Indiana Estate Planning & Elder Law

Friends Of The Firm Friday - Watch Us Farm

Watch Us Farm is a Zionsville, Ind., nonprofit vocational training program serving adults with special needs. The farm was founded by Janice Agarwal, PT, cNDT, who also serves as executive director.

She shares, "Adults with special needs working at Watch Us Farm take pride in creating excellent quality products and textiles. We would like more people to recognize the value a job provides to adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities and the good work our community of adults is doing at Watch Us Farm.  We can’t change a person’s disability, but we can change the way other people perceive adults with special needs."

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Long-term, the team hopes to create a self-sustaining community combining jobs, housing, and social engagement for these often-forgotten adults. The nonprofit is supported by foundation, corporate, and private donations and by the sale of its products.  Donations to the farm are tax-deductible.  Watch Us Farm welcomes volunteers and partnerships with local businesses and industries to expand the jobs available to this talented group of adults.

 

These adults are so talented in fact that they recently won an international award - the 2021 Elizabeth and Richard Ashford Textile Award.  Ashford Handicrafts Ltd., based in New Zealand, is a world leader in the manufacture of quality spinning wheels, weaving looms, and textile equipment and offers an annual award to encourage and support textile artists and help them enjoy artistic freedom. Watch Us Farm uses an Ashford loom in their weaving service line and was selected to receive the award after a competitive, worldwide application process. 

The Ashford Award provides international recognition for Watch Us Farm and the design and creation of beautiful rugs, table runners, dish towels, scarves, and baby blankets by local adults with special needs, as well as Ashford equipment, wool, fiber, and yarn with a value of approximately $3600. Watch Us Farm textiles are sold at Zionsville’s Truffles & Creams Chocolatier Back to the Bricks, My Sugar Pie, and online. 

You can learn more about Watch Us Farm at https://www.watchusfarm.com/.

Facebook: Watch Us Farm

Instagram: @watch.us.farm

Phone: 317-590-6496

Friends Of The Firm Friday - CAREByChristie

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

CAREbyChristie has been in business since early 2020. The company mission, "Creating a Roadmap for Eldercare" was built by founder, Christie Freeze.

After Christie had served more than 4,000 family caregivers and witnessed the missing link to navigating that role, she realized that she loved connecting resources based on specific situations. 

That's why she offers a do-it-yourself (DIY) Roadmap, The CareGETTER System For Caregiving Success, and the 1:1 Strategy Session to adult children and family caregivers through CAREbyChristie. These services empower families to make the best decisions with their loved ones for preferred outcomes.

Christie's goal is to bridge the gap between caregiving resources and holistic health needs for family caregivers. She isn't bound geographically to help families with these challenges though she primarily serves clients in Indiana.

Learn more about CAREbyChristie at:

www.carebychristie.com

www.facebook.com/CAREbyChristie

www.instagram.com/ShareTheCARE_Show

Podcast (visit your favorite streaming service and search @ShareTheCare)

Next month, Christie will be launching a video course on her CareGETTER System For Caregiving Success. If you want to join the waitlist or get updates via email, send Christie a message at [email protected]

Business Succession Dos & Don’ts from Sports Teams

While some might think family-owned sports teams are more plagued than Boston was by the 86-year “Curse of the Bambino,” I encourage you to look past curses to investigate causes. Identify potential estate and financial planning challenges your business might face, and deal with them. You’ll have better odds your family ends up on the winning side.

 What can we learn from sports teams when it comes to passing on the family business? As it turns out, there are several good and bad examples of business succession in the sports world.

Recently, we have seen the forced sale of the Los Angeles Clippers because the owner's racist rant came to light. The Los Angeles Dodgers were recently sold in part because of the bitter and protracted divorce of its owners. Now, the owner of the New Orleans Saints is in a competency dispute with his family that could force the sale of the team.

In recent memory, both the Chicago Cubs and Miami Dolphins have been sold because the owner passed away without properly planning for how estate taxes would be paid.

Forbes has more on these situations in an article titled "Another Family Sports Team Failure, Another Lesson Learned."

The article also includes lessons to be learned from sports teams for other family businesses, which include:

• Poor planning outside of the business can cause the business to fail. This is especially true if the failure to plan for estate taxes causes the sale of the business.
• Family businesses can thrive with good planning. Both the New York Yankees and Pittsburgh Steelers have recently survived as family owned businesses after the owner passed away.
• No matter how much planning you do, bad things can still happen. The key thing is to plan well enough that the damage from any issues is contained.

Without question, one of the wisest moves you can make is to work with an experienced estate planning attorney. He or she has “been there and done that,” when it comes to the successful transfer of the business and preservation of family relationships in the process.

