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Articles
Easy Ways to Turn Common Insurance Mistakes Into Tax-Free Wealth
It’s frustrating. Year after year, our office is asked to give a second opinion on the completed estate plans of owners of family businesses.
Rising Interest Rates Could Wound Your CIs
People often say something like, "Irv, I'm very conservative." Then they tell me that they have allocated all or a large amount of extra cash in what they consider to be "conservative investments"
Enrich Your Family While You Help Others
Always remember, your succession plan—whether transferring your business to your kids or selling it to employees or some other buyer—must never stand alone.
Leveraged Gifts: A Better Way to Beat the Tax Man
Want to win the estate tax game? Think gifts. Leveraged gifts.
What Should You Do If Your Child Is a Stockholder... and the Divorce Devil Is (Or Might Be) Calling?
Do any of your kids own stock in your family business? Or are you thinking of transferring stock to your kids? If the answer is ‘Yes’ to either question, read this article closely.
Payroll Taxes Go Up, Up… Again
If you make money by the sweat of your brow, I have news for you. Bad news. Social Security taxes have been and will continue to be an outrageous and costly burden.
Some Tax Points Most People Don't Know, But Knowing Might Save Your Day
IRS to crack down on offshore credit card fraud. S Corporation must treat working shareholders as employees. Corporate officer held personally responsible for payroll taxes.
Estate Planning vs. Wealth Transfer: Which Is Better For You and Your Family?
Have you finished your estate plan? Are you working on your estate plan? If so, this article is must reading. From a tax standpoint, a traditional well-done estate plan reduces your family’s estate tax burden at your death.
Why Your Corporation Should Never Own Your Life Insurance… And How the Right Ownership Enriches Your Family
It is rare indeed that we look over the life insurance program of a business-owner client without finding a potentially expensive tax blunder -- sometimes the income tax, sometimes the estate tax. Usually both.
Questions, Questions, Questions... Answers, Answers, Answers
Recently, I gave two seminars titled, “Tax Secrets of the Wealthy.” One in Las Vegas to a large audience of active business owners (all members of a national trade association). The second in the clubhouse of my condo-home complex in Naples, Florida (four miles north of Marco Island).
The Power of Two: A Tax Hercules
Regular readers of this column know that a common thread for many of the articles center around a specific theme: Tax Secrets of the Wealthy.
Solving a Tough Business Succession Problem: How to Treat the Non-Business Kids Fairly
An Easy Way to Increase Your Retirement Income
This is one of those articles that only fits a specific, but very important group of people. If it fits you, you’ll be delighted. If it doesn’t, please find one or more people who can use it. They’ll thank you forever.
Goodbye Old Friend: The Split-Dollar Life Insurance Show Is Over
Over the years my office -- with me leading the parade -- helped structure hundreds of split-dollar life insurance plans (Split-$ Plans). Wow!… What a great wealth-building strategy. But say “Goodbye.”
How to Eliminate the Estate Tax: Join Irv's Crusade
Transferring the wealth—it took you a lifetime to accumulate—is one of the most complicated and perplexing problems you must solve. Why?… The estate tax monster.
Taxpayer Victory Makes Tax-Free Life Insurance Strategy Even Better
Let’s set the stage (with a true story) for a must-do tax-saving strategy.
Sorry, But 90% Of All Estate Plans Enrich The IRS, Instead Of Your Family
While scanning the pages of one of the trade journals that carries this tax column, a headline for an ad intrigued me:
Experience Has Taught Us the Best Way to Attact and Keep Great People
Our typical consulting assignment is to put together a wealth transfer plan for a successful business owner.
Hey Kids, “Someday It'll All Be Yours”
“The inheritance boom is quietly reshaping how we think about death.” How true.
Your Old Life Insurance Policy May Be Worth More Than You Think
We are about to delve into “Senior Settlements” (SenSet).
How to Keep Your Wealth In the Family Instead of Losing It to the IRS
Most successful business owners spend a lifetime accumulating wealth…. But when they die (or their surviving spouse dies, if married), they lose half or more of their wealth — by law — to the IRS.
Sorry, But 90% Of All Estate Plans Enrich the IRS, Instead of Your Family
Whether you call it estate planning, lifetime planning, wealth transfer planning or whatever, your master plan must include three separate plans.
Experience Has Taught Us the Best Way to Attract And Keep Great People
“How do I keep my top executives?“ And “How do I attract new quality people?”
Many Business Owners Spend a Lifetime Accumulating Wealth For Their Families, Yet Lose It to the IRS… Why?
The tax law frustrates successful business owners at every turn.
Did Your Lawyer (Inavertently) Rip You Off?
“It never occurred to me that so many estate planning experts could be so dead wrong. Or that there is a better way to transfer my business to the kids and deal with my other assets.
