themselves and their children about important new issues and properly update their planning. The point here is clear – updating estate planning documents on a routine basis is important, and that process should include a client education component involving a recognition of needed changes through review, analysis, and comparison in coordination with your planning goals.
Are you taking the time to think about this planning-related issue?
Stephen R. Elville is the principal and lead attorney of Elville & Associates, P.C., a leading estate planning, elder law, and special needs planning law firm in Maryland. Elville and Associates engages clients in a multi-step educational process to ensure that estate, elder law, and special needs planning works from inception, throughout lifetime, and at death. Clients are encouraged to take advantage of the Planning Team Concept for leading-edge, customized planning. The education of clients and their families through counseling and superior legal-technical knowledge is the practical mission of Elville and Associates. If you would like to set an appointment with Mr. Elville to discuss estate or elder law planning issues, you may contact him at 443-393-7696, or via email at steve@elvilleassociates.com. #elvilleeducation
By: Nicole T. Livingston – Associate Attorney
In 2016, the Maryland Fiduciary Access to Digital Assets Act became law. This law allows your agent named in your power of attorney, a trustee named in your revocable living trust, or a personal representative named in your Last Will and Testament to obtain access to your digital assets. Prior to this law being enacted, agents, trustees, or personal representatives of your estate had a difficult time accessing online accounts or social media sites. Under the new Act, you must have language in your documents that specifically state that your fiduciary has access to your digital assets. Our documents were updated to reflect this new required language. If you have not reviewed your documents in recent years, you should consider scheduling a review meeting with your attorney to discuss this important update to your documents.
As digital assets become more common for all of us to have, it is important to incorporate them into your estate plan. Digital assets include purchased movies, songs, books, or games which can be a significant amount of money. Often clients have digital pictures stored on a cell phone, on a social media site such as Facebook, or a website such as Snapfish or Shutterfly. These accounts are at risk if you do not appropriately plan for your fiduciary to gain access. Your family members may want to retrieve these memories and you do not want them to violate any privacy terms of the service agreement you agreed to when you signed up for these services. With the permission granted in your estate planning documents, your fiduciary can contact these sites and gain access.
Clients who have a business and own a website domain site may need their fiduciary to gain access to the site if you become incapacitated or upon your death to gather pertinent business assets or proprietary information. Electronic access to bank accounts is becoming more common. Gaining access to electronic accounts to administer an estate is no longer a hassle under the Maryland Fiduciary Access to Digital Assets Act. There are systems in place to allow companies to provide a temporary password to gain access to the data and ease the administration of your estate.
There are steps you can take now to ease the burden on your fiduciary. First, you should update your documents with the required language if you have not already done so. Second, create a list of your online accounts and keep the list updated on a yearly basis. When you file your tax return each year, you can schedule a reminder to verify that the list has not changed. Third, provide the passwords to your fiduciary using a secure method. There are several businesses that offer services to store usernames and passwords. Whatever method you choose, make sure your fiduciary knows where and how to find the information. Taking these steps now can ease the burden of administering your estate.
By: Stephen R. Elville – Principal and Lead Attorney of Elville and Associates, P.C.
In yesterday‘s Time to Think blog, we discussed how the inclusion of a Trust Protector provision as part of your estate plan can provide scope, depth, flexibility, beneficiary protection, and more. You can provide for a Trust Protector in your estate planning, elder care-related, or special needs planning documents (Will, Revocable Living Trust, or Irrevocable Trust) in one of two ways: (1) a Trust Protector can be appointed to serve in an active, current role, such as in the case of a special needs trust; or (2) a Trust Protector can be prospective, a special fiduciary who can be appointed at some future time by someone you choose now for this purpose. What’s often important is not how the Trust Protector will ultimately serve, but rather that you have provided for the possibility of a Trust Protector to serve if one is ever needed.
Are you taking the time to think about this planning-related issue?
Stephen R. Elville is the principal and lead attorney of Elville & Associates, P.C., a leading estate planning, elder law, and special needs planning law firm in Maryland. Elville and Associates engages clients in a multi-step educational process to ensure that estate, elder law, and special needs planning works from inception, throughout lifetime, and at death. Clients are encouraged to take advantage of the Planning Team Concept for leading-edge, customized planning. The education of clients and their families through counseling and superior legal-technical knowledge is the practical mission of Elville and Associates. If you would like to set an appointment with Mr. Elville to discuss estate or elder law planning issues, you may contact him at 443-393-7696, or via email at steve@elvilleassociates.com. #elvilleeducation
By: Stephen R. Elville – Principal and Lead Attorney of Elville and Associates, P.C.
