Bruce Starks, CPA, CFP® – Page 45

Contingent Business Interruption versus Extra Expense Insurance

Course: Insurance Planning Lesson 6: Commercial Property and Liability Insurance Student Question: Can you please provide an example of contingent business interruption and extra expense insurance? Laura Instructor Response: Hi Laura, Good question. Here’s how contingent business interruption insurance might apply. You own a nationwide chain of jewelry stores that specialize in gold/palladium alloys. Your…

The Loss of One-Half of Marital Assets in a Spousal Application for Medicaid Long-Term Care Insurance

Good to Know Married clients could lose one-half or more of their jointly owned countable assets when a spouse applies for Medicaid Long-Term Care insurance (LTCi). Countable assets1 include cash, publicly traded investments and other assets. Today, we’ll focus on creating the awareness needed to potentially avoid the loss of countable assets. But first, let’s…

Maximum Family Benefit

Course: Insurance Planning Lesson 10: Social Security Student Question: Does the maximum family benefit apply to a husband and wife that are both fully insured if the combined total between the two exceeds the maximum family limit? If I understand correctly, the maximum family limit only applies if there are beneficiaries within the family receiving…

Crummey Powers

Course: Insurance PlanningLesson 16: The Irrevocable Life Insurance Trust Student Question: Must Crummey powers always be in effect to apply the annual gift tax exclusion in order to transfer to an Irrevocable Trust? Or is it the case that as long as it was done once, will all transfers be eligible for the annual gift…

Good to Know: Lesser Known Ways To Qualify for Medicaid Long-Term Care Insurance

Good to Know In our last blog, we identified three ways to manage the risk of long-term care expenses: Self-insurance for wealthy clients Private long-term care insurance for the middle class Medicaid for the desperately poor Today, our focus turns to a deeper understanding of Medicaid. Conventional wisdom holds that most Americans cannot qualify for…

Cash Surrender Option

Course: Insurance PlanningLesson 13: Life Insurance Policy Provisions and Conditions Student Question: Concerning the cash surrender option, is this stating that I can receive an amount of cash from my whole life policy based on premiums paid, accumulated dividends and interest earned minus any loan repayment with interest? And can I cash out at any…

CFP® Certificants in the News: CFP® Professionals, Job Satisfaction and Demographics

CFP Board Releases 2019 Survey of CFP® Professionals. CFP Board surveys its Certificants every two years. The 2019 survey canvassed 800 CFP® Professionals and addressed a number of topics, including job satisfaction and key demographic metrics. Job Satisfaction CFP Board reported a continued trend of high job satisfaction among CFP® Professionals working as financial planners.…

Liability Legal Defense Costs

Course: Insurance PlanningLesson 2: Insurance Planning Student Question: Are the defense fees in a liability case charged against the total liability that an insured carries? For example, I have a $100,000 liability policy. I have to pay $80,000 to the injured party. Legal fees on my behalf are $50,000. Am I going to be out of pocket…

4 Ways to Afford Long-Term Care Insurance

How can the average American afford Long-Term Care insurance (LTCi)? Before we answer that question, let’s refresh our memory on the strategic use of LTCi. In our previous blog, we identified the following strategies to manage long-term care costs: Self-insure If you can comfortably afford catastrophic (e.g., dementia) long-term care costs of as much as…

Unused Premium

Course: Insurance PlanningLesson 8: Gift and Estate Valuation Student Question: Could you please clarify for me what the unused premium would be in term life insurance? I don’t quite understand how you could not use the premium. Thanks. John Instructor Response: Hey John- Certainly. A lot of different terms in insurance, to be sure. Assume…