Meissner Joseph Ruggles, Inc. Legal Blog

The short answer to the question of whether your estate planning binder needs to be in your “go bag” is - probably it does, especially if it contains the original signed documents.  We are in fire season here in California and the east coast is being pelted by...

Have you ever received or given a “loan” from or to a family member with the expectation that it would be paid back with interest and a promissory note was signed for the funds?  Not likely.  A new Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals case – Estate of Bolles (9th Cir. 2024)...

There are two statements I hear over and over again as a Trusts and Estates attorney. First: I don’t have any money so I don’t need an estate plan.  Second: My estate plan is super easy, everything goes to my spouse and then to my kids.  Hopefully, this blog will be...

Due to the prevalence of DNA matching on genealogy websites, it will become more and more common to discover formerly unknown relatives.  I had a recent matter where a child contacted someone that showed up as a half-sibling on a popular genealogy website.  After some...

The issue of in-laws comes up quite often when I advise clients about estate planning.  Most of the time it is a discussion that a client does not want their son-in-law or daughter-in-law to receive anything from their trust. And sometimes it is a client wanting to...

I recently met with a client who needed to establish a conservatorship for their child.  The child was diagnosed with a mental illness before turning 18 years old.  I told my client that I needed to do a little research because I was not sure if we had to file for a...

It’s my birthday month, obviously September is one of the best months, for that reason, but it also, growing up on the east coast, was the start of a new school year and the change of the seasons.  The weather got colder, leaves started to fall and sweaters were...

It can be frustrating to a Conservator when they attempt to marshal an asset held by a financial institution in another state and that institution does not recognize their California Letters of Conservatorship.  I had this happen recently when my client tried to have...

I recently was contacted by a potential client asking me to set up a Miller Trust for them.  I have to admit that I did not know what they were talking about but discovered that was for good reason since California does not allow Miller Trusts otherwise known as...

I often have potential clients come to me asking for ways to protect their assets.  They are sometimes under the impression that their family trust provides a layer of protection in a way that a business or irrevocable trust protects assets, and that is just not the...