If I Inherit Money, Do I Have to Pay Tax on the Money?
Video Summary
Hi! I’m Chip Waller. The question is, do I have to pay inheritance tax on any money that I receive from an estate?
The answer is no. Estate taxes are paid by the estate, so you may be paying them indirectly because it may reduce the amount of the monies that you received as a result of paying an estate tax.
I am not aware, although cannot say conclusively, as to having no inheritance tax in any state. But in Florida there is no inheritance tax and, also, there are no estate taxes. So as far as I know that, well, in fact, there are no inheritance taxes if you live here in Florida that you have to pay.
So if you have any more questions about taxes and estates, well, give me a call at 727-847-2288.
Thank you!
How Much are Estate Taxes in Florida?
Video Summary
Hi! I’m Chip Waller. How much are estate taxes in Florida?
Well, you’re looking at Santa here, there are no estate taxes in the State of Florida so you can leave an unlimited amount to whoever you like and there are no estate taxes.
How about the Federal government? Well, the recent tax law provides that you can leave up to over $5,000,000.00 and there are no estate taxes that are due to the Federal government.
If you are married you can leave an unlimited amount to your spouse. And between the two of you, you can leave upwards to $10,000,000.00 jointly. That takes some – a little bit of planning. But, unfortunately, for me, I haven’t happened to have too many clients that have over $5,000,000.00 or even have the $5,000,000.00 to worry about the estate taxes.
Now, if you own real estate outside the State of Florida there may be estate taxes that are owed to another state where the decedent owned real estate, such as North Carolina, New York or whatever other state other than Florida.
But the good news is, Florida does not have an estate tax.
So, if you have some questions about an estate or want to do some estate planning, or have an estate to be administered, give me a call at 727-847-2288.
Thank you!
Ask Thomas Mitchell: How Do I Protect Myself from Nursing Homes Taking all My Money?
Video Summary
Good afternoon! My name is Tom Mitchell. I’m one of the partners at Waller
& Mitchell. We’re located in beautiful downtown New Port Richey, and I’m an
Elder law attorney.
One of the things that I frequently get asked to do is to help people who have a senior family member who has declined in either mental or physical health and has to go into a nursing home, and the family wants to know, is there any way we can preserve some or as much of their assets as we can and still have them go into the nursing home and be taken care of properly?
And, in fact, there is a Federal/State program that provides the nursing home care for individuals who are indigent. It’s called Medicaid, the Institutional Care Program.
Being a welfare-style program, it does have asset and income limitations. For a single person the asset limit is $2,000.00. And for a married couple the asset limit is $120,000.00. For the income limit for a single person who is in a nursing home it’s approximately $2,250.00. For the individual in a married situation and the individual is living at home, they can have as much income as they want.
And so there are some assets that are not counted. The house is not counted. A car is not counted. Retirement accounts are not counted. So there are some things that we can do, however, to help transfer the other assets that are accounted against Medicaid eligibility.
The only thing that you can’t do is you can’t give it away. If you give the money to the kids or the grand-kids then the person going in the nursing home will be disqualified for Medicaid eligibility for a period of time that is related directly to the amount of money that was given away.
So if you want to know how to do any of these things, go ahead and give us a call. I’m Tom Mitchell at Waller & Mitchell. We’re at 5332 Main Street in New Port Richey.
Thanks!
- Published in Medicaid Planning, Videos
Can a Chapter 13 Bankruptcy Help to Forestall a Foreclosure?
Video Summary
Can a Chapter 13 forestall a mortgage foreclosure action? You betcha it can! Because once you file any kind of bankruptcy action, it is a federal court, and so it immediately stays the foreclosure action. And even if it’s scheduled for foreclosure sale, the Chapter 13 will stop the foreclosure sale if it’s filed just before the sale date after it’s already been going through a foreclosure.
I don’t do bankruptcies; however, my understanding of a Chapter 13 is that you basically say that I can make the payments, and I’m a little bit behind on my other payments, so the bankruptcy court – this is my understanding – will take your deficiencies or the payments that you’re behind, and let you spread that out over a 60-month period, but that means you’ve got to make your regular payment, as well as one-sixtieth of the back payments. And if you don’t make those payments, well, you get kicked out of a Chapter 13.
Now sometimes it’s sort of frustrating if you’re trying to foreclose a mortgage where people will file more than one 13. We call those a Chapter 26 or Chapter 39 if they keep filing, you know, several times after you go through the foreclosure process, but it can be very useful.
Also, if you file bankruptcy action, you have a good chance of possibly working out a mortgage modification in the federal bankruptcy court. So if you need a referral to a good bankruptcy lawyer, well, give me a call and I’ll be happy to give you the name of an attorney who will be glad to try and help you or refer you to someone that will do a Chapter 13 for you.
My phone number is 727-847-2288.
- Published in Real Estate - Foreclosure, Videos
What Can a Tenant Do if the Landlord Refuses to Fix the Property?
Video Summary
What can a tenant do if a landlord refused to repair the property? Well, the Landlord-Tenant Statute provides that you can give the landlord a seven-day notice to repair the property, and if they don’t, well, then you’re in a position to terminate your lease and vacate.
What I have found in talking with many tenants is they just want them to fix the property. They really don’t want to move out or can’t afford to move out and probably the landlord would be tickled to death if the tenant moved out, but the remedy that you have is to give a notice to the landlord that he’s got seven days in which to repair the problem and if they don’t, well, then you’re in a position of terminating the lease.
I have done this for some of my tenants in apartment complexes and although they’ve done it properly in my opinion, the apartment complex still has turned over this matter to collection agencies and turned them over to credit bureaus, which you can then contest, but that’s about the only remedy you have, and so if you have some problems, well, you can give me a call at 727-847-2288.
- Published in Real Estate, Videos