How To Turn Your Hidden Asset Into Cash…Quickly, Easily and Legally
What is your “hidden asset”?… Simply, it is your unused insurance capacity.
At Last, An Easy Way to Make a 16.36% Average Annual Rate of Return…Without Risk
Chances are you have never heard of this investment. What is the investment?… senior settlements (SS)… Also called Transferable Insurance Policy or TIP(s).
How To Turn a Tax Tragedy Into a Wealth-Building Miracle
This is one of those bad-news, good-news tax stories.
How “The Retirement Plan Rescue” Saves You a Ton of Taxes, Yet Creates Tax-Free Wealth
Raise your hand if you have a “substantial amount” in a qualified retirement plan (typically an IRA 401(k), profit-sharing plan or the like).
Thank You Readers—“TIPs” Topped ‘Em All…Held #1 Position On Google
Yes, we are talking about an investment, which is called “life settlements” (more often called “senior settlements,” SS for short). A TIP is a fractional interest in an SS. An example is the easiest way to understand this simple investment.
A Successful Business Owner's Dilemma: How to Invest Your Accumulated Cash Profits
“I know how to make money in my business… but when it comes to making money with my investment money, either I don’t have time to watch it, don’t know how to watch it or rely on my investment advisor. When the market is up, my advisors do fine… when it’s down they do lousy.”
How To Get Rich… Or If Rich, How To Get Richer
“Do you know the Rule of 72 and how it works?”
Sick Of Paying Tax?… Call the Tax Doctor For A Second Opinion
Joe called me. He wanted a second tax opinion for a business transfer plan and an estate plan put in place by Joe almost two years ago. Wow, this patient was really sick (running a high tax fever, lots of tax dollars). This is the story of the symptoms, the diagnosis, and the “magic-tax potions” that cured the patient.
A Well-Guarded Secret Revealed: How To Make A 16.28% Average Rate Of Return Per Year… Without Risk
Is there an investment that can match the potential high returns of successful stock market investors, yet has the prime characteristic (no-risk) of traditional safe investments?… Yes!
Vanilla Estate Planning...Boring; But Throwing a Tax-Saving, Wealth-Building Party With the "Magnificent Seven”… Exciting
What are the M7?… Actually seven separate strategies designed to answer the questions and at the same time to save huge amounts of estate tax or create huge amounts of wealth (usually tax-free).
Big Valuation Victories For the Good Guys
First, a simple question: How much would you pay for property worth $100,000, if you must spend $30,000 to fix it (commissions, special taxes or whatever) before or after selling it?… Certainly not more than $70,000… Or less, if you want to make a profit.
The Client Called It “Tax Magic”
Do you have a large amount of retained earnings and excess cash in your Corporation, but the double taxing power of the law has your cash locked in the corporation? Most business owners think they are stuck, but there’s an easy way out.
Want To Get Real Estate Out of Your Corporation… Tax Free?
“How can I get real estate out of my corporation without being taxed to death?”
Yes, It's Okay To Beat Up the IRS…Legally
Need help getting started on your own beat-up-the-IRS-legally plan?
Why Your Estate Plan Often Flunks the Real-Life Test
Now, there’s a game you don’t want to play with your estate plan. Try this real-life tax horror story.
Think Fast, What's Your Business Worth?
What is the most valuable asset you own? Hands down, almost every business owner answers, “My business.” Good! Next question.
Website Saves the Day and a Ton of Taxes Too
Readers of this column must love my website (www.estatetaxsecrets.com)… because so many of you visit it. It’s really a learn-more extension of this column.
Diagnose, Then Cure the Estate Tax Disease
A dreaded disease is spreading like wildfire—in all 50 of the United States.
Destination: Conquer the Estate Tax... Legally
“Irv, can you help me avoid (or beat/or kill/or finesse/and many more variations) the estate tax?”
How You Can Enrich Your Family and Charity Too
You’ll like what you are about to read: How to actually make money while giving it away.
The Tax Knight and His Merry Men Rescue a Distressed Taxpayer
...you should hear Joe howl about the cost of funding (annual insurance premiums) his irrevocable life insurance trust (ILIT).
A Smart Way To Transfer Your Business
Here’s the general rule: When you or any member of your family sells stock back to your corporation (called a redemption), the redemption is usually taxed as a dividend…a tax disaster.
My Annual Report On the Wealth Transfer Plan Test: The News Is Better
“If you use the right tax tools and techniques together with the right professionals (lawyer, insurance consultant, and CPA), you can and will develop a plan to beat the IRS. Every time. And legally.
The Best Tax-Free Investment For the Truly Conservative Investor
Every conservative investor tells me, “I don’t want to risk losing my investment.” Fine. A worthy goal. But here’s the problem.
Value Your Business To Protect Your Family From The IRS
Do you know how to make a grown man cry? Tell him his business has been destroyed by fire, flood or God.
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