Blog Articles
Info About Wills, Trusts, and More…
Hello and welcome! I am Eileen Kerlin Walsh, and I will bring you valuable and topical information on Estate Planning. Estate Planning is the legal process of protecting your assets and your loved ones in the event of disability or death.
Why do you need an estate plan? If you don’t have a valid Will or Trust, Illinois law determines how your assets pass, to whom and when. Having no estate plan can lead to unnecessary taxes, creditors, probate court and other undesirable results. This is the most costly way to pass assets to your loved ones. You can do much better and my column will show you how!
The Legacy of Film Legend Val Kilmer
Actor Val Kilmer’s passing in April 2025 highlights estate planning issues that can affect almost anyone. Although Kilmer was a celebrity, these issues—including managing real estate in more than one state, deciding what happens with digital assets, and using...
3 Powers to Consider Giving to a Trust Protector
Many estate plans today include trusts that become irrevocable upon the trustmaker’s death and continue for the benefit of a surviving spouse, children, or other loved ones. Some trusts are designed to span multiple generations. For example, a trust may leave an...
Trust Funding: Setting Your Trustee Up for Success
A revocable living trust can serve as a valuable estate planning tool to help ensure that your finances remain well managed if you become incapacitated (unable to manage your affairs while you are alive) and to provide future financial security for your loved ones...
3 Simple Ways to Avoid Probate Costs
The bad news: When a person dies owning property in their sole name without a beneficiary, their loved ones will have to go through a court-supervised process called probate to transfer the property out of the deceased person’s name and into the name of intended...
Help! This Probate Is Taking Forever!
After a loved one dies, their money and property that goes through probate must be distributed to the people legally entitled to it, either according to a last will and testament (also called a will) or the state’s default distribution scheme (found in its intestacy...
It’s True – Nosy Neighbor Nellie Can Find Out About Your Probate
Most people think of probate (the process of collecting, managing, and distributing a deceased person’s money and property) as a private process. However, because probate involves the court system, most filings become a matter of public record. That means your nosy...
How to Help Your Loved Ones (and Your Life Savings) Avoid Probate
Today, many people use a revocable living trust instead of a will, joint ownership, or beneficiary designation as the foundation of their estate plan. When properly prepared, a trust avoids the costly public, and often time-consuming, court processes of...
Assisting Your Clients: Planning for Conflict-Prone Families
The following provides reasons why people may contest a will or trust and what your clients can do now to attempt to avoid conflict after they have passed away. You care deeply about your clients. As an extra step, you can dig deeper and learn about your clients’...
Assisting Your Clients: Three Types of Trusts to Plan for Minor Children and Grandchildren
There are certain reasons that establishing an estate plan can be of the utmost importance. Having minor children or grandchildren is one of those reasons. Most parents do not have time to keep up with their own tasks, let alone consider what would happen if they died...
Assisting Your Clients: Do Not Let Your Clients Leave Their Loved Ones with a Sticky Mess
Ice cream is a delicate balance of fat globules, ice crystals, air bubbles, and sugar suspended in a watery base. Once the temperature climbs above freezing, the ice crystals start to melt. Air bubbles expand. Fat molecules soften. Without its frozen framework, your...