The United States has its own swine-like flu in all 50 of the United States.

Let’s start with some new tax laws Congress is likely to pass before 2009 ends. You must divide these new-tax-law candidates into two distinct groups: the good guys and the bad guys.

Most clients (usually readers of this column), when I ask, “What is your charitable intent?” respond with something like, “Nothing significant.”

You’ll like this true story. A reader, let’s call him Joe, of this column had completed his transfer-to-his-kids plan and his estate plan in 1996.

You’ve had it. After 15, 25 (well, you fill in the number) or more years of building your business, you want out.

Years ago (from the 1950s to the late 70s), it was the custom to put real estate in a separate corporation (R/E Corp.), which would then lease the real estate to the corporation operating the business. It was a lousy ...

Trying to beat the income tax collector is a time-honored annual activity. But you only get one chance to beat (or be beaten by) the estate tax collector. In most cases, an organized estate plan leaves the collector with an ...

Recently, I read an article titled, “What Makes For Success?” by Kemmons Wilson, the founder of Holiday Inn. He said, “It is great to attain wealth, but money is really just one way – and hardly the best way – ...

There are many types of qualified plans: pension, profit-sharing, 401(k) and IRAs are the most popular.

If you use the right tax tools and techniques together with the right professionals (lawyer, insurance consultant, and CPA), you can and will develop a plan to beat the IRS. Every time. And legally.

The first commandment of my someday-I-will-write-it bible of taxation would be “Thou shalt not put real estate into a corporation.” We see it at least a dozen times year: When readers of this column ask us to do a tax ...

Own a family business? Want to transfer it to your kids? Then you’ll love this article. It’s about an old IRS letter ruling that is one of my favorites. It might be labeled “the lazy man’s way to plan your ...

Many of the columns I write and the seminars I give deal with family business succession planning. Can you guess the most common succession situation and related problems? Getting the business from dad and/or mom to one or more of ...

The Internal Revenue Code is not a friendly creature. It is designed to “taketh” your money; “giveth” is not in its vocabulary.

Succession planning has always been and still is a hot topic. Let’s start with a classical fact pattern and the tragic tax results that are sure to follow for the uninformed.