By Steven J. Oshins, Esq., AEP (Distinguished) Anybody who follows sports knows about Shohei Ohtani’s former best friend and interpreter (Ippei Mizuhara) stealing more than $16 million from Ohtani’s bank account to fund his gambling addiction. Ohtani is the modern-day Babe Ruth on the baseball field, but he clearly has bad taste in friends, at least with respect to Ippei Mizuhara. Choosing Trustees When our clients form trusts, they make decisions about current and successor trustees and who can remove and replace trustees. It is likely that Ohtani selected (or would have selected if he hasn’t yet formed any trusts)…
64 Years of Combined Experience Running a Successful Estate Planning Practice
An Interview of Phil Kavesh’s Two Most Senior Employees Interview by Kristina Schneider, Practice Success Coach I had the most amazing experience to go on a trip with nationally renowned estate planning attorney and Ultimate Estate Planning Attorney, Phil Kavesh’s, Law Firm Office Manager (Arlyn V. or “AV”). We went out to Florida to visit with his Senior Estate Planning Paralegal (Elaine A. or “EYA”). Elaine just celebrated her 34th anniversary working for Phil and Arlyn will be celebrating 30 years this August. During our trip, not only did we get the opportunity to stop by a client’s office and…
The Upcoming 2025 Trust Tsunami and How to Handle it
By Steven J. Oshins, Esq., AEP (Distinguished) The estate and gift tax exemption is scheduled to drop in half at the beginning of 2026. This is going to shift the supply/demand ratio so far in favor of estate planners that wealthy prospective clients who know they need to make their large gifts need to start acting now. If wealthy clients wait until the last minute, they will likely find that no capable estate planners have any capacity to get the gift trust(s) drafted, executed and funded by the end of 2025. Act Now! One strategy is to get the gift…
How a Free Book Gets More Clients for Your Estate Planning Practice
By Foster Web Marketing Are you an estate planning attorney that wants to attract more clients and cement yourself as a trusted professional in your field? Look no further than the tried-and-true method of offering a free book. In the marketing industry, we often refer to free books, guides, and other offers as “lead magnets.” And we do it for a good reason! These kinds of offers magnetize potential clients to your firm and stand as evidence that you want to help them work toward solutions to their problems. They’re also a powerful way to showcase your knowledge, build credibility,…
Drowning in E-mail? Tips to Save Time and Be More Efficient!
By Kristina Schneider, Practice Success Coach Electronic mail, otherwise known as e-mail, has become a vital and primary form of communication for most businesses. In fact, it’s the very reason you’re probably reading this newsletter article. While e-mail has become a very efficient way to communicate and handle business, it can also become a source of major inefficiency and time-wasting in the office. Think about how much time is spent sifting through all of your daily e-mail. Double or triple that when you come back from the weekend. And let’s not even talk about how much e-mail we come back…
In-Person Seminars Are Back and Working!
(And You Should Ditch Online Webinars!) By Philip J. Kavesh, J.D., LL.M. (Taxation), CFP®, ChFC, California State Bar Certified Specialist in Estate Planning, Trust & Probate Law It’s no secret that I am a huge fan of seminar marketing. Seminars have been a tested and proven marketing staple for my law firm and many other estate planning attorneys for over 35 years – – if you do them right! Unfortunately, the pandemic forced in-person seminars to shut down. My law firm, like many others, adjusted by offering virtual seminars online. For a while, the virtual model appeared to work and…
3 Ways to Inspire Brand Loyalty and Stand Out From Your Competition
By Foster Web Marketing Most people don’t think too much about trying a different brand of pasta, and they probably don’t pay a lot of attention to the label on their socks. But those same people probably DO have strong feelings about something—whether it’s the make of the car they drive, the smartphone they use, or the running shoes in their closet. If it’s something crucial in your life that has to work for you without fail, it’s not unusual to develop a strong sense of “brand loyalty.” And it’s really not so different when someone chooses an estate planning…
The Most Effective Way to Handle the Price Objection
By Philip J. Kavesh, J.D., LL.M. (Taxation), CFP®, ChFC, California State Bar Certified Specialist in Estate Planning, Trust & Probate Law If you were to ask most estate planning attorneys to narrow down the most common objection most people have about moving forward with their estate planning, price would definitely be on the top of the list. With the influx of cheap, online and do-it-yourself estate planning, living trusts have become a commodity and people are more price-sensitive than ever. While price may still be one of the main reasons a prospective client may choose not to do business with…
Is Seminar Marketing Dead?
By Kristina Schneider Do you think seminars are dead? I keep reading a lot of articles and marketing pieces coming out of companies that are promoting other internet-based services that keep stating that seminars are dead and an antiquated and outdated way to market your estate planning services. I laugh only because I know of several law practices that are regularly bringing in consistent new clients in each month using seminars. First, I think it is important to be honest with ourselves about the differences between estate planning and other areas of law (such as divorce, personal injury, DUI, etc.). …
The Beneficiary Controlled Trust*
By Steven J. Oshins, Esq., AEP (Distinguished) The Beneficiary Controlled Trust name was first introduced to the estate planning industry by my father and me in our two-part article, “Protecting & Preserving Wealth into the Next Millennium,” published in the September and October 1998 issues of Trusts & Estates magazine. [Portions of this article were taken from the 1998 article.] Since that time, the Beneficiary Controlled Trust concept has been widely used by estate planners all over the country. This article describes this philosophy. Background Most trust scriveners draft trusts that make mandatory distributions to the beneficiaries upon reaching certain…