Articles
Articles
Finding the Law on Fiduciary Duties
Clients are commonly confused about various fiduciary roles and their duties. The job of helping them understated these roles and the obligations that with them is typi ...
Celebrating 20 Years of High Standards in Legal Competence and Ethics
Often when clients meet with lawyers, it can be a stressful, uneasy time of crisis. For Doug Chalgian and Amy Tripp of Chalgian & Tripp Law Offices, creating an app ...
Staying at Home as You Age
Most everyone who thinks about it thinks that when they get old that they will stay in their home and not go into institutional care setting. And while positive thinkin ...
Death Tax Talk Puts Planners on Edge
With a new administration in Washington, come increased attention to our tax laws, including laws that tax assets when people die. For estate planning attorneys, this i ...
Understanding Adult Guardianships
In everyday conversation, the word "guardian" could have many meanings. But in elder law, and in probate court, the term is used more precisely. It means someone wh ...
Probate Basics for the Intellectually Curious
Clichés about “avoiding probate” and “protecting your assets” are recited ad nauseum at the so-called “educational seminars” (aka sales presentations) put on ...
The Cautionary Tale and Tragic Death of Virginia Kermath
Everything I know about Virginia Kermath came from reading a Michigan Court of Appeals opinion. In that opinion, I learned that Virginia was a demented 89-year-old who, o ...
The Cat & Mouse of Exploitation Litigation
In litigation involving the financial exploitation of a vulnerable adult, timing is often everything. Let's say, for instance, that Dad really likes his new caregiver. ...
Elder Law Lessons From William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare, the ultimate Renaissance man, offered insight into pretty much every aspect of the human condition. Estate planning is no different. Following are ab ...
Sweating the Small Stuff
Clients sometimes get confused about the way lawyers use the word “property.” In the legal community, the word “property” has a very broad meaning. It ...
Best Practices for Family Exploitation Cases
From the perspective of the child who moved to New Jersey 30 years ago, the sibling who moved back into the family home to live with (and be supported by) his aging mothe ...
Old Estate Planning Ideas Give Way to New Technology
As Duane Horton contemplated his death, he decided to use on app on his smartphone to write a message that explained how he wanted his estate distributed when he was gone ...
Getting Old is Not for Sissies
Recently, a colleague told me about an experience she had with her father and father-in-law. Both were widowed. Both were of an advanced age. Both were beginning to exper ...
An Attorney’s Duty to Effectively Communicate With Clients Under the ADA
A client with hearing loss contacts your office wanting to draft an estate plan. She relies on American Sign Language (ASL) for most of her communication. You freeze, ...
Elder Bankruptcy
Fixed incomes and fixed assets make older adults particularly vulnerable to financial fluctuations. A bad investment, an unexpected medical crisis, a financial predator ...
Per Stirpes and Right to Representation
Yes –“Stirpes”is a Word
In estate planning, lawyers sometimes use archaic legal terms. At times, these legal words are unnecessary and can create confusion. At o ...
The Fall of the High Achiever
I litigate cases involving exploitation of older adults. Early in my career, I was in court on a particularly difficult case. A highly respected scholar, professor, autho ...
Their Greatest Gift
I knew early in law school that I wanted to do something with people with disabilities, including issues of aging in vulnerable adults. When I was in high school, I had t ...
Guilty Thoughts at the Funeral Home
Someone close to you died. You’re nicely dressed and at the funeral home. All the talk is about condolences, sympathy and shared memories. It’s not that you aren’t ...
Amy Tripp – Bringing Dignity to Practice of Elder and Special Needs Law
Amy Rombyer Tripp keeps client files filled with details few lawyers would ever think to ask: favorite food, laundry detergent, brand of shampoo.
Not every file inside C ...
Estate Planning: For the Family Farm or Business
So-called "business succession planning" has always presented unique challenges to estate planners. And while there are certainly many challenges to successful business s ...
Our Updated ABLE Brochure
Are you wondering if an ABLE Account is right for you or for a loved one? Our attorneys have spent countless hours studying the ABLE Act and looking at ABLE programs acro ...