Reference: Forbes (February 16, 2015) "Another Family Sports Team Failure, Another Lesson Learned."

Planning to Pass on the Family Business

Building a successful business takes hard work, careful planning and significant foresight.  When a business has been able to maintain its success for a significant period of time, owners and/or executives must begin the task of succession planning. Family owned and operated businesses face particular challenges in this area. 

Building a family business is hard work. Planning for its continuation after the founder retires or passes away may actually be harder. A succession plan is something that’s very specific to each business. There are various elements that may work for one family business and not another.

Recently, the Wealth Management.com published some tips on succession planning in an article titled "Succession Planning for Family Businesses."

The tips include:

• Keep compensation for being a part of the business and any inheritance separate, making sure younger family members are invested in the business.
• Train younger family members how to run the business and teach them about financial responsibility at the same time.
• Communicate your succession plan clearly, but keep it flexible enough so it can change when circumstances change.

If you have questions about making a succession plan part of your estate planning process, talk to an experienced estate planning attorney about it.

Reference: Wealth Management.com (January 20, 2015) "Succession Planning for Family Businesses."

Passing on a Family Business? Plan Wisely to Avoid Family Drama

It's a high-stakes multi-million-dollar sibling rivalry that reads like a Hollywood movie script and is playing out in a federal courtroom in Covington. And an end to the nearly 20-year drama may be just six months away, as a judge set a trial date for early May 2015 in the case that pits brothers against sisters, who allege they were cheated out of their family's fortune.

 Sibling rivalries aren't just for school-aged children. Estates can stir up fights among family members if handled the wrong way.

In recent news, four sisters allege that their three brothers improperly cut them out of their proper inheritance.

John Griffin founded his family business, Griffin Industries, in 1943. The meat-processing company eventually grew into one of the largest privately held corporations in Kentucky. However, when Griffin passed away, his children started fighting over the company.

Recently a judge stated that the brothers breached their fiduciary duty to the sisters. Now, after nearly 20 years, a trial date is expected to be set for next January as reported by WCPO in "Family feud: Griffin Industries inheritance fight still going strong after 19 years; could end soon."

Most of the documents in this case have been filed under seal, so we do not know exactly how to asses this particular battle. Nevertheless, these types of family feuds over the business are not unusual.

Passing on a business to the next generation requires proper planning.

What is intended after the founder passes away needs to be made very clear in the founder's estate plan. Ideally, the next generation should be informed of these intentions and the estate plan to implement them.

That gives the surviving family members time to prepare to run the company and lessens the likelihood of future fights. An experienced estate planning attorney can help ensure that everything runs smoothly, preserving both the business and the family.

Reference: WCPO (November 13, 2014) "Family Feud: Griffin Industries inheritance fight still going strong after 19 years; could end soon"

Preserving The Family Business

Family businesses account for much of this country’s domestic product and are core to the American Dream. Whether it is a century-old international automobile manufacturer or a group of local dry-cleaners, family involvement in the business is a common goal. Like anything worth keeping, it takes work to preserve.

A business is not merely a thing. No, a business is a mindset, an activity and, oftentimes, even a lifestyle. It can get complicated. If your legacy is the family business, then with great responsibility comes the need for equally careful planning, preparation and dialogue.

Because every business is different, as every family is different and every individual is unique, what is right for a family business is something to be figured out and understood. That said, businesses have been coming and going for generations. Some have transferred successfully and others less so. Consequently, there are some tried and true strategies to consider when planning for your own family business succession.

Whether your objective is a sale, windup or succession, Forbes has provided a practical roadmap in a recent article titled “Six Steps For Making Your Business A Family Legacy.”

Here are the six steps by heading alone:

1. Give the family a reason to continue the family business
2. Develop a management team
3. Structure a business succession plan
4. Fund the business succession plan
5. Wealth replacement for other family members
6. Have a successful business

So what is right for you, your family and your business? I recommend reading the original article and then consulting with your team of professional advisors. Your attorney, accountant, financial planner and insurance agent will each bring a valuable and unique skill set to the table.

Reference: Forbes (February 3, 2014) “Six Steps For Making Your Business A Family Legacy”

Can Family Wealth Go On For Generations?

As for the last conspiracy theory – elite families passing their wealth from generation to generation – evidence suggests that it is the exception rather than the rule.

 If you were able to create some wealth through the family business, how do you keep it going in future generations? It seems as though very few families are able to successfully keep the wealth going strong.

Only the big family names (think “Rockefeller”) lead us to believe that family wealth is perpetual. In reality, family wealth left unchecked has a tendency to follow the laws of entropy as it devolves into chaos and greater and greater breakdown or division. This phenomenon, along with some constructive advice, is featured in a two-part Forbes article titled “How The Wealthiest Families Make And Lose Their Money.”

