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Do I have to pay the decedent’s credit card bills and medical bills from a joint account which was maintained during his lifetime? And I am the co-owner? The answer is no. Creditors are required to file their claims in a probate proceeding, and if there is no probate proceeding, they have no way to file a claim and no way to recover whatever bills that are owed. This even goes to Medicaid liens. If there are no assets in the decedent’s name, they’re not able to recover these, and you have no responsibility to use the money that was in a joint account to pay the decedent’s bills. The joint accounts are by statute become the asset or the sole owner of the co-owner of the account. So if you have any questions, give a call at (727) 847-2288.

 

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How do I check the tax status on an estate? Well, we’re fortunate here in Florida that Florida has done away with estate taxes. The federal government has raised the estate tax limitation to 12 million. So that pretty well takes care of most of my clients as far as having to worry about estate taxes. Whenever, if you do own real estate outside the state of Florida, and another state, that state may have an estate tax for the real estate that is situated out in, in their state. As far as income tax is concerned, the executor of your estate needs to file what they call a fiduciary tax return or 10 41 where they report any income that the estate or trust has received during the administration. And then if they’ve distributed out, well, then they’ll issue K one to the recipient of the money, the beneficiary. So that’s sort of a overview of taxes for estates and trust. If you have any questions, give me a call at (727) 847-2288.

 

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If I name one person as the beneficiary on my 401K account but change my mind and want to designate someone else while writing my Will, will my Will take precedence over the designation of my 401k? The answer is no. A 401K is basically a contract, which has a designated beneficiary on it, and must. And if you’re married, you must name your spouse, and otherwise the provisions of the 401k agreement, our participation agreement, that is drafted or provided to you by your employer, that’s going to control your Will. The Will only controls assets that are just titled in your name alone, so that if there’s a designated beneficiary on a bank account, that’s going to control over your Will. So the assets that are just in your name, are controlled by the Will. All your other assets that have designated beneficiaries are con controlled by contract, so no, your Will will not modify the provisions of your beneficiary of your 401k. If you have any questions, give me a call at (727) 847-2288

Can I Terminate a Lease?

 

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Can I terminate a lease? No, you can’t terminate a lease by yourself. It would take the consent of both the landlord and the tenant to agree to terminate it. The only other provision to be able to terminate a lease is if either the landlord, if you’re the tenant, has breached the lease and you wish to terminate it because of his or her breach of the lease. And on the other side of it is that if you can terminate the lease if the tenant has breached the lease many times, that’s as a result of non-payment and you can sue for your damages or whatever, but that would terminate the lease. So, you cannot unilaterally or on your own just turn around and terminate the lease. You have to look at the provisions. I would suggest if that’s an option you would like, particularly with an apartment complex or whatever, or anytime you’re rent residential property or even for that matter, commercial property, you might negotiate the time you prepare the lease. A buyout provision, I’ve seen it. Usually they say that you, once you give notice of the buyout, you have to pay two months of the rent to be, to buy your way out of the lease. Or you can negotiate whatever dollar amount it would be necessary to be able to be released from law lease. If you have any questions, give me a call at (727) 847-2288.

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What is an unofficial Will called? I call it a annuity, and that it doesn’t accomplish anything or will in order to be effective. It must be signed in the presence of two witnesses. All the parties have to see each other or have to be in each other’s presence, and the witnesses must sign the Will and the presence of the person making the Will and the person making the Will has to sign the presence of the other two witnesses. So, whatever is met by unofficial Will, it doesn’t count unless it’s executed with those formalities and is not effective in order to pass the assets of the decedent to the beneficiaries. Under the unofficial Will, I’m really not familiar with the term, but if it’s any, if the Will isn’t executed with the formalities that I’ve outlined, then it is a null. If you have any questions, give me a call at (727) 847-2288.