Trust protectors add dimension, scope, and depth to an estate plan, and the essential capability needed to deal with ongoing change in an uncertain world. If your estate plan does not include a trust protector or the potential for the appointment of a trust protector, then your plan likely lacks flexibility. Why leave yourself and your beneficiaries in this potentially untenable situation? If you would like to learn more about the advantages of a trust protector as part of your estate planning, please see the contact information below.
Are you taking the time to think about this estate planning issue?
Stephen R. Elville is the principal and lead attorney of Elville & Associates, P.C., a leading estate planning, elder law, and special needs planning law firm in Maryland. Elville and Associates engages clients in a multi-step educational process to ensure that estate, elder law, and special needs planning works from inception, throughout lifetime, and at death. Clients are encouraged to take advantage of the Planning Team Concept for leading-edge, customized planning. The education of clients and their families through counseling and superior legal-technical knowledge is the practical mission of Elville and Associates. If you would like to set an appointment with Mr. Elville to discuss estate or elder law planning issues, you may contact him at 443-393-7696, or via email at steve@elvilleassociates.com. #elvilleeducation
Attorney or Financial Planner? Often, Both.
By: Olivia R. Holcombe-Volke – Partner, Elville and Associates, P.C.
Let me start with a PSA (public service announcement). Everyone over the age of 18 should have a basic estate plan in place. This advice is based upon the reality of the risk of incapacity – from which no one is exempt – and the desire to protect against court-ordered guardianship. It has nothing to do with the amount of money you have. If you are 18 and have a significant amount in assets, good for you – you definitely need to call me. But if you are the more common 18 year old, with a checking account and (maybe) a car, you still need to call me, because you are now considered an adult in the eyes of the law. If you trip and fall and suffer a traumatic brain injury, and you don’t have a basic estate plan in place, you risk that the court must become involved in your life in order for anyone, including your parents, to be able to help you.
I am an attorney, and my areas of expertise are estate planning, special needs planning, and asset protection planning, with some estate and trust administration, elder law, tax, and fiduciary litigation knowledge and experience thrown in for good measure. Luckily, I work at a law firm where there are experts in all of these areas, and so my clients, and any clients of Elville and Associates, can feel secure in the guidance they receive from us regarding trusts (of any kind), wills, advance directives, financial powers of attorney, guardianship, probate, SSI/SSDI/DDA/Medical Assistance, veteran’s benefits, fiduciary litigation, nursing home placements, and many other ancillary matters that fall within these areas.
What I am not equipped to do, other than know enough to be dangerous, is to carry out Roth conversions on traditional IRAs, or instruct on the proper diversification of investments, or whether long-term care insurance or 529 college savings planning are appropriate pieces in a client’s overall financial puzzle. When clients have questions about anything of this sort, the appropriate expert to bring into the conversation is a financial planner.
Which leads me to my second PSA, which is that if you have questions about planning your financial future, or the right investments to make with your money, you need the guidance of a financial planner. If you have hundreds of thousands of dollars sitting around and you are not sure what to do with them, you definitely need a financial planner. But even if you are nowhere near that, if you desire guidance or to have questions answered regarding your financial actions, a financial planner is the expert you need.
In what I found to be an amusing exchange, a family member who is starting her professional career in the financial planning world, with whom I have been family for 11 years, recently said to me, “You do trusts? I didn’t realize!” Now, whether or not this is indicative of the fact that I am a good dinner companion who does not dominate the conversation with talk of my honorable status as one of millions of attorneys, I found this to be insightful, speaking to the reality that I am extremely well-versed in what I do, but not necessarily so in the areas of expertise of other professionals. And that the same is true for other professionals.
