First, we have to understand the concept of a "hot document."  A hot document is one that confers authority.  A Will is never a hot document until the Testator dies.  A Power of Attorney usually confers authority at the time that the document is sign...Read More

I attended a spring “boot camp” of the Special Needs Alliance last weekend.  I have been a member of this organization since 2002.  It is an invitation-only professional organization of lawyers who have expertise in planning with families who have di...Read More

Last Saturday, several of our clients, friends and their family members, attended our annual Trust School.  We hold another session of the Trust School each fall, concentrating on Special Needs Trusts.  But this spring session is all about all types ...Read More

An agent is a person chosen by another person to act on their behalf.  The person who chooses an agent is often called the “principal.”  The agent represents the legal rights and responsibilities of the principal, but the principal does not give up a...Read More

I really do not know the answer to this question.  But now that I have your attention, let me talk about two articles that appeared recently.  The first article is titled “With health care, like anything else, we get what we pay for,” which appeared ...Read More

In our law practice, we represent family members.  When we are retained, it often has something to do with our client’s relationship with his or her family.  Families are organic and they have systemic issues that date back for many years.  We work v...Read More

We have many folks who contact us about financing long term care. Sometimes there has been a diagnosis of Alzheimer’s or another long term debilitating disease, and sometimes there has been a fall or a sudden illness that puts the family in crisis mo...Read More

When you open your newspaper and a pink flyer falls out telling you to come to a seminar about trusts, does that make you wonder why you do not have one too?  It seems like everyone has trusts these days.  Should everyone have trusts, as the flyer se...Read More

My adult daughter asked me once what medications I was taking.  I told her that I took two prescription medicines.  She asked me what they were and what they were for.  I told her that one was a medicine for hypertension and that the name started wit...Read More

On January 4, 2011, The National Alzheimer’s Project Act (“NAPA”) was enacted by Congress.  This Act creates an integrated national plan to overcome Alzheimer’s, which includes providing information and coordination of research across all Federal age...Read More

The Tax Relief, Unemployment Insurance Reauthorization, and Job Creation Act of 2010, also known as the Tax Relief Act of 2010, was signed by the President on December 17, 2010.   For those of us interested in estate and gift taxes, we learned right ...Read More

On Friday, December 17, President Obama signed tax legislation that extends the current income tax rates and capital gain rates for two years.  Below are the income tax rate schedules. 

The capital gain rate will remain 15% for long term capital gai...Read More

In a press release dated November 23, 2010, Dr. Alfredo Vigil, Secretary of Health for New Mexico, announced an 8% cut to the annual budgets of the 3,700 recipients of Developmental Disabilities Waiver Program.  There will also be a 5% rate reduction...Read More

The cover of The New Yorker this week features a turkey with different slices marked for different nutty relatives.  It is an example of the dread that many families feel about the holidays.  What will happen around the table this year?  Will we have...Read More

Our pets are beloved family members.  Most of us will go to more trouble caring for our pets than we might for our children.  My daughter used to criticize me because in her eyes, I would wisk our family cat off the vet if she had a warm nose, and if...Read More

We all live where we want to, until we can’t anymore.  Then, housing becomes a much bigger issue than we ever thought it would be.  It is not about which town, or which neighborhood, or split level or ranch.  It is about what type of housing will acc...Read More

Last week the annual Southern New Mexico Estate Planning Institute was held.  This is the 18th year of this institute, and it continues to be very high level and the best two day program addressing the issues of estate planning that is held in New Me...Read More

Ordinarily we would not do a blog about restaurants that we like, but this is not an ordinary restaurant.  We had lunch on Friday at Tim’s Place.  You may have read about this eatery in the local newspaper, because it opened just recently.  It was re...Read More

We know about posses from watching western movies.  The sheriff deputized a group of men by giving them badges, and then they rode off on their horses to catch the cattle thief.  The posse was an organized group who were endowed with certain powers a...Read More

Ads have been running on TV paid for by the Coalition to Protect Seniors, Inc., which state that people on Medicare should oppose health care reform because it will take away $445 million in Medicare benefits.  Our law firm works very hard to protect...Read More

In 2009, a woman came to our office who had been referred to us by a divorce attorney.  She was a mother whose 6 year old son was born with a chromosomal defect.  The family is an honest hard working family.  Dad worked in construction and mom had re...Read More

As we age, we can lose many of the faculties that we have taken for granted for years such as, hearing, sight, balance, memory and mobility, to name a few. Even with very good health, these functions upon which we have depended for years can fail us....Read More

No federal estate tax in 2010.  No step up in basis in 2010 (except for $1.3 million).  Will the Bush tax cuts expire?  No more two year GRATs?  What will happen in 2011?  Uncertainty.  Like we do not have enough of it!

 Are there opportunities for p...Read More

            I am spending this week eagerly awaiting the arrival of my first grandchild.  I know, this is old hat for many of you, and you are the lucky ones!  But this is my first.  What advice can I give the new parents without being too pushy or m...Read More

Assert yourself at any age

 One of our client’s mother moved recently from independent living to an assisted living facility in the Sacramento Valley in California.  She had previously lived in an apartment independently, and she had been responsible...Read More

The New York Times ran an article on August 10, 2010, reporting that a study had been completed showing that a spinal fluid test can predict whether or not a patient has Alzheimer’s.  It is now well known that a person can have this dreaded disease f...Read More

My short answer to this question is “Yes!” 

"Oh,” you might say, “of course you would say that; you are an estate planning lawyer and you are drumming up business.”

Setting your suspicions aside, let me tell you that everyone has an estate plan alrea...Read More