Monday, September 12, 2016

Planning for Your Family

By: Laurie Valentine

Planning for how to provide for your family at your death should be a key objective of estate planning and it is good stewardship. The costs of probating and distributing your estate and the amount of death taxes due may be greater if you have not planned well, which means less to pass to your beneficiaries.

For those with children under age 18, thought needs to be given to whom you want appointed as guardian for your children if both parents died before all are 18 or older. The court-appointed guardian will make all the decisions you as a parent would be making for your children until each reaches age 18. You can include a provision in your Will designating who you want appointed as guardian.

A decision also needs to be made as to whether the share you want to leave to a family member will be given to them outright or whether their share should be managed by someone else, either until they get to an older age or perhaps for the rest of their life if they are incapacitated or just not good money managers.

Including a trust provision in your Will allows you to empower another person to manage the share of a family member beneficiary. Usually the trustee is permitted to use the trust income for the beneficiary and may also be authorized to use trust principal for the beneficiary’s health, education and other needs.

Heed Paul’s admonition in 1 Timothy 5:8 and “….provide for [your] relatives, and especially for the members of [your] household…” 

Laurie Valentine is COO and Trust Counsel for the Kentucky Baptist Foundation, PO Box 436389, Louisville, KY 40253; (502) 489-3533 or 1-866-489-3533 (Toll-free, Kentucky Only); KYBaptistFoundation.org

The information in this article is provided as general information and is not intended as legal or tax advice. For advice and assistance in specific cases, you should seek the advice of an attorney or other professional adviser.

Tuesday, September 6, 2016

Educate and Encourage

By: Richard Carnes 

As the development agency for Kentucky Baptist churches, the Kentucky Baptist Foundation (KBF) helps educate a church’s staff and lay leadership on effective ways to implement intentional legacy planning programs for church members. It is imperative that churches educate and encourage their members to see their financial stewardship more broadly than just the donation they place into the offering plate. This stewardship training extends to planning the utilization of all the financial resources entrusted to church members for the benefit of their family, their church, and Kingdom causes.

Church leaders can make great strides in impacting the financial well-being of church member’s families and the well-being of the church’s ministries by scheduling teaching opportunities for their church members on how to become “Kingdom -minded” stewards. The great news for church leaders is they are not alone in providing this type of Christian estate stewardship training for their members. The KBF helps facilitate this training of church members to become more “Kingdom-minded” by conducting educational seminars on financial and estate planning topics at your church. This educational resource is provided by the KBF at no cost to Kentucky Baptist churches.

Some examples of frequently requested seminars are:

Estate Planning Mistakes and Solutions - Discover what the ten biggest estate planning mistakes are and how to avoid them to assure you manage your finances wisely.

Who Will Be In Charge If …? – Explores incapacity planning tools – powers of attorney, health care advanced directives, Living Trusts and what happens if no prior planning has been done.

Ways To Make Gifts To Your Church – Estate stewardship giving ideas to encourage church members to take stewardship to a deeper level – what to give, how to give, and why we as Christians should give.

As your church begins to plan its Fall series of education and training for Wednesday evenings, Sunday evenings or the Sunday morning Sunday School hour, please consider inviting KBF staff to conduct a seminar session at your church. To learn more, please contact the KBF’s trust counsel, Laurie Valentine, or me at our toll-free number (866) 489-3533 for the KBF’s full list of legacy planning seminar topics and to schedule a seminar date.

Richard Carnes is president of the Kentucky Baptist Foundation, PO Box 436389, Louisville, KY 40253; toll-free (866) 489-3533; KYBaptistFoundation.org