What Experience Do You Have Helping Clients With Asset Protection Planning?

Having practiced for over 9 years in northeast Ohio, time and time again we’ve experienced clients who are simply not aware of the techniques or guidelines of protecting their assets. We’ve helped those clients with asset protection, managing probate, or even avoiding probate altogether. So our office is very experienced doing a wide variety of family planning, asset protection planning, and probate planning.

Why Is This Important For People To Know About?

We work hard for our money. It’s important to protect our assets and our money we’ve worked hard to earn, but it doesn’t have to be hard. It’s easy, it’s affordable, and it’s important. We don’t want to see our clients lose any of that, so we’re here to help them learn how to protect their assets, how to avoid probate, and to meet their family planning needs and goals.

What Is Asset Protection Planning?

Creditors will seek to claim your assets and property through your estate or probate. There are a variety of different strategies and techniques intended to protect your assets and protect your property from those creditors. Asset protection planning is finding which strategies and techniques fit your personal situation, and using them to protect your assets and protect your property.

What Are The Threats To Your Assets During Life And After Death?

It’s not just death that exposes your assets to risk. You, and anyone, can be sued at any point in time, by anyone, for just about anything. Divorce can happen. Emergency can strike, life-changing events occur. Bankruptcy. Any number of things can happen suddenly in our lifetime and threaten our assets. And after our life we have probate court, through which our assets are subject to creditors.

What Should Be The Goals Of Proper Asset Protection Planning?

Our goal in asset protection planning is to protect your assets during and after your lifetime, so that your assets can be passed to your loved ones. We want to make sure your assets are preserved and protected from potential lawsuits, bankruptcies, divorce, or other life-changing events during your lifetime, and to protect your assets from creditors after you pass. It’s important to transfer your assets to loved ones so that creditors can’t go after your property, and can’t go after your loved ones for those assets.

What Assets Need Protecting?

I believe you need to protect all your assets. Whether it’s your house, your car, your personal effects, just about any and every type of property is subject to creditors. Protecting every single one of your assets is extremely important.

What Assets Are Exempt From Creditors In Ohio?

Each and every state has their own laws regarding creditors’ rights and responsibilities.

Creditor rights and responsibilities In Ohio are governed by the Ohio Code 2329.66. These laws are, of course, always subject to change. Laws change all he time, but as of right now, the types of assets protected from creditors include life insurance policies and annuities, the proceeds from annuity contracts. Life insurance policies are protected as long as the beneficiaries are the owners, the spouse, or the children. Your residence, to a certain extent, can also be exempt if it’s your homestead.

Certain retirement accounts may be also exempt from creditors, qualified retirement plans, IRAs, Roth IRAs, things like that. You have to be careful with retirement assets though. When they’re sitting in that retirement account, they should be protected, but once they start paying out, you have to be very careful as it might be subject to creditors.

Also partnership interests in Ohio, as creditors usually don’t have any rights against a partner’s interests in a partnership. There are special laws regarding the partnership interests for creditors.

And like I said, this is always subject to change. But as of right now, as a general rule, there are some assets that may be protected from creditors.

For more information on Asset Protection Planning In Ohio, an initial consultation is your next best step. Get the information and legal answers you are seeking by calling (330) 222-3898 today.