Asset Protection Trusts – the New Game in Town
With little fanfare, at the close of 2016, the Michigan Legislature passed (and Governor Snyder signed) legislation that created a new and dramatically different estate p ...
10 Costly Special Needs Planning Mistakes
In this free download, 10 Special Needs Planning Mistakes to Avoid, you will find the key costly mistakes you can make when planning for a loved one with special needs an ...
The Present, Past and Future of Elder Law
For obvious reasons, I interact with a lot of people who are looking for an “elder law” attorney. The label seems to have caught on. So I will take this opportunity t ...
Bay County judge awards $1.5M for trust conversion
By Douglas Levy
Douglas G. Chalgian said that in his nearly two decades of practicing probate litigation and elder law, he had never encountered an instance in which a ...
Estate Plans for When Your Kids Won’t Do As Well As You
By the time I meet with clients (usually in their 50s or 60s, if not older), they have a pretty good idea of how
their children will make out: whether their marriages wi ...
A Matter of Trust
For many people, the process of estate planning begins with the question: “Do I need a Trust?”
In the remainder of this article, a question and answer approach will ...
Finding the Right Lawyer
The way I see it, people often struggle to find the right lawyer for their cases. Over the years, I have been involved in many cases in which more than one party is repre ...
The Top 10 Ways to Incite Anarchy When You Die
When I talk to clients about their estate planning objectives, and make suggestions as to how things might go smoother, one reaction I sometimes get is: “I don’t r ...
Caring for Aging Parents
It sounds like a simple proposition: hiring caregivers to help an impaired older adult remain in their home. But, as with many of the issues that arise in the context of ...
Modern Estate Planning Focuses on Life Events
Unless your estate planning documents provide direction as to how to strike the balance between protecting assets and paying for higher quality of care, decisions w ...
Starting a Lawsuit in the Real World
One of the more frequent conversations I have with clients these days comes up with people who are considering starting a lawsuit. Because of the nature of my practice, t ...
Advising Clients on Medicare
For too long, Medicare has been the forgotten stepchild of elder law. Few attorneys know its ins and outs, and most struggle to profitably integrate it into their law pra ...
What Could Go Wrong with Your Living Trust?
When asked about an estate plan, clients often say: “We’re all set, we have a living trust.” And that’s good. Often having a living trust (a.k.a. revocable trust) ...
Patterns in Financial Exploitation of Vulnerable Adults Cases
Clients who meet with me about elderly family members who are being, or have been, financially exploited are often surprised when, shortly into telling me their story, I ...
When Elder Law Meets DINK Planning
As an elder law attorney who also does estate planning, I've noticed a marked increase in client couples with dual incomes and no kids (so-called "DINKs"). While my exper ...
Two Stories About Aging
As an elder law and estate planning attorney, helping clients understand options and make informed decisions is rewarding. But the decisions they have to make are often d ...
Overcoming the Urge to “Do Something” About Long-term Care
Getting old is scary. Friends and loved ones are dead and dying. Your body has declined. Your mind may be failing. What seemed like a nice nest egg now seems inadequate. ...
New Power of Attorney Law Challenges Planners
As our clients age, and as the population of persons with cognitive impairments expands, the importance of the financial power of attorney is elevated. This reality is re ...
Is Your “Living Trust” Alive, or Barely Breathing?
I often tell clients that estate planning is about two things: (1) What happens to your stuff when you die; and (2) who can make decisions for you if you are alive and ca ...
Adult Guardianship: The New Divorce
Family conflicts have historically been the province of family law or divorce court. Now those same issues have become the meat and potatoes of the elder law practitioner ...
Plan to Be 100
These days, living to be 100 years old is not unusual. But most people (at least most of my clients) don’t necessarily want to think about what that means from a planni ...
What Does “Asset Protection” Really Mean?
When clients talk to me about setting up a trust, they often believe that by doing so, they will “protect their assets,” although they are rarely able to explain what ...
My Kids, Your Kids, His Kids, Her Kids: Why Second Marriages Make Estate Planning a Challenge
Estate planning is about two things: (1) What happens to my stuff when I die?; and (2) Who makes decisions for me if I am alive but unable to make decisions for myself? B ...
