Trusts & Estates

This course revolves around the gratuitous transfer of wealth, beginning with underlying philosophical tensions and broad societal concerns, and then focusing on “who gets it when you go,” including the legal requirements for wills, revocable trusts and other will substitutes, and what happens in the absence of such a document.  Also considered are statutory protections for a decedent’s surviving family members and an array of other related topics, such as powers of appointment, incapacity planning, charitable giving, asset-protection planning, tax planning, and fiduciary responsibility.  Local stories are used to illustrate the impact of trust and estate laws on the lives of real people.