From the preliminary conference to the pretrial conference, we’re bookending a significant part of the case. So it’s going to be your legal documents that bring you to court. Litigation documents. One side’s suing another. Let’s use divorce. There’s going to be a plaintiff. That person alleges grounds or a reason for divorce.

The other side replies. With a document called an answer, I didn’t do it, that wasn’t me, I don’t consent. And then there should be some negotiation without court dates. Letters between counsel, telephone calls, emails, perhaps some proposed resolution. And some cases end there. A settlement is reached, a written stipulation is prepared, submitted to the court, order and judgment.

In other cases, do not end there. They ramp up. One side has to request a preliminary conference. Preliminary conference is getting the lay of the land before the court. What issues exist? There’s a, uh, sort of a fill in the blanks legal, uh, court form, uh, grounds you write them in. And, um, counsel’s names and addresses, and where, uh, retainer agreements submitted, where, uh, statements of net worth submitted, right?

And the court will ask you a series of things. Are there children? And, uh, What can be narrowed down, and then what will each side asked for in terms of discovery? Depositions, EBTs, uh, debt, uh, uh, written interrogatories, uh, discovery and inspection, a range of discovery tools, some disclosures, trading, uh, Uh, different authorizations, then there’ll be some other conferences, a compliance conference, and then a trial date can be set, and you know, we’re months into it, or a year into it, or two years into it, depending on the speed of the court and the circumstances involved.

Once you set a trial date, they’ll back into a pre trial conference. At that pre trial conference, Again, depending on the judge, you may have to have your trial notebook, you may have to have all of your exhibits, you might have to exchange documents, um, and that’s where we are. Cases can settle at the pre trial conference.

Why? Because you might have the opportunity to see, uh, some information that you had not previously seen. Let’s say you knew that there was, uh, some type of asset, but because of different reasons, uh, that asset wasn’t, the value of that asset wasn’t fully disclosed or, you know, You were just made aware of it and so if you saw the numbers or it’s a pension and it had gotten evaluated and there are different asset classes, different methodologies to split or divide what exists and you may be able to do that and if you do it you never need the trial and you’ll go to an inquest instead.

I just simplified the entire divorce process. If you’d like me to simplify for you, please reach Frank Brunel.

Questions to ask your estate planning attorney. How long are you in practice? How long have you done estate planning? How long have you done elder law? Do you review existing plan before you start a new plan? How much will you charge me? How long will this take? What is included? What is involved? What do you expect of me?

After I do the plan with you, I could, after I do the plan with you, will we ever review it again? Those are the type of things. Now, we need to know the length of time it will take from beginning to end. Consultation, to sign up, to intake form, to drafting of the plan, to review, the final signing. Those are all of the steps necessary.

And do you get a chance to see the plan and review it? And then sign. What if you have changes? It’s very difficult to absorb all of the information in one shot. If you came in to sign, have you seen the plan? We’ve discussed what’s in it, you should have discussed what’s in it, but actually see and observe and understand the language you used.

Have you gone over this with the person that you want to be a trustee? Have you gone over it with an executor? Is it a husband and wife type of event? Is it a single person? Is it, uh, a person that’s in a long term relationship? We figure it all out. You know your story, your situation, your scenario, what’s best for you.

And you speak to me about it. And then we work it out, make a plan. It gets what you want and what you need. We make sure that it’s done correctly. And those are some of the type of questions you should ask.

When should I update my estate plan? Well, let’s hope that you have an estate plan. Over the course of weeks and months, I’ve tried to explain to you the importance of an estate plan. Getting what you have to who you want to have it when the appropriate time comes. Once a year, once every five years, probably a good rule of thumb.

And you should update or amend or change your estate plan when life events happen. A marriage, a divorce, single person, married person, married person, single person. So things have changed when you have children, when you buy a house, when you acquire an asset, when you inherit an asset, when you change brokerage company, Vanguard to Merrill Lynch, Merrill Lynch to Shearson Lehman, life events, acquiring of assets, selling assets, those are the times that you should, you should amend your will, you should change your will, you should update your will, you have one child and you birth a second child, change the plan, you have a minor child and that child becomes an adult, Change the plan.

If anything in your plan has lapsed, I am giving the house located at 123 Main Street to my daughter. And then you sell 123 Main Street and you buy 626 Wilson Place. Well, did you want 626 Wilson Place to go to your daughter or to do something else with it? That’s when you should update your estate plan.

I think that’s it. If you have questions about when you should change your estate plan, Or if you don’t have a plan and you would like to obtain a plan, reach out. Frank Bruno Law.

