{"id":4505,"date":"2019-07-25T08:28:38","date_gmt":"2019-07-25T12:28:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.atyourbusiness.com\/blog\/?p=4505"},"modified":"2019-07-25T08:29:04","modified_gmt":"2019-07-25T12:29:04","slug":"protect-your-assets-3-ways-to-ensure-your-business-lives-on-after-your-death","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.atyourbusiness.com\/blog\/protect-your-assets-3-ways-to-ensure-your-business-lives-on-after-your-death\/","title":{"rendered":"Protect Your Assets: 3 Ways To Ensure Your Business Lives On After Your Death"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>When you built your business, you knew you were building something that would last.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Trouble is, you&#8217;re not going to live forever. And if you want your business partners and family to benefit from your business after your death, you have to plan accordingly.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Here are three tips you need to protect your assets after you&#8217;re gone.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">1. Plan Ahead<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>When it comes to your assets, you&#8217;re the most reliable caretaker. So if you want to protect your assets after you&#8217;re gone, the best thing you can do is plan ahead.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>At the most basic level, you need to approach probate with <a href=\"https:\/\/www.forbes.com\/sites\/steveparrish\/2015\/05\/04\/five-ways-business-owners-can-avoid-probate-problems\/#26c4b5d22630\">two fundamental strategies<\/a>:&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ol><li>Keep any assets that don&#8217;t need to be in probate from landing in probate in the first place<\/li><li>For those assets that must pass through probate, structure everything ahead of time<\/li><\/ol>\n\n\n\n<p>Some assets are <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thebalance.com\/what-are-probate-assets-an-overview-3505271\">subject to probate<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thebalance.com\/what-are-non-probate-assets-3505237\">some are not<\/a>. Assets subject to probate don&#8217;t necessarily need to pass through probate, but they have to be passed on the right way if you want to avoid it. Even if you do estate planning, these assets will go through probate if you try to pass them on incorrectly.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>For example, all of the following cannot be included in a will:&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul><li>Joint tenancy property<\/li><li>Property and assets in a living trust<\/li><li>Life insurance proceeds that have a beneficiary<\/li><li>Proceeds from a payable-on-death bank account<\/li><li>Stocks and bonds held in beneficiary<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>All of these assets can be passed on independent of a will since they abide by their own rules.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>A probate attorney can help sort this out. Check out the attorneys at <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dicksonlegal.com\/seattle\/probate-law-attorneys\/\">https:\/\/www.dicksonlegal.com\/seattle\/probate-law-attorneys\/<\/a>.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">2. Use Joint Ownership and Joint Tenancy<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>So, if you can take advantage of these shortcuts, use them.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>For example, one way to get around this with business property is through <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thebalance.com\/understanding-joint-ownership-of-property-3505235\">joint ownership with rights of survivorship<\/a>. Basically, when one owner dies, the surviving owner will continue to own the asset, regardless of the estate or heirs at law of the deceased.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Keep in mind that if you want to pass your business to your family this way, you have to name a family member or one of your heirs as a joint owner. Otherwise, it won&#8217;t matter if they&#8217;re named as one of your heirs.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Similarly, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.investopedia.com\/terms\/j\/joint-tenancy.asp\">joint tenancy<\/a>&nbsp;is when two or more people own a property with equal rights and obligations. When one owner dies, the remaining owners continue to own the property.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">3. Add Beneficiaries or Convert Accounts<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Another way to ensure that your business assets pass to your family is to name beneficiaries when possible and convert accounts that can be converted. This is especially useful if you want to distribute your assets unevenly.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Let&#8217;s say, for example, that you own a business worth $2 million and you own $2 million in assets outside of your business. Let&#8217;s also imagine that you have an estate plan that leaves the business to your daughter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This is fine&nbsp;\u2013 except for the part where you have two sons (she&#8217;ll get 50%, they&#8217;ll get 25% each).&nbsp;You can get around unequal distribution (and save future awkwardness) with a life insurance policy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Take out a life insurance policy worth $2 million and make your two sons beneficiaries. You can then leave your $2 million business to your daughter and split the $2 million life insurance and $2 million non-business assets between your sons.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Everyone gets an equal share, but you still get to distribute your assets as you like.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Keep in mind that, unless you specifically say otherwise, many states will split your total assets between your spouse and all of your children (spouse gets 50%, children split 50% equally between them).&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Need to Protect Your Assets?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>If you need to protect your assets, it&#8217;s time to get in touch with a great attorney and learn your way around probate law.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Looking for more great legal tips? Check out our blog for more useful posts like this one.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>When you built your business, you knew you were building something that would last.&nbsp; Trouble is, you&#8217;re not going to live forever. And if you want your business partners and family to benefit from your business after your death, you have to plan accordingly.&nbsp; Here are three tips you need to protect your assets after [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.atyourbusiness.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4505"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.atyourbusiness.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.atyourbusiness.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.atyourbusiness.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.atyourbusiness.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4505"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.atyourbusiness.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4505\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4507,"href":"https:\/\/www.atyourbusiness.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4505\/revisions\/4507"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.atyourbusiness.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4505"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.atyourbusiness.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4505"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.atyourbusiness.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4505"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}