New Jersey Estate Planning & Elder Law Blog : New Jersey Estate Planning Lawyer & Attorney : Deirdre Wheatley-Liss : Fein Such Kahn & Shepard Law Firm : Elder Law, Tax Planning

First, we're trying something new here and have created a video overview the 2011-2012 Tax Sale on Gift Taxes, Estate Taxes, and Generation Skipping Taxes.  For wealthy individuals this is an unprecedented opportunity to transfer that wealth to other generations at little or no tax costs.  

While our video aims to educate you about why these tax law changes can have a real dollar impact on a family, take a quick look at the tax law changes:

In short, you can make a tax free gift of 5 times more assets in 2011-2012 than you could in 2009, or will be able to in 2013.  This is truly a limited opportunity for people to cut Uncle Sam out of their estate plan.

Is video a good medium to discuss these topics?  Does the PowerPoint add or take away from the information?  Does video make tax law more accessible?  Feedback is appreciated!

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I wouldn’t have taken bets on it, but Washington has hammered out how our federal tax laws are going to look for the next 2 years. On the plus side, we know what taxes are going to look like in January 2011, which is a far better place to be than Monday of last week. On the downside, this does not represent thoughtful tax reform – instead, it is knee-jerk politicking with the intent to dump the tax issues in the voters' laps at the next election so no politician is "responsible" for having taxes go up.

The cost of this package? $858,000,000,000.00 added to the federal deficit- yeah, that's a big number. Oh, and "added to the federal deficit” really just means that we spent $858,000,000,000.00 that we don't have. What I'd like to see happen in the new year – an actual bi-partisan examination of how tax policy affects the economy, and a roadmap to create a balance between the amount that we are spending, and the amount of revenue being generated.

To get back to the new law, the Tax Relief, Unemployment Insurance Reauthorization, and Job Creation Act of 2010 ("TRA") extends many tax cuts that were going to expire on December 31, 2010, as well as throws in some new tax laws. Some highlights:

• The maximum federal income tax rate will remain at 35%. New Jersey income taxes are an additional maximum 8.97%
• Married couples will continue to benefit from the 200% standard deduction
• High income taxpayers will not be subject to phase-out of itemized deductions and personal exemptions for high-income taxpayers
• Most key - "Patch" of alternative minimum tax exemption to keep rate with inflation (this is a law they should really make permanent)
• Capital gains and dividends will continue to be taxed at 15%. New Jersey income taxes are an additional maximum 8.97%
• The federal estate tax returns with a portable exemption of $5 million per person and a maximum tax rate of 35% (more to follow). New Jersey’s exemption rate continues to be $675,000 per person and is not portable.
• The greatest opportunity is created in the increase of the gift tax exemption and generation skipping tax exemption to $5 million per person at a 35% maximum rate. New Jersey does not have a gift tax.
• Extension of unemployment benefits for 13 months
• Employees will benefit from a 2% reduction in Social Security withholding
• Business owners can depreciate 100% of new business assets placed in service before January 1, 2012

My thanks to Sobel & Co for their excellent TRA summary, which I used as a resource.

 

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The new estate tax legislation proposed by Sen. Reid (D. NV) contains some pleasant surprises for wealthier Individuals.

First, as expected, it proposes to raise the estate tax exemption amount to $5 million per person with a maximum 35% estate tax rate for the next 2 years.

Additionally, the proposed legislation is retroactive to January 1, 2010, so that the estates of people who died in 2010 can select the new 2011 law, or the basis allocation law that has been in place during this year.

Most unexpected,the new law also proposes a 2 -year window where there is a $5 million gift tax exemption per person, with a gift tax rate of 35%. There would similarly be a $5 million Generation Skipping Tax exemption.This could give individuals a huge planning opportunity to transfer assets with great growth or income potential to the next-generation at little or no transfer tax cost.

And now we wait to see what happens next…

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That's right - the gift tax is on sale this year, but the opportunity is closing fast.  You have until December 31, 2010 to act on the biggest gift tax sale I have seen in my years of practice.  But what is the fine print?

• Each person has a $1 million exemption from gift tax for gifts during their lifetime in excess of the annual exclusion amounts of $13,000 per gift recipient per year. 

• In 2010 only, gifts over $1 million are taxed at 35%.  In 2009 the tax rate was 45% and its scheduled to go up to a maximum rate of 55% in 2011. 

• There is no generation skipping tax on gifts made to grandchildren (or further generations) in 2010.  This creates an opportunity to shift wealth from grandma to grand-kids and leave Uncle Sam out in the cold.

So who is this sale targeted at?  Families where the oldest generation is "set" financially and can afford to give away dollars now, their children are already independently successful and don't "need" mom and dad's money, and the family goal is to maximize the amounts distributed to future generations.

Many families are surprised at the wealth of the oldest generation - those "old fashioned" values of saving dollars, deferred gratification and not buying things you can't afford has lead to large amounts of wealth.  The one year only gift tax sale is worth a family conversation over Thanksgiving to see if planning can be done now to reach the family's goals at a much lower cost. 

Image: Salvatore Vuono / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

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 My two prior posts have been about the  federal tax impact for single individuals who die in 2010, and the federal tax impact for married individuals.  In summary the results for singles were not good, and for marrieds were worse – the "death" of the estate tax creates a capital gains "trap" for survivors.  While all this will be moot if Congress does as they have promised and create an estate tax retroactive to January 1, 2010, they haven’t acted yet, and as of January 1, this is the law.

What planning can be done in this environment?

Can you just say “whoo-hoo”; I’ll give everything to my children.  Hold on there – the federal estate tax is repealed in 2010, not the federal gift tax.  Each person still has a lifetime exemption of $1,000,000 – if you make gifts in excess of that in 2010, you will be subject to the federal gift tax at a rate of 35%.

However, the generation skipping tax (“GST tax”) is repealed in 2010.  The GST Tax essentially says that you can only leave up to $3.5 million to grandchildren without paying a separate tax of 55%.  The theory behind the GST Tax is that the government should share in the wealth at each generation.  If grandma leaves everything to granddaughter, the IRS might need to wait 75 years until tax can be collected again.  If assets go the children, the IRS might only have to wait 30 years to tax again.  So, in 2009 you could leave up to $3.5 million to grandchildren without GST tax. In 2010, you can leave everything to grandchildren without an additional tax.  For wealthy families, this could mean a huge amount passing to lineal descendants with the only tax cost(s) being capital gains (click here for an explanation of the 2010 capital gains tax trap for estates).

The estate plan you had in 2009 and will need again in 2011 won’t really make sense in 2010 unless they make the estate tax retroactive.  Do you need to go out and totally revise your plan? Not necessarily.  If you have a terminal situation however, it definitely bears looking at your current plan to make sure it addresses how to plan to minimize capital gains taxes instead of estate taxes.

Gifts to grandchildren may be a winning strategy in early 2010.  Also, for anyone who is terminally ill, a change of an estate plan to leave assets to grandchildren may be a winner as well (although if the estate plan isn’t changed, disclaimers may be able to be employed by the children to a similar effect).  And it will bear looking at the estate plan of anyone who is terminally ill.

Image: Danilo Rizzuti / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

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