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…
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that are promoting other internet-based services that keep stating that seminars are dead and an antiquated and outdated way to market your estate planning services.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…