The article offers a solid point about the power of solidarity. The family that sticks together stays together, and so it is with the family business and the family wealth. As a whole, the family assets get a single voice, a larger capacity, and even attracts the attention of professional management.  Absent that solidarity, the basic estate laws can effectively and efficiently work to pull apart the assets, the business, and potentially the family’s financial health.

As you read the original article, think about your own family assets. How do you want to pass along your family wealth, whether you have a little or a lot?

Reference: Forbes (February 5, 2014) “How The Wealthiest Families Make And Lose Their Money”

Passing The Torch - Five Business Succession Tips

To ensure your exit goals are met and your family relationships remain intact, it's important to clarify the family succession process right from the start.

When you are a family business owner looking to pass the torch, the business is typically your greatest asset and likely the center of the family's wellbeing. You cannot afford to mess this up.

Succession planning is unique because business is business, and so a successful succession is a careful one.

There are a great number of moving pieces to your business and to your family. Nevertheless, there are some basic guiding principles to help tie it all together. A recent article in The Business Journals offers “5 tips for a successful family succession.”

While you should consult the original article for the details, here are the “five tips”:

1. Be Transparent
2. Clarify Ownership Values
3. Plan Ahead
4. Consider Financial and Tax Ramifications
5. Stay Connected

Essentially, respect the family as family and the business as business. Family is here to stay and everyone has to come out on top, while the business requires leadership, sharp decision-making, and a business mindset. It pays dividends to work with the family and maintain transparency regarding your plans to make the “handoff” and their plans to receive.

Ownership is a big issue to clarify, since ownership and a voice in the company straddles that fine line between merely family-owner and head-honcho decision-maker. These may be roles some loved ones are designed to occupy.

What are the issues that most directly affect you and your family? How can or will you work through them to pass on the business?

These are not simple questions by any stretch. More to the point, succession is more a process of working out the solution than just offering up the plan. You might say that succession is always a process unique to each family and family business, but one during which it is essential to have a steady hand guiding the process.

Reference: The Business Journals (December 9, 2013) “5 tips for a successful family succession”

Prep Your Business Sale With These 10 Tips

An estimated 70% of businesses don’t have a family member capable or willing to assume responsibility. What are you doing to plan for the sale?

 A certain reality will eventually set in when it comes to the future of your business.  And that reality is that some day you are not going to be there to run it. It is just a matter of time, and there may simply be no family member there to step up to the task, which is something even further from your control. For many a business, and for the betterment of the family, this means a sale. So what are you doing to prepare the business for sale?

It is, indeed, a hard math, and not something that comes easy to most of us. Nor does selling the business you worked so hard to create. Nevertheless, when so much of the family wealth is locked into the business, be sure to consider proven, practical tips for preparing it for a sale.

To get you started, consider a recent Forbes article titled “10 Simple Tips To Make Your Business Acquirable.”

The problem shared by most sales is that a business is only valuable if it is “acquirable.”  The 10 tips largely speak for themselves, but you will want to read the description of each in the original article.

Here they are:

1. Check Your Ego
2. Be Irrelevant [aka, do not personally be the “value” to the business]
3. Become Known
4. Develop Great Systems
5. Clean Up the Financials
6. Make a Profit
7. Develop Reasonable Expectations
8. Focus on Continuity
9. Be Transparent
10. Maintain Perspective

Remember: selling the business is crucial to your own retirement and the future of your family. Approach the process realistically and early.

Reference: Forbes (November 13, 2013) “10 Simple Tips To Make Your Business Acquirable”

Your Business Exit: By Design Or By Default?

What will be the most likely exit scenario from your business when the time comes?

  If you own a small business, what will your last day at work be like? What is your exit strategy? The answer hinges on whether your exit will be by design or by default.

To exit your business by design requires coordinating your personal estate with the estate of the business. Oftentimes the two are intertwined. Ask yourself the question recently posed in the title of a recent Forbes article: “How Will You Leave Your Small Business The Last Time?”

Will you sell it? Apparently as many as a third of business owners surveyed by the author planned to do so. However, the business brokerage industry reports a successful sales record of not much more than 20%.

Going to pass it on to the next generation? Some 14% of survey respondents said they were, but only roughly 30% of family businesses actually continue to the next generation.

In either case, the numbers simply do not add up well for casual business exit planning.

Just as you have worked hard to build your business, it seems you will need to work hard to successfully leave it. Accordingly, plan now for that last day or risk losing your investment by default.

Reference: Forbes (November 4, 2013) “How Will You Leave Your Small Business The Last Time?”