Many clients are shocked to find out that the life insurance policies they own at death are includable in their estate when determining whether a Federal or Massachusetts estate tax return must be filed. In Massachusetts, an estate tax return is required to be filed when an individual passes away owning over $1,000,000 in assets. If that individual owns one or two life insurance policies on their life, and a piece of real estate, it does not take much else to meet the Massach

When clients come to Lake Shore Legal seeking an estate plan, their goals are routinely to ensure that the assets they own pass to the correct recipients upon death. One of the more common and popular methods to ensure that clients’ wishes and goals are achieved is to place assets into trust. Once the asset is in a trust, the asset is considered to be owned by the trust and governed by the trust instrument. The trust instrument directs how the asset is to be treated and ultim