Miltons Estates Law

Wills & Estate Planning by video. Our lawyers will 'meet you' in your home. Evenings and weekends. A wealth of information including prices and our free eBook, Estate Plans and Wills: A Practical Guide, on our website.

New eBook. Our free eBook on Estate Plans and Wills is now available on our website. Everything you need to know about the fundamentals, all in plain English. https://ontario-probate.ca/wills/free-ebook-on-wills/

I hate articles like this. Joint ownership of property is great for my family - it is probably terrible for your family but that creates lots of work for me, ...and thus helps me towards my dream of 'one cottage for each family member'. Please keep putting your house, cottages, and investments in 'joint tenancy' with one of your adult children as a bush-league attempt to avoid probate taxes so that my family can amass the wealth to which I feel entitled. See more

Wills & Estate Planning by video. Our lawyers will 'meet you' in your home. Evenings and weekends. A wealth of information including prices and our free eBook, Estate Plans and Wills: A Practical Guide, on our website.

Another story about joint bank accounts. Great source of grief for clients, work for us.

New eBook. Our free eBook on Estate Plans and Wills is now available on our website. Everything you need to know about the fundamentals, all in plain English. https://ontario-probate.ca/wills/free-ebook-on-wills/

I hate articles like this. Joint ownership of property is great for my family - it is probably terrible for your family but that creates lots of work for me, ...and thus helps me towards my dream of 'one cottage for each family member'. Please keep putting your house, cottages, and investments in 'joint tenancy' with one of your adult children as a bush-league attempt to avoid probate taxes so that my family can amass the wealth to which I feel entitled. See more

Another story about joint bank accounts. Great source of grief for clients, work for us.

The reality is, "the will is often the easy part". Figuring out what assets should be in the estate is often very tricky. If you don't make it clear - especially about property and investments outside the country, no one will track them down and they will be lost.

My father has these eSight3 glasses. Truly spectacular. Not cheap, and require some effort to get used to, but hugely helpful for macular degeneration.

Good article. But thankfully, people will keep doing silly things like putting their houses in joint tenancy with one of their children, and as a result we will continue to be busy helping people sort out the mess.

This is the first of a good two-part series by Tim Cestnick on the perils of specific bequests. Without careful planning, by giving specific things to specific... people, your will can cause great unfairness and bitterness, create unnecessary tax liabilities, and open the estate up to challenge (especially dependents' support claims). In part two, he shows how better planning for this estate could have created better fairness, and, saved $800,000 in taxes. See more

This is the second of this 2-part series. We see mistakes about each of these items - registered plans, failure to use roll-overs, failure to use life insuranc...e properly, and general failure to plan properly all the time. Here's a tip: it costs a little $ to save a lot $ in the estate world. Do-it-yourself estate planning is normally "do-it-to-your family unnecessary tax and bitterness increasing". See more

A good little article about planning challenges for blended families. Careful planning and will drafting is definitely required, if you want to avoid a huge squabble.

A useful little reminder of why you should not delay finalizing your will.

This is a very useful guide on beneficiary designations. Far too many people mess this up, especially naming an adult child the beneficiary and leaving their estate stuck with a massive tax bill.