The Pitfalls of “Helping Out” Your Family Members
In America, parents have a tradition of “helping out” their children. But it is assumed that the need for this help ends at some point, typically when the child gradu ...
Planning with Discretionary Testamentary Trusts
Many estate planners remain unaware of the proper situation in which a discretionary testamentary trust ("DTT") may provide a desirable option for their clients... ...
Understanding the Power of Power of Attorneys
It is not uncommon to become involved in legal disputes where someone is troubled by the way a “power of attorney” is behaving... ...
Protecting Your Inheritance
The focus of estate planning and elder law is typically on preparing documents and taking other steps to implement the wishes of the person establishing the plan and leav ...
What Does Asset Protection Really Mean? Part II
This is the second part of an article What Does “Asset Protection” Really Mean? In the first installment, the topics of Protecting Assets from Probate, Protecting Ass ...
Special Needs=Special Planning
The term “special needs” gained some notoriety during that brief period of time that Alaska Governor Sarah Palin was in the news as the running mate of Senator John M ...
Elder Law Litigation and the Lessons I’ve Learned
Elder law litigation is on the rise. But little has been written about it, and from what I see in probate courts around the state, little is understood... ...
The Power of Discretion: An Introduction to Creditor Rights and Disability Planning Under the Michigan Trust Code
The rights of creditor’s to collect against assets held in trust are expressed in Part 5 of the Michigan Trust Code (the “MTC”). The objective of this article will ...
Ten Common Twists in the Road to a Smooth Estate Plan: Part II
This is the second part of an article that addresses common issues that arise in estate planning and ideas on how they may be addressed... ...
Ten Common Twists in the Road to a Smooth Estate Plan: Part I
As an estate planning attorney, it’s nice once in a while to meet with clients who really have a “simple” estate plan — but then again, if that’s all you had to ...
Drafting Trusts with Prophylactic Planning Provisions—How Far Should You Go?
Most of us are comfortable with the idea of including a catch-call provision in our trust agreements that prevents trust property from unexpectedly being distributed to m ...
Funerals and Family Fights
It’s a cliché among estate attorneys: the biggest legal battles often begin with disputes about the smallest items: “who gets the mantle clock?” … for example... ...
Medicaid Planning Basics
Welcome to the complex, confusing and sometimes controversial world of “Medicaid Planning.” “Medicaid planning” is an area of the law in which attorneys advise cl ...
The ABC’s of Medicaid
Medicaid is a government health insurance program. Unlike Medicare (the other big government health insurance program) to qualify for Medicaid a person must be elderly or ...
Estate Recovery
In the recent flurry of legislative activity in Lansing, a new law was enacted that is especially important to Michigan’s senior citizens. The “estate recovery” law ...
Medicaid Planning: Time of Change
Times are changing in the world of Medicaid planning. Always a volatile area of the law, Medicaid planning has entered a period in which the changes being implemented are ...
Be a Hero to Your Clients: Seven Simple Questions about VA Aid and Attendance Pensions
Planning for clients who need long term care is not always about Medicaid. Many clients may be eligible for other benefits, most notably the “Aid and Attendance” Pens ...
ICLE’s New Michigan Medicaid Planning Handbook
This book is unique in that it provides practical, step-by-step instruction about obtaining Medicaid assistance for the client who is facing a nursing home stay, or who m ...
New Law Clarifies Funeral Rights
Michigan recently adopted new laws designed to clear up confusion about who has the legal authority to control funeral arrangements for a decedent... ...
Federal Legislation Leaves Medicaid Planning in Limbo
On February 8, 2006, President Bush signed into law the Deficit Reduction Act of 2005 (DRA), a massive piece of legislation that requires states to significantly change s ...
Elder Law and Medicaid in 2004
Historically, clients come to elder law attorneys confused and, as a result, often frightened. Both are unfortunate... ...
Helping Elderly Clients Who Have Been Financially Exploited
In Michigan, circuit court is the general trial court. As such, circuit courts have subject matter jurisdiction over all matters except those statutorily exclusively assi ...