New Estate Tax Offers New Drafting and Structuring Opportunities Say Experts

ARLINGTON, Va., Feb. 4, 2011 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- With the passage of the Tax Relief, Unemployment Insurance Reauthorization, and Job Creation Act of 2010, many practitioners are now scrambling to update their client's estate planning documents and forms to take advantage of the new dynamic estate planning opportunities and challenges. 2011 Estate Tax Changes, a new BNA Tax & Accounting webinar led by noted tax authors and commentators Jerry Hesch, Alan Gassman, and Christopher Denicolo on February 10, puts together charts, language and text to help practitioners mount the learning curve and move into client interaction and drafting update clients documents and planning. A number of drafting approaches to this planning will be discussed, with sample clauses.

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"This valuable analysis comes at a time when practitioners need to change client documents to assure that surviving spouses' heirs can choose between estate tax exemption and stepped up basis," says BNA Tax & Accounting Managing Editor Harry Pskowski.

The new $5.0 million exemption, together with a 35% tax rate, applies to estates of those dying in 2011 and 2012, as well as to gifts and generation-skipping transfers made in those years. Then, in 2013, the pre-EGTRRA law will return, with a $1.0 million exclusion and a maximum 55% tax rate. This presentation will allow participants to focus on the opportunities offered for planners by these changes, and bring clarity where there has been much confusion.

Hesch, Gassman and colleague Christopher Denicolo will show how many estates of wealthy taxpayers who died during 2010 may elect to be subject to the estate tax in order to have new taxable basis in the assets they leave to facilitate having new depreciable basis and less capital gains liability for their families.  

This live webinar will provide participants with:

• Estate and tax planning opportunities for clients with estates both above and below the new $5,000,000 thresholds
• A working knowledge of the new rules, and how to work with them
• Deadlines for taking action and filing tax returns and important tax elections
• What to do for estates of clients with over $5,000,000 in assets who died in 2010
• Professor Hesch's analysis of the clawback risk, and why it should not prevent large 2011 and 2012 gifting
• How many favored past techniques will continue to apply in 2011 and 2012, but in different ways
• How dynasty trust planning will be different and more popular
• The pros and cons tax exemption portability in 2011 and 2012, and how to make credit shelter trust planning more flexible
• Why this is an opportune time to review estate plans
• Expanded opportunities to use the estate tax regime for income tax planning if an individual owns interests in real estate where liabilities exceed tax basis

About the Speakers

Jerome Hesch, J.D, M.B.A., is Of Counsel with Carlton Fields in Miami, Florida and a BNA Portfolio author.  He has extensive experience as a tax and estate planning consultant, and his practice experience includes the use of captive insurance companies, financial derivatives, and energy tax credits. Hesch is a member of ACTEC and has published extensively, including several Tax Management Portfolios, and is co-author of a law school casebook on federal income taxation, now in its fourth edition. Hesch is also director of the Notre Dame Tax and Estate Planning Institute. His career includes service with the Office of Chief Counsel, IRS, and two decades as Law Professor with the University of Miami School of Law.

Alan S. Gassman, J.D., LL.M. practices law in Clearwater, Florida. Each year he published numerous articles in publications such as BNA Tax & Accounting, Estate Planning, Trusts and Estates, The Journal of Asset Protection, and Steve Leimberg's Asset Protection Planning Newsletters. Mr. Gassman is a fellow of the American Bar Foundation, a member of the Executive Council of the Tax Section of the Florida Bar, and has been quoted on many occasions in publications such as The Wall Street Journal, Forbes Magazine, Medical Economics, Modern Healthcare, and Florida Trend magazine. He is the senior partner at Gassman, Bates & Associates, P.A. in Clearwater, Florida, which he founded in 1987.

Christopher J. Denicolo, J.D., LL.M. is an associate at the Clearwater, Florida law firm of Gassman, Bates & Associates, P.A., where he practices in the areas of estate tax and trust planning, taxation, physician representation, and corporate and business law.

2011 Estate Tax Law Changes will take place February 10, 2011, from 2:00 p.m. - 4:00 p.m., ET.  To register for this webinar and obtain further information about CLE and CPE credits, go to http://www.bnatax.com/2011-estate-changes-webinar/?open&cmpid=tmtxpr2011 or call 1-800-372-1033, menu Option 6, then Option 1.  The per site fee is $249.

To receive automatic, email notification of upcoming BNA webinars that may be of interest to you, go to: http://www.bna.com/emailsignup.htm.

About BNA Tax & Accounting Webinars

BNA Tax & Accounting is the foremost source of tax and accounting research, news, practice tools, and guidance for tax attorneys, CPAs, corporate tax managers, estate planners, and financial accountants.  Designed for today's busy practitioners, our webinars offer the same expertise and relevance that are the hallmark of all BNA Tax & Accounting resources. Conference attendees have the opportunity to ask the speakers questions, and may be eligible to earn CLE or CPE credits - all from the convenience of their own office or conference room.

SOURCE BNA Tax & Accounting