I represent a person that is the subject of a guardianship proceeding. So my client’s adult children identified that my client needs a guardian. Could be a male or a female. Uh, I’m gonna use she. My client is a female. These persons are her children. Now, what do we do? Well, in a guardianship, they have to allege facts and circumstances that would demonstrate to the court that my client is a danger to herself or others.

Can they do that? Well, there’s a petition. They’re alleging certain facts. And they’re alleging certain situations that have occurred. But my client has a level of competency. And it’s not a term used necessarily in guardianship. We use the term capacity. But she has a level of competency. See how I did that?

It’s a bait and switch. She seems okay in dealing with her. She’s able to be reasonable and be agreeable and be able to, uh, state her position. So there’s several points of friction that occur. Someone says that a guardian is needed and sometimes the friction is the person says, I don’t need a guardian. I don’t want a guardian.

I don’t need a guardian. I’m okay. These quirky things that you’re saying about me, well, that’s just who I am. I like to, uh, keep a lot of belongings. Right? I am not a hoarder or something like that, right? That might be the synopsis or some other thing. Now, the other position of friction, the other point of friction could be where everyone in the family says, Yes, mama does need a guardian, but it shouldn’t be you.

It should be me. So, I don’t know if that’s gonna happen now. Right now, what I do know is that I am the attorney for the alleged incapacitated person and we’re going to put up a vigorous defense. Uh, it’s gonna involve cross examining the petitioner, any other fact witnesses they put on the witness stand.

And then ultimately, I need to put my client on the stand to demonstrate her capacity. The who, the what, the where, the when, the why, the how. Does it matter if you know who the president is? I don’t know. But what if you do know that you’re married, and you do know that you have two children, or five children, whatever, the appropriate amount for your family, and it’s actually correct?

What if you can pay your bills? What if you can manage your money and shop for yourself? Do you still need a guardian? Well, I’m gonna put up a vigorous defense, and we’ll see where it goes.

Who pays for the nursing home? It is expensive to say the least, and the word least shouldn’t even be in this conversation. Nursing homes and, and I’m in New York City, nursing homes in New York have a daily rate. People pay it monthly, and there’s an annual cost. So in New York City, I’m looking at a statistic.

As of 2024, in New York City, there’s a 469 per day cost, which is 171, 276 per year in New York City for a nursing home. And Long Island, which is Nassau County and Suffolk County, the daily rate is 482 per day. with an annual amount of 176, 016. So you’re looking at more than 170, 000. And who pays for that?

Well, if you’re rich, if you have money, if you are middle class or above, you’re paying out of pocket. If you are poor, poor in quotes, maybe air quotes, Because Medicaid is a federal program administered by the states, and each state has a different definition. So in New York, you could own a home, and it’s a non countable asset.

But there are complicating factors with that, if you own a home. Because perhaps you can have a lien be placed against that home, and then there might be Medicaid asset recovery. But the rich pay out of pocket. The poor pay If poor within certain guidelines can qualify for Medicaid, and then there’s a category of person in the middle with proper and appropriate planning can apply for Medicaid as well.

Medicaid is the only insurance provider that pays for, it’s a little bit difficult to say it that way, Medicaid is the provider that will pay for. nursing home, uh, coverage. Medicare does not. Long term disability insurance, if obtained a long time ago, and if you qualified at the time, were healthy, it can pay for a portion of it.

Rarely do I ever see long term care coverage paying for all of it. That could be as well. So, out of pocket, or a government program, That’s how you pay for, uh, a nursing home facility. So we’re talking about a skilled level care location. And the skilled level facilities nowadays, currently, within reason, are like the hospitals of ten years ago.

Doctor, skilled nurse, uh, nurse practitioner. But if you look at the reviews online, you’re going to see Even the best locations, you know, one of the first, uh, Google review or Yelp reviews will be terrible, uh, this was bad, that was bad, the food, the care, the coverage, it’s dirty,

overworked, and even expensive underpaid. That might be the way to look at it. Because of this extreme cost, you should have a plan in place. Medicaid, Asset, protection trusts. Think about it, put it into effect. If you need help, FrankBrunoLaw. com.

Set it and forget it. Once you have an estate plan, never look at it again. No, not at all. Once you set up your estate plan for the facts and circumstances of your life at the time you set it up, perfect. But then when your circumstances change, please take a look at your estate plan. So if you’re single, when you make a plan and then you get married, change it.

If you’re married and you make a plan and you have a child, change it. You have a second child, change it. Third, fourth, fifth. Keep changing it. Change it until it matches your circumstance. If you get divorced, should you change it? Yes. Yes, you should change it. If, unfortunately, someone passes away, a child or your spouse, change it.

