Estate tax

Estate planning checklist

Estate planning is an essential part of wealth management. It’s particularly important in cases where your client’s estate involves significant assets (such as cottages or small businesses), complex issues (such as foreign beneficiaries) or multi-faceted relationships (such as blended families).

By Mike George |January 1, 2012

5 min read

Estate Planning

Five Ways to Pay Capital Gains Tax

When selling or passing ownership of a business, 23% of the fair market value of the business goes straight to the CRA. How should you save for it?

By Ted Warburton |November 7, 2011

3 min read

Estate Planning

Five ways clients can avoid property hassles

Holding property jointly has long been called the “poor man’s will”—a way for a person to transfer wealth on death without spending the money to draw up proper documents. So, if a client is considering transferring property into joint ownership with a spouse or children, play devil’s advocate and explain the risks

By Barry Corbin |September 1, 2011

2 min read

Estate Planning

Will estate taxes come back?

Read: André L’Espérance’s column Increasing estate value for the affluent Will estate taxes come back to Canada? They are certainly in the spotlight. The estate tax debate lurches back and forth in the U.S., as the legacy of the tax package enacted by the Bush administration in 2001 – with a sunset clause allowing the […]

By Scot Blythe |August 15, 2011

4 min read

Help clients keep their cottages

Succession planning for the cottage is complex, especially when it’s to be shared by multiple family members who all have an emotional attachment. For many cottage owners, values have increased so significantly that their children may be forced to sell it just to pay capital gains and probate taxes.

By Mike George |August 1, 2011

7 min read

Business owners need proactive tax planning

A heavy tax burden is a grave concern of surviving families as many Canadian family businesses owners take an approach to tax planning that is ‘too little, too late’, according to the Canadian results of PwC’s latest Global Family Business Survey. The study noted that the majority of Canadian family business owners are not fully […]

By Vikram Barhat |February 17, 2011

3 min read

U.S. estate tax certainty begins in the New Year

Last Friday, the Tax Relief, Unemployment Insurance Reauthorization, and Job Creation Act of 2010 was passed and signed by President Obama. Since U.S. lawmakers seem to like to use acronyms a lot, I thought I’d give this one a try myself. How does TRUIRJCA sound? Don’t quote me on that. Let’s just call it the […]

4 min read

U.S. estate uncertainty still exists

Grandma still has time to get run over by a reindeer. Could it be? An early Christmas present from President Obama and the U.S. Congress? Well, if the Democrats in the U.S. House get their way over the next few days, that present will be a little smaller. So what am I talking about? As […]

3 min read

U.S. to reinstate estate tax

Yesterday, President Obama and the Republican Congressional leadership tentatively agreed to work on draft legislation that would reinstate U.S. estate tax January 1, 2011, with an “exemption” of U.S. $5 million for U.S. citizens and U.S. domiciliaries and a maximum estate tax rate of 35%.

1 min read