The American Bar Association Guide to Wills and Estates, Second Edition: Everything You Need to Know About Wills, Estates, Trusts, and Taxes (American Bar Association Guide to Wills & Estates) [Paperback]

American Bar Association (Author)

Book Description

Series: American Bar Association Guide to Wills & Estates | Publication Date: February 17, 2004

Estate planning is for everyone who wants to protect the ones they love.

The American Bar Association Guide to Wills & Estates, Second Edition, contains everything you need to know about planning an estate, preparing a will or trust, and minimizing inheritance taxes. Organized in easy-to-follow chapters with sidebars containing tips, checklists, and key information, this book will show you how to make plans that will be carried out exactly as you wish.

The ABA Guide to Wills & Estates will help you:
• Take steps to help your family now
• Determine what to put in your estate plan
• Decide whether to prepare a will, trust, or living trust
• Avoid or reduce estate taxes
• Change your plans if the law or your circumstances change
• Transfer property without a will with substitutes such as life insurance and joint tenancy
• Understand the benefits of living gifts and life insurance
• Choose an executor and trustee
• Ensure that your will won't be contested

Editorial Reviews

From the Inside Flap

The American Bar Association Guide to Wills & Estates, Second Edition, contains everything you need to know about planning an estate, preparing a will or trust, and minimizing inheritance taxes. Organized in easy-to-follow chapters with sidebars containing tips, checklists, and key information, this book will show you how to make plans that will be carried out exactly as you wish.

The ABA Guide to Wills & Estates will help you:
·Take steps to help your family now
·Determine what to put in your estate plan
·Decide whether to prepare a will, trust, or living trust
·Avoid or reduce estate taxes
·Change your plans if the law or your circumstances change
·Transfer property without a will with substitutes such as life insurance and joint tenancy
·Understand the benefits of living gifts and life insurance
·Choose an executor and trustee
·Ensure that your will won't be contested

About the Author

The American Bar Association is the nation's leading legal authority and the largest voluntary professional membership organization in the world. With more than 400,000 members, the ABA provides law school accreditation, continuing legal education, information about the law, programs to assist lawyers and judges in their work, and initiatives to improve the legal system for the public.

Product Details

• Paperback: 384 pages
• Publisher: Random House Reference; 2 edition (February 17, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0609809342
• ISBN-13: 978-0609809341
• Product Dimensions: 7.9 x 5.2 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 13.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 2.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #752,500 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

28 of 30 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Not helpful, December 27, 2006

By 

David Annis - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The American Bar Association Guide to Wills and Estates, Second Edition: Everything You Need to Know About Wills, Estates, Trusts, and Taxes (American Bar Association Guide to Wills & Estates) (Paperback)

The ABA should be ashamed. This is not a book designed to inform but a list of reasons to see a lawyer. Interested in software to help. They cover that topic saying "since lawyers generally charge less for less complicated estates, you may be able to gain the benefits and flexibility of real legal advice for little more than the cost ofa computerized will kit." They let you know that "many alternative estate providers fail to inform you when there may be abetter (or cheaper) way to accomplish your goals" implying that the infallible lawyers always do so.

Want to use a statutory will - they'll tell you why you should use a lawyer instead.

Interested in learning about benificiary deeds they tell you "Your lawyer can explain the ins and outs of your state's law relating to beneficiary deeds."

Here's another very informative passage "Your lawyer can help you figure out which is which, so that you know what property you can transfer through estate planning."

Setting up a trust "you should surely use a lawyer to set one up. * If the trust is for the benefit of your minor children, ..."

How about this gem from page 44 "...should be coordinated with your estate plan, preferably with the assistance of your lawyer."

Or this one from page 46 "Check with your lawyer to see whether your state permits this arrangement and whether it's a good idea for your situation."

Want a well crafted will? Your infallible lawyer can help "craft your language so that no ambiguities remain that might invite a court challenge. Your lawyer can help you do that."

Don't ask practical questions, like which states allow statutory wills, those aren't answered.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Review of book recommended by American Bar Association, June 18, 2008

By 

Ben Martin - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The American Bar Association Guide to Wills and Estates, Second Edition: Everything You Need to Know About Wills, Estates, Trusts, and Taxes (American Bar Association Guide to Wills & Estates) (Paperback)

I was dissapointed with the book. I tried to look up the word "situs," but it wasn't there. Every other page of the book, it seemed, emphasized the importance of seeing a lawyer. This makes me think, the ABA, is an organization, whose main purpose is to promote the prosperity of attorneys - just like the ADA is for dentists - and the AMA is for Doctors. Most of the public thinks the ADA and AMA are "watchdog" orgaizations, they are not. I always thought the purpose of the ABA was to regulate attorneys, but apparently it has similairties to the ADA, and AMA, in that it's main purposes is securing busienss for it's members.

Another book I have purchased is much better. It even advises that lots of attorneys make mistakes where Trust Law & Estate Planning is concerned, and how important it is to find the right attorney. From the little bit I read of the ABA recommended book, I doubt I would find anything like that, in the book. And then again, the index in the back seems to be especially lame.

3 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good Guide to Estate Planning, February 17, 2006

By 

Lillie (New York) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The American Bar Association Guide to Wills and Estates, Second Edition: Everything You Need to Know About Wills, Estates, Trusts, and Taxes (American Bar Association Guide to Wills & Estates) (Paperback)

Thorough and fairly easy to understand. It does a particularly clear discussion of trusts.