This insight was additionally bolstered by a recent comment from a potential client, who said, “My financial advisor said I don’t need to do a Revocable Trust to avoid probate – I can just set all of my accounts up to be POD (payable on death).” This was actually the second time I had heard this in as many months. As a brief aside, the reason not to do this, as a general rule, is because this type of “plan” risks any number of contingencies (the recipient of the POD asset is deceased when the time comes, or in the process of divorce, or is being sued, or is receiving government means-tested benefits that they will lose if they receive the POD asset – just as a few examples). A well written Will or Revocable Trust (or other estate planning document) will address many, many contingencies, and provide many contingency plans, to address the “what ifs” that may exist or occur at the actual time of death. But my overarching point is that clients who rely solely on their financial planners for estate planning advice are getting expert advice from the wrong type of expert – and vice versa.
I would argue that everyone over the age of 18 needs to have a basic estate plan in place. And I would also argue that most adults, if not all, will benefit from having a financial plan in place. The key is using the right expert in the right role. A quality estate planning attorney will recognize her or his areas of expertise, and not attempt to provide guidance on subject matters that fall outside of those areas of expertise. The same is true – or, should be true – for other professionals with other areas of expertise. The best experts in their respective fields know this, and will help guide clients accordingly.
By: Stephen R. Elville, J.D., LL.M. – Principal and Lead Attorney of Elville and Associates, P.C.
Most people approach estate planning as an important but long-put-off project. A natural tendency in this process is to view the planning as ”permanent” and ”forever”. This is a mistake and actually represents the first step towards plan failure. The correct and healthy way to view and approach estate planning is as a continuous process – one where you design and implement the best estate plan you can based on current facts, circumstances, goals, and intentions, with the knowledge and understanding that the estate plan should be reviewed periodically (every 1 to 2 years) throughout your remaining lifetime. By using this holistic approach, several things will happen, among them these: the task of selecting fiduciaries will become easier due to the knowledge that the plan will be revisited; the treatment of beneficiaries and beneficiary shares will be less stressful due to a longer-term approach; the alignment of assets within the planning structure can be fully reviewed and refined over time thereby ensuring that assets flow properly; and the possibility of the estate plan working as you intend are greatly increased. A healthy, holistic approach towards estate planning can and will lead to its ultimate success.
Have you taken the time to think about this issue?
Stephen R. Elville is the principal and lead attorney of Elville & Associates, P.C., a leading estate planning, elder law, and special needs planning law firm in Maryland. Elville and Associates engages clients in a multi-step educational process to ensure that estate, elder law, and special needs planning works from inception, throughout lifetime, and at death. Clients are encouraged to take advantage of the Planning Team Concept for leading-edge, customized planning. The education of clients and their families through counseling and superior legal-technical knowledge is the practical mission of Elville and Associates. If you would like to set an appointment with Mr. Elville to discuss estate or elder law planning issues, you may contact him at 443-393-7696, or via email at steve@elvilleassociates.com. #elvilleeducation
By: Stephen R. Elville, Principal and Lead Attorney of Elville and Associates, P.C.
“The issue of how important legal documents can be notarized during the COVID-19 emergency has been resolved. Yesterday Governor Hogan waived the requirement of in-person notarization of documents and authorized the remote notarization of documents. This important pronouncement means that the execution of important estate planning and other legal documents can now proceed uninterrupted despite the need for social distancing and the stay-at-home requirement. Thanks to the leadership, foresight, and proactivity of our Governor, critical personal estate planning documents such as financial powers of attorney can continue to be implemented during the national/world health crisis. If you or any family member are in the process of implementing or updating estate-related, elder law-related, or special needs planning-related documents, traditional notarization requirements are no longer a barrier. Elville and Associates has responded immediately to the Governor’s Executive Order by effectuating processes and procedures for the remote notarization of documents in accordance with the Order.
“Have you taken the time to think about this issue?”
Stephen R. Elville is the principal and lead attorney of Elville & Associates, P.C., a leading estate planning, elder law, and special needs planning law firm in Maryland. Elville and Associates engages clients in a multi-step educational process to ensure that estate, elder law, and special needs planning works from inception, throughout lifetime, and at death. Clients are encouraged to take advantage of the Planning Team Concept for leading-edge, customized planning. The education of clients and their families through counseling and superior legal-technical knowledge is the practical mission of Elville and Associates. If you would like to set an appointment with Mr. Elville to discuss estate or elder law planning issues, you may contact him at 443-393-7696, or via email at steve@elvilleassociates.com. #elvilleeducation
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