Tuesday, February 4, 2014

The Need For Asset Protection Planning

By Serena Price


Asset protection encompasses legal techniques and statutory laws that are used to protect individual and business assets from civil money judgements.Asset protection planning is however used to protect assets from creditor claims without tax evasion or concealment. If a monetary judgement is won against someone, he or she could become bankrupt in trying to pay off. Therefore to keep his or her personal assets from creditors, there needs to be a legal protection program.

Common planning techniques used to protect assets include retitling certain assets, maximization of IRA contributions, using a family partnership, moving funds to a trust, or using a limited liability company for families. A lawyer is usually required to help the in developing a protection plan for the assets. He/she intervenes in the discussion of short term and long term financial targets as well as assisting the client in developing an asset protection plan.

It is also important to note that this form of plan only works if the action is undertaken before suing. This is because creditors cannot be defrauded under the law. For instance, if a person is already being sued or is going to be sued, and transfers his/her assets to avoid creditors reaching them, then the court will reverse that transfer. The planning process should therefore only begin before any lawsuit is undertaken.

An asset protection plan comprises of two major goals, particular estate planning goals as well as short term and long term goals.Examining the short and long term goals enables a person to learn about the current and future income sources, the sum of money required for retiring, as well as the sum of money to be passed to the heirs if the person dies.

After examining financial goals and developing a comprehensive financial plan, all the existing assets can be reviewed to exempt them from the creditors. If the assets are not exempted from creditors, they can then be prepositioned. A financial plan is used to preposition assets that a person may be intending to acquire in the future by protecting them from potential creditors.

After developing a financial plan, the value of all assets in place is then calculated. The results are used to develop an estate plan that is then used in addressing certain issues like taking care of the client in case he/she becomes mentally ill. The estate plans also address issues like assessing who will be in charge of the assets and family if the individual dies.

An estate plan can also encompass planning through the use of advanced techniques. These would include the irrevocable trusts and family liability companies. The companies and trusts should take care of everyone in the whole program including other beneficiaries.

Once the financial goals have been integrated with the goals for estate planning, an asset protection planning is carried out. This also involves positioning or prepositioning all the assets to be protected with an attorney. Thereafter, the client can hold negotiations with the creditors. You should however ensure that the person you have consulted in experienced and certified to carry out these duties.




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1 comment:

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