What Is A Joint Trust And Can I Establish One?
Video Summary
What is a joint trust and can I establish one? A joint trust is whenever usually husband and wife sign a trust agreement. Thereby you’ve gotta have two people, of course, to have a joint trust, particularly whenever they own all their assets jointly, and it’s not – you just need to contact an attorney to be able to establish a joint trust.
If the purpose of the joint trust is to avoid probate, you can do that through titling your assets as husband and wife and that way you avoid probate when the first one passes away. If the purpose of the joint trust is to establish a… who you want to receive the asset when both the husband and the wife passes away, that is very, very remote on a simultaneous death, and I really don’t recommend it on that basis.
Also if you do set up a joint trust, do not put your homestead property into a joint trust. There’s all sorts of problems that are associated with that. Also joint trust destroy what they call tenancy body entirety is to give you a certain amount of protection from creditors if there is a judgment against either husband or wife under Florida law. So I am not a big fan or I don’t usually recommend folks to set up joint trust. I think you can title your assets so that they can go to the survivor rather than having a joint trust. If you don’t want your assets to go to your spouse, you have a prenuptial agreement; you have a second marriage or something like that; then I suggest you have separate trust, one for the husband and one for the wife as far as that’s concerned. And again, not putting the homestead property in either trust.
So if you have any questions about establishing a trust, joint or otherwise, give me a call at (727) 847-2288. Thank you.
Ask Jaleh: Reasons For Medicaid Planning.
Video Summary
Reasons for Medicaid planning. Medicare or long-term care insurance benefits may be unavailable or insufficient to cover the costs of nursing home institutionalization.
While Medicare and HMOs may pay part of the nursing home care for the first 100 days, they will only pay for quote unquote skilled care, and a three-day hospitalization requirement must be fulfilled before any days of care and coverage will be allowed. The first 20 days full expenses will be paid by Medicare or Medicaid. And for the next 80 days the patient must pay a sizeable per day coinsurance amount.
Nursing homes in metropolitan areas of Florida normally charge $250.00 per day or more simply for room and board. Thus, the Medicare and HMO coverage will not pay the entire bill. Further, because of the narrow definition of skilled care, the national and Florida average for Medicare and HMO coverage is 10 to 20 days and not the full 100 days allotted. Long-term care calls for long-term money management to provide essential health and quality of life services and wears over and above that furnished by the Medicaid benefits. The burden of costs of catastrophic medical care is especially poignant in cases of married couples. Community spouses who do not plan ahead, often live in poverty to keep an ill spouse in a nursing home.
If you have any questions regarding skilled nursing care and/or Medicaid planning, please give us a call here at Waller and Mitchell at 727-847-2288.
- Published in Medicaid Planning, Videos
After A Notice Of Comencement Is Signed Can You Change Contractors?
Video Summary
After a Notice of Commencement has been signed, can you change your contractor? The answer is yes; however, it is circumstances surrounding changing your contractor is what’s critical.
If you change it before you go in to get your building permits, or while you’re getting building permits under a different contractor, well then you will simply prepare an Amended Notice of Commencement before you ever start work. If however you terminate your contractor, well then you’ve got to through a termination process as far as terminating the contractor and simply filing an amendment as your Notice of Commencement is concerned. So yes, you can. It is somewhat difficult to do. And usually involves discharging a contractor and then filing a Notice of Recommencement under a – filing a Notice of Recommencement to start your work. So I guess the best way to say this you can, but you need to do it very carefully, and what the circumstances would be. So if you have any questions about your Notice of Commencement well give me a call at 727-847-2288.
- Published in Real Estate, Videos
Am I Required To Allow Unattended Access Inside My Home To A Contractor?
Video Summary
Am I required to allowed unattended access inside my home by my contractor? The answer to the question is no; however, you need to look at the consequences and are you there, or someone there at every day to provide him access.
Because your contractor’s gonna want to be able to get in there and get the job done. And so he’s not gonna want to have to wait until you’re at home or whatever. Of course, if you have a contractor that hadn’t shown up, and he wants to show up every three of four weeks, well it sounds like you need to get rid of your contractor and get someone else. But you could probably write into the contract that says that he is – that you will be available or negotiate that on the front end. And particularly if you’re doing a remodeling and you’re living there in your home, the answer to the question is no.
However, it may impeded the progress of your job. But my experience says, well, that hadn’t been a problem you being there to allow him access, it’s been a problem of him not showing up, and then him wanting to show up whenever he wants to and then complain that he couldn’t get in to do the work. So it sounds like a problem between the owner and the contractor, and sounds we need to get a new contractor and go through that process rather than talking about access to the home.
So if you have any questions about your construction contract and your contractor, well give me a call at 727-847-2288.
- Published in Real Estate, Videos