Central Coast Probate

Attorney David R. Duringer has filed a 92-page federal complaint (Duringer v Morro Bay) in US District Court, Central District of California, against the City of Morro Bay and several other defendants, for violation of his civil rights under the US Constitution,...

The Fifth Circuit on December 26 vacated its December 23 stay of a Texas federal judge's injunction against Corporate Transparency Act (CTA). Although the merits panel still has the matter set for expedited appeal to the next available oral arguments panel, vacation...

Earlier this month, a Texas federal judge issued a nationwide injunction against the heinous and unconstitutional Corporate Transparency Act (CTA), which required burdensome reporting for many types of entities, even non-business entities created f0r family estate...

As my practice matures and I take on more high-net-worth clients, it's amazing how poor the estate planning is among some of these families. Sometimes, there is no planning at all! In other cases, there is very simple cookie-cutter planning, which is always bad...

Yesterday Trump announced he will sign full national concealed carry (CCW) reciprocity, meaning you will be allowed to carry in any state as you travel. The bill has been pending in congress for some time, so it will likely be enacted quickly. Just in time, as Gov....

My classmate Kamala Harris claimed back in 2007 as San Francisco District Attorney that the police are able to randomly search homes to check for compliance with San Francisco's gun storage law. That law served as a model for similar laws later passed by many...

The IRS has released Revenue Procedure 2024-40, which specifies annual inflation adjustments for tax year 2025. Some highlights: Gift, estate and generation-skipping transfer tax exemption amounts: $13.99 million (up from $13.61 million) Annual gift tax exclusion (IRC...

Charitable Remainder Trust (CRT) planning can be quite complex, and the expenses involved usually are justified only with a very large gift to charity, well north of a million. Practically speaking most of this planning is tax-driven and must be to make it feasible,...

There seems to be a misconception among some California estate planning attorneys that BDOT planning (BDOT stands for Beneficiary Deemed Owner Trust; also called a 678 trust, named after IRC §678) is inconsistent with, and should never be used with, a trust designed...

At the beginning of this year, the California Uniform Directed Trust Act (CUDTA) went into effect, codified in Probate Code §§ 16600-16632. It was a long time coming, having been first proposed back in 2010 by our state bar's trust and estate section. When it went...

Six years ago I posted this article proposing use of an advanced planning technique known as the Health and Education Exclusion Trust (HEET) to leave a dynastic legacy of firearm training. Such a trust might be called a Gun HEET. The Fall of the Republic and...

[Central Coast residents: You can safely ignore this article because we are here to help you with comprehensive planning.] Most of our local clients prefer to have the first meeting in person at our office in Morro Bay. After that initial meeting, many of these local...

Under Private Letter Ruling 202428003, the IRS has allowed late filing of a Qualified Subchapter S Trust (QSST) election, to obtain relief from termination of S corporation status. The corporation represented that the termination was inadvertent and not for tax...

The CRPA on September 19, 2024, petitioned for en banc review of the Ninth Circuit panel's decision regarding preliminary injunctive relief in May v Bonta (written by Judge Graber aka Grabber) oppressively curtailing the right to bear arms in California. En banc...

A distribution from a limited liability company (LLC) is a payment of cash or property made by an LLC to the LLC’s owners, also known as members. Although state law sets forth certain default rules, LLC members can specify in the LLC’s operating agreement when and how...

The Ninth Circuit panel in the May and Carralero ("May v Bonta") sensitive places cases yesterday issued its opinion, written by Judge Graber (i promise to refrain from adding another b to her name), which, if not soon corrected by en banc ruling (either on motion, or...

[UPDATE: Gov. Noisome signed AB 262 into law on 9/22/24.] AB 262 is an innocuous sounding bill providing for the study of safety regulations relating to children's camps. Yet given California's recent history of attacking gun culture, we can expect this bill to result...