News and Insights

Dusting Off Your Estate Plan

After you sign your will, it may be tempting to put it in a safe place and forget about it.  However, it’s wise to revisit your will, and your entire estate plan, from time-to-time.  The following are just some of the reasons why updates to your estate plan may be appropriate. Change in Family Circumstances. […]

Planning with Retirement Assets

For many people, their retirement assets, such as IRAs and 401(k) Plans are their most valuable assets.  Therefore, it is particularly important to plan carefully for what will happen to these assets at death.  Doing so is tricky because most of these plans, with the exception of Roth IRAs and Roth 401(k) Plans, are subject […]

Gift and Estate Tax Uncertainty

Gift and estate tax uncertainty is not new.  Over the past several years, we have seen the amount a person can leave free of estate tax utilizing their estate tax exclusion amount rise from $600,000 in 1997 to $11,580,000 in the year 2020, with several stops in between.  We have had one year of estate […]

Jennifer Spitz has been named Tax Law Lawyer of the Year for Boulder for 2021.  The Best Lawyers ®  “Lawyer of the Year” honor is bestowed on a single lawyer in each practice area and designated metropolitan area making this accolade particularly significant. Honorees are selected based on impressive voting averages received during the peer-review assessments.

      COVID-19 has prompted many people to think more seriously about their plan for death and possible disability. The following are ten steps you can take to be better prepared: Have a Last Will and Testament. Your will directs the distribution of your “probate” assets, nominates a personal representative (executor), and contains other […]

Estate Planning in Uncertain Times

Lyons Gaddis COVID-19 Alert This Alert is one in a collection of articles created by Lyons Gaddis in our effort to get important information to our clients regarding the effect of the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak in the United States.  This Alert focuses on estate planning issues during the current crisis. April 1, 2020 Estate […]

Decanting and the Art of Change What is in a name?  There was a time when irrevocable meant just that.  In Colorado (and at least 24 other states); however, an irrevocable trust can now be changed by decanting.  Decanting can describe the gradual pouring of a liquid, typically wine, from one container into another.  Recently, […]

Frank Lumpkin Jr. loved Georgia football.  As the story goes, one Saturday (over 50 years ago) Mr. Lumpkin walked through downtown Columbus, Georgia with his infant son.  He came upon an Auburn fan and the two ultimately came to blows, with Lumpkin clutching his son’s bassinet in his left hand while he swung at the […]

Spot is my neighbor’s dog. There are few people Spot doesn’t want to bite. Because I fostered her as a rescue puppy, I am one of the lucky and very few humans that she loves unconditionally. If anything happened to Spot’s family, she would be welcomed into my home. She knows the way quite well. […]