The National Elder Law Foundation has been reaccredited as a certifying organization for elder law for a period of five years beginning on January 26, 2020. “Accreditation of the National Elder Law Foundation as a Certifying Organization for Elder Law; No. 188 Disciplinary Rules Doc.” (11/14/2019), 49 Pa.B. 7083 (11/30/2019).
The Internal Revenue Service has published final regulations on the changes to the federal estate and gift tax basic exclusion amount (BEA), which doubled from $5 million to $10 million in 2018, but will return to $5 million in 2026. “Estate and Gift Taxes; Differences in the Basic Exclusion Amount,” TD 9884, 84 F.R. 64995 (11/26/2019), Doc. No. 2019-25601.
The final regulations appear to be effectively the same as the proposed regulations, and my comments on the proposed regulations can be found in “Proposed Regulations on Exclusion Amount Changes.” (The Internal Revenue Service did not adopt my alternative approach, which is explained in my “Comments on Proposed Regulations on Exclusion Amount Changes,” and the reasons that my comments were rejected are explained in part 8 of the preamble to the final regulations.)
A change of beneficiary for death benefits under the State Employees’ Retirement System (SERS) was not effective until received, and so ineffective when the employee died after mailing the change of beneficiary and before it was received by SERS. Estate of Lynn D. Wilson v. SERS, 219 A.3d 1141, 21 WAP 2018 (Pa. 11/20/2019).
The new amendments to the Orphans’ Court Rules (“Order Amending Rules 1.7, 1.8, 2.1, 2.5, 2.7, 3.5, 3.7, 4.3, 4.6, 5.1, 5.3, 5.4, 7.1, 10.1, 10.5, and the Index of the Appendix of the Pennsylvania Orphans’ Court Rules, and Rescinding…
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Father forfeited his intestate share of child’s estate by failing to provide any financial support and deserting the child by failing to visit the child or perform any parental duties in the six years before the child’s death. Thaddeus Lee Estate, 9 Fid.Rep.3d 311 (Monroe O.C. 2019).
In action against agent, former beneficiary of retirement account had standing to object to change of beneficiary designation by agent. Because the action was against the agent individually, and not the decedent’s estate, the Dead Man’s Rule will not apply. Objections based on statutes of limitations were dismissed, and the jurisdiction of the court was not pre-empted by ERISA. Winfield Scott Lasser Estate, 9 Fid.Rep.3d 305 (Chester O.C. 2019).
The court approved the agreement of sale of real estate that was signed by only one of the co-trustees and opposed by the other co-trustee, finding that the sale was in the best interests of the trust. Frances Nowicki Estate, 9 Fid.Rep.3d 297 (Bucks O.C. 2019), on appeal, 2184 EDA 2019 (Pa. Super.)
In finding that the testator was “quite lucid” at the time the will was signed and was not suffering from weakened intellect, the Orphans’ Court applied the wrong standard because undue influence is generally a gradual process and the fruits of the influence may not appear until long after the weakened intellect has been played upon. Applying the correct standard to the evidence, the Superior Court found that the testator was suffering from a weakened intellect and that there was a presumption that the will was the product of undue influence. The trial court also erred in failing to qualify a registered nurse as an expert witness on the issues of testamentary capacity and weakened intellect, but that error was not reversible error because the contestants were not prejudiced. Estate of: Stella Fabian, 2019 PA Super 334 (11/7/2019), rev’g, 9 Fid.Rep.3d 1 (Carbon O.C. 2018).
For some reason, the web addresses (also known as “uniform resource locators” or “URLs”) of the on-line versions of the Pa. Bulletin and the Pa. Code (regulations) have changed. The Pa. Bulletin had been “pabulletin.com” and the Pa. Code had been “pacode.com”, but they are now both found at “pacodeandbulletin.gov”.
Evans Estate Law Resources has always worked to provide links to original source materials, so that practitioners can check original sources and be assured of seeing authentic materials. This kind of change in URLs is therefore of concern because it “breaks” all of the links constructed over the years.
The links to the Pa. Bulletin still seem to work, so there is currently some kind of redirection in place, but it’s not known how long they will work, and so efforts will be made to update the links.
The old links to the Pa. Code do not seem to work, so priority will be given to updating those links first.
Our apologies for any inconvenience that may result from this transition.
The Internal Revenue Service has published proposed regulations that include new life expectancy tables for minimum required distributions under I.R.C. § 401(a)(9), which applies to both qualified retirement plans and individual retirement accounts. “Updated Life Expectancy and Distribution Period Tables Used for Purposes of Determining Minimum Required Distributions,” REG-132210-18, 84 F.R. 60812 (11/8/2019).
The proposed new tables generally provide for longer life expectancies, which means that smaller distributions can be made. For example, a 70- year old IRA owner who uses the Uniform Lifetime Table to calculate required minimum distributions must use a life expectancy of 27.4 years under the existing regulations. Using the Uniform Lifetime Table in the proposed regulations, the IRA owner would use a life expectancy of 29.1 years to calculate required minimum distributions. So the required distribution would be calculated by dividing by 29.1 (3.436% of the retirement fund) instead of 27.4 (3.650%), which is a reduction of about 5.85%.
As another example, a 75-year old surviving spouse who is the employee’s sole beneficiary and uses the Single Life Table to compute required minimum distributions must use a life expectancy of 13.4 years under current regulations. Under the proposed regulations, the spouse would use a life expectancy of 14.8 years, which will allow a distribution which is about 9.5% smaller.
The Required Minimum Distribution calculator in Webcalculators has already been updated to include the new life expectancy tables as an option for projecting future distributions. Although the calculator does not show a side-by-side comparison between distributions under the current and proposed regulations, it is fairly easy to generate two reports under the two different regulations and see the differences in the two reports.