Customer Reviews

The Complete Living Trusts Program

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If you want to understand the basic foundation of estate planning, this is the book for you. Martin Shenkman discusses many of the concepts that Certified Financial Planners must understand to effectively work with their estate planning clients. The book assumes that the reader has some familiarity with the basic principles of estate planning such as wills, probate, and gift and estate taxes. The book gives sound advice to help the reader decide what level of estate planning is appropriate for their individual circumstances. In some cases, a simple will may be all that you need, but others may benefit from a revocable AB marital trust. Other more advanced estate planning ideas are also discussed (insurance trusts, multi-generation trusts) for those with larger estates or a family business that they want to pass on to the next generation. The book does not discuss every possible technique in estate planning, but provides a fine overview of the range of techniques available. Also, the book does not provide a way for you to write your own will or trust, as Mr. Shenkman strongly advises that you seek competent legal advice to prepare these all important legal documents (very good advice indeed!)

The current edition of this book was published in 2000 and is obviously a bit out-of-date with the new and evolving estate tax legislation. However, the techniques discussed in this book will very much have application in the latest changes of estate tax legislation.