Ask Liz Weston

Get smart with your money

q&a

Q&A: Remarrying late in life

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Dear Liz: This is regarding the letter from the children worried about their widowed father remarrying. My father remarried a year after my mother died. He was 86. His wife and her family gave him love, care and companionship until his death at 93. I gained a wonderful new family whom I love. Once my dad asked how I would feel if he included his wife in his will. My response was that it was his money and he should do whatever he wanted. He raised me, sent me to college and was a kind and caring person. He owed me nothing else.

Answer: Thank you for sharing your positive experience with your stepmother and her family. Late-in-life companionship can be a real blessing.

Unfortunately, some predators target lonely older people and isolate them from their families as a way to get control of their finances. The predator paints the children’s attempts to intervene as “proof” of their greed. The original letter writers had seen this scenario play out in other families and hoped to avoid it in their own.

Q&A: Proposition 13 considerations

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Dear Liz: I read your column with some interest since I just had a client who received a life estate from his long-term partner. They neither married nor formed a registered domestic partnership, either of which might have saved my client some bucks.

The Los Angeles County assessor reassessed the property at its full value even though the remainder will go to my client’s partner’s children on my client’s death. The property was originally purchased in the 1970s. I’d like to think that I or any other estate planning lawyer could fashion a satisfactory work-around for this potential problem faced by folks who wish to give a life estate to someone without Proposition 13 protection and the remainder to someone with that protection.

Of course, one must always bear in mind that the tax tail should not wag the business dog, so a weighing of burdens and benefits is always in order in any plan.

Answer: Here’s another case where stinting on an estate planning attorney’s fee probably cost the heirs vastly more.

For those of you who don’t live in California, Proposition 13 limits property taxes to 1% of the assessed value, and assessments typically can’t increase more than 2% a year until the home changes hands. The lower “Prop. 13” value of a home can be inherited by the children, which means their tax bill would be a fraction of that owed by someone who purchased a similar property more recently.

Instead, the property in question lost its Proposition 13 protection and its tax bill more than tripled.

Q&A: Transferring property after death

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Dear Liz: Just a quick comment on the woman who contemplated transferring her house to her partner and daughter as joint tenants. One must always consider the property tax impact on such transfers. In Los Angeles, real property that is transferred to a transferor’s significant other who is not the spouse or domestic partner will ultimately be reassessed by the county assessor. There are a number of property tax reassessment exclusions on transfers, such as from a parent to a child, from a person to his or her revocable trust and between spouses. This is why all factors must be considered before such a transfer is made.

Answer: A revocable transfer on death deed allows real estate to avoid probate in many states, but this option shouldn’t be used before thoroughly researching the consequences and consulting an estate planning attorney. Read on for an actual case where an ill-considered transfer had big financial consequences.

Q&A: Does moving to a new state necessitate a new living trust?

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Dear Liz: My husband and I have a revocable trust that was drawn up in Florida. We live in California now. We are renting and don’t own a house. Do we still need a trust if we don’t own property and have just one adult child to leave our financial funds to? One tax planner wants to charge us $1,800 to revise our trust to comply with California laws. That sounds high to me. What do you recommend?

Answer: Any time you move across state lines, you should have your estate documents reviewed and — probably — revised. State laws differ, and in this case you moved from a common law state to a community property state, where the rules differ a lot. Property acquired during marriage in a common law state isn’t automatically owned by both spouses, while in community property states, it typically is.

“Property,” by the way, doesn’t just refer to real estate. It refers to pretty much all your assets, including financial funds.

A relatively simple revocable living trust typically costs $2,000 and up, so the price you were quoted does not seem high, but you can check with one or two other estate planning attorneys if you want to compare costs.

Q&A: The downside of federal student loans

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Dear Liz: Are federal student loans turned over to a collection agency still collectible after 20 years?

Answer: Yes. Very much so. There is no statute of limitations on federal student loans, which means collectors can come after you until you pay or die, whichever comes first. Statutes of limitations on most other types of debt limit how long you can be sued. Federal student loans also typically can’t be erased in bankruptcy.

Those aren’t the only ways federal student loans differ from other debt. The government can seize your tax refunds or take part of your wages without going to court. Even Social Security benefits aren’t protected, as they are from other creditors.

So it makes sense to dig yourself out of this debt if you possibly can. You can find out how to do so at the U.S. Department of Education’s Federal Student Aid site (studentaid.ed.gov).

Q&A: What to consider when deciding how to bequeath your home

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Dear Liz: I’m at 74-year-old retired woman living in a completely paid-off condo in California. I hold title in my name only. I would like to add my partner of 20 years and my married adult daughter to my home title so they will not have to go through probate if something happens to me. What would be the easiest way to do that? Someone told me a quick deed to each person giving them a third of the condo. I want it as joint tenancy so the condo would just go to the survivors. My parents always held title with my brother and myself. Do you see a problem with this?

Answer: The “quick deed” to which you refer is probably a quitclaim deed, which would transfer your entire interest in the property to someone else and possibly create gift tax issues. That’s not what you want.

Another option is a revocable transfer on death deed. Like many other states, California now offers this option so that real estate can bypass probate. You would retain ownership of the condo until you die, when it would pass to the people you designate.

But please think carefully before bequeathing a home to two people, especially two who aren’t related or married. What if your daughter needs to sell the house to raise cash and your partner doesn’t want to move? What if your partner needs to remodel the home as she ages but your daughter refuses to share in the costs? Would one have the wherewithal to buy out the other?

Another way to avoid probate would be to create a revocable living trust that allows your partner to live in the home until her death, said Los Angeles real estate attorney Burton Mitchell. The property then could be transferred to your daughter. It may not be the right solution, especially if your partner and daughter have similar life expectancies, but it’s one of many you should explore with an experienced estate planning attorney.