Law professor Gerry W. Beyer of Texas Tech University School of Law has written an article about pet trusts called “Pets Trusts: Fido with a Fortune?”

Dogs, cats, parrots, and other pet animals play extremely significant roles in the lives of many individuals. People own pets for a variety of reasons – they love animals, they enjoy engaging in physical activity with the animal such as playing ball or going for walks, and they enjoy the giving and receiving of attention and unconditional love. Research indicates that pet ownership positively impacts the owner’s life by lowering blood pressure, reducing stress and depression, lowering the risk of heart disease, shortening the recovery time after a hospitalization, and improving concentration and mental attitude.

The primary goal of the pet owner’s attorney is to carry out the pet owner’s intent to the fullest extent allowed under applicable law. Accordingly, the attorney should select a method which has the highest likelihood of working successfully to provide for the pet after its owner’s death. (The pet owner should also determine if any special arrangements need to be made to care for the pet if the owner becomes disabled.) After discussing the history of providing for a pet after the owner’s death, this article discusses the variety of techniques currently available and comments on the advisability of each.

Special features of this article include: sample pet trust provisions; “client-friendly” FAQs; summary of tax concerns with pet trusts; comprehensive appendix with links to all pet trust statutes (42 states plus D.C.).

CBSMoneyWatch.com:  “At first glance, the failure of Congress to plug the 2010 estate tax loophole appears to be good news for children of ailing rich parents — and of little consequence to everyone else.  But in fact, by letting the tax lapse, Congress has created a bunch of unintended consequences and increased the chances that you will owe taxes on an inheritance.  Yes, the perverse result of the disappearing estate tax is that some people of lesser means may owe capital gains taxes on inherited assets.  What’s more, since many wills and trusts are written on the assumption that the estate tax exists, a will that made sense last year (or any other year, for that matter) could result in your surviving spouse getting shut of your estate.  Here’s what you need to know about the estate tax, and how to protect yourself and your heirs, at least until Congress takes action.”

Wealth Strategies Journal:  “We plan and plan and plan yet the best laid plans go wrong! We plan for contingencies and provide for flexibility yet people can end up bewitched, snafued, flummoxed, and frustrated.  How does a train jump the carefully laid out tracks?  Here we have a few examples of such derailment including an executor's worst nightmare of personal liability for estate tax, a will that stymied a lucrative building sale (after 99 years!) and trusts that needed to be terminated by hook or by crook.”

The Trust Advisor Blog:  “Who has rights to digital property after death or incapacitation?  Why is it important to consider digital property in estate plans? . . . Recently, a great deal of attention has been given to the digital life after death – especially gaining access to a deceased person’s email accounts.  We have entered into an age where digital storage is replacing physical document storage.  In the future, more important property will be created, revised, and stored digitally.  And as more people move important components of their lives onto the computer (from photos to legal documents, medical records and beyond), it becomes necessary to devise a safe and secure method for a deceased or otherwise incapacitated person’s loved ones to access digital property.  A recent article from The Wall Street Journal suggests everyone establish a separate plan to deal with online property issues when they die or become incapacitated.

Wall St. Journal:  “Spouses of those wealthy who die this year might find themselves with nothing if the family will isn't revised—a major wrinkle that could follow Friday's repeal of the federal estate tax.  As started on Jan. 1, estate taxes will be repealed for 2010 only. That means unless Congress acts otherwise, there is no limit to the wealth that can be passed on to heirs without incurring federal estate taxes through the end of the year.  But wills have often been written on the expectation that estate taxes were a fact of life for years to come, estate planners say. As a result, wills typically direct assets not subject to the tax be passed on to children—for 2009, up to $3.5 million—with the rest directed to the spouse.”

Wall St. Journal:  “Spouses of those wealthy who die next year might find themselves with nothing if the wills aren't revised — another wrinkle of the impending repeal of the federal estate tax Friday.  Starting Jan. 1, estate taxes will be repealed for 2010 only. That means unless Congress acts otherwise, there is no limit to the wealth that can be passed on to heirs without incurring estate taxes through the end of that year.  Often, wills have been written with an expectation the estate tax structure that has been in place for years would continue, estate planners say. The wills typically direct that assets that aren't subject to estate tax be passed on to children — for 2009, up to $3.5 million — and that the rest go to the spouse.”

New York Times:  “WITH 2010 a few days away, there are several tax matters that wealthy investors need to consider next year. The two at the top of the list are whether they should convert their taxable retirement account to a tax-free Roth individual retirement account and how to deal with the uncertainty over the estate tax. . . . That leaves the wealthy with decisions to make about two of the biggest financial events of their life: retirement and death.”

erblawg:  “It’s always tragic when someone passes away before they have had the opportunity to live a long and fulfilling life. The details are still being released regarding the circumstances surrounding her death but Brittany Murphy is another young hollywood star who’s life was cut short.  Being an estate planner, when someone famous dies the first thing that comes to mind (for better or worse) is whether or not they wrote a will.  To many young people, death seems like a far off occurrence and estate planning is something that can always be put off until another day.”

Bloomberg:  “Estate planner Richard Behrendt helped his client make $5 million loans to each of his children this year, avoiding gift taxes of 45 percent and saving the kids as much as $837,000 apiece in interest.  Rates for so-called intra-family loans have declined as much as 53 percent since 2008.  ‘The timing of it was clearly tied to the rock bottom of these rates,' said Behrendt, who works for Robert W. Baird & Co., based in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.   The loans may be the perfect holiday gift to help relatives this year, according to Carol Kroch, head of wealth and financial planning at Wilmington, Delaware-based Wilmington Trust.  For wealthy taxpayers, they can be used for estate planning purposes, since gains earned will be free of estate and gift taxes”

New York Tiimes:  “Robin Beaulieu was telling me about her daughter’s bike accident.  It was an event that would force Beaulieu not only to confront the death of her child but also to embrace a new way of dying.  We were sitting last spring in the kitchen of her small apartment in Manchester, N.H. Beaulieu took a drag on a Marlboro, poured a cup of coffee and told me that her daughter, Amanda Panzini, had been a rambunctious, bighearted teenager.  She loved animals, even ;flea-ridden, mangy dogs,' Beaulieu said, and was a fiercely loyal friend.  When confronted by the possibility of donating her brain-injured daughter’s organs after the accident, Beaulieu never doubted that Amanda would have wanted them to go to someone who needed them . But Amanda first had to be declared dead, and in her case, the only way that could happen was if her parents chose a precisely choreographed death — one conducted by medical personnel in a hospital procedure meant to allow Amanda to die while preserving her organs.  From this, the doctors and Beaulieu hoped, would come new life.”

The Denton Record Chronicle has an article today on a subject that I stress with my estate planning clients.  The article is called “Estate plans remove the guessing after you're gone.”  I urge my clients to make an inventory in their estate planning portfolio that describes the nature and location of all of their valuable assets and to tell their family where to find the portfolio if something were to happen to them.  Many, many times people contact me and ask how they can determine what property a parent owned and who was supposed to inherit the property.  People who do not create a plan that identifies assets and that is given to their heirs risk that the heirs may never know of the property and may not inherit it.