If you buy a different property, change it. If you have Right? You get it. You get where I’m going with this. So, set up an estate plan. Should be an all encompassing plan for your life’s circumstances. I have a spouse, three children, a property, some other assets that I don’t want to disclose to all of the internet.

No, I have assets. And, uh, for my bank account, I might have a beneficiary designation. And for my insurance policy, I have a beneficiary. Brokerage account, the same. Properties owned jointly. Just take care of each of the items that you have. And that’s it. I don’t want to repeat it. I’m going to repeat it one more time.

Change your plan when your life’s events change. Marriage. Death, divorce, remarriage, child, grandchild, right? The birth of, that’s when you change. You change it according to new and different facts. Facts always change things. So you’re in love and you have a spouse. Perfect. Magnificent. You get divorced, and you don’t want that spouse to inherit and there’s, you know, some language inside of a divorce judgment that it’s as if the person pre deceased you, but why rely on that?

Why rely on another court document to intervene into your estate plan? Change it while you can. And if you need assistance in changing it, we can change it. frankbrunolaw. com

I met with a young man today, father of two children, mid thirties, married, owns a property with his sister. Well, he has no will. Could be plenty of issues. Couple of things here. He owns the property with his sister, so in the event that he should pre decease his sister, that property will pass the way they own it on the deed.

That property will pass to his estate. Presently, he does not have a will. What happens then? That becomes an administration proceeding. And his wife would own 50 percent and his young children, let’s give them the age of six and four, these young children would own the house. The portion that the dad owns would own it along with their mom.

So the exact math of it would be the mother would, so his wife, the mother of the children, would own 25 percent of the total house. The gentleman’s two children would own 12. 5 percent each, that adds up to the 50 percent and that 50 percent would go with the 50 percent owned by his sister. Does anyone think that’s a good result?

No! We don’t want children 6 and 4 to inherit property and maybe he wants his wife to own 50 percent with his sister. So, after he wants to cut his children out, in the event of some unfortunate incident where he passes away and the kids are still minors, What will his wife do? Well, she would be required to have a guardianship proceeding in the surrogate’s court.

Become the guardian of the person and the property of the children with respect to their inheritance. We don’t really want that. What should this person do? At the very least, this individual needs a last will and testament to direct where the property should go. In the event that I pass away, I want all of my estate to go to my wife.

Then it eliminates the children, at least the underage children, these minor children, That should not be inheriting property. If he wanted the children to inherit property, that’s a different story. And we could do it. Why you would want that, I don’t know, but maybe he would want to preserve the legacy of the children.

You could do that. It can be done. It can all be done. Reach out, and I will tell you how the whatever it is that you want can be accomplished. Thank you.

How long does guardianship last? I received this question and as in everything law, it depends. Guardianship in New York takes place across a few different courts for different reasons. And unfortunately, the term, the title guardian is used in all of them and guardianship. Far and away, the area of practice that I handle, uh, the most of in guardianship is Article 81 guardianship.

It’s when one adult person seeks to be the guardian of another adult person. There is also a guardianship in the surrogate’s court. With a primary focus, it’s the same. One adult person seeking to be the guardian of another adult person. That’s typically a parent seeking to be the guardian of their developmentally disabled child.

So when a developmentally disabled child turns 18, they’re still living in the care and under the supervision of a parent. If that parent has to access a bank accounts and programs and Deal with doctors or they need that type of a guardianship in the surrogates court. And then there’s a third type of guardianship that takes place in the family court where a either a family member, a surviving family member, perhaps a grandparent or an aunt or an uncle, or even a family friend, can seek, uh, to obtain guardianship of a minor child.

And that goes until the child is 21. And that’s a. Parental role, very similar, with few distinctions between guardianship of that child and custody. Very similar. It’s a guardianship that deals only with the care and custody of a child. Taking the child to a doctor, enrolling the child on health insurance, uh, dealing with parent, teacher, guardian meetings at school, right, for the education of the child.

That goes till 21. Custody only goes to 18, but if guardianship you get to 21. So, question was how long does it last? Took me 2 minutes and 25 seconds to get there. Well, in the family court it ends at 21. In the surrogates court, in the supreme court, the guardianship of an adult person, that can be of an indefinite duration.

Duration, which means forever, the passing of a person, um, or it could be for a definite period of time, say a one year period, and then each year the guardian has to renew. We’ll make an application or an extension that’s based on the, the discretion of the judge. Maybe there had been a specific reason to have a guardianship for a, a fixed duration and the judge wants to, uh, keep track of that case.

And there’s even a role called a special guardian that has limited purposes. So special guardian for, to, to sell a property or a special guardian to, um, be involved in a divorce or a special guardian. To explore certain programs for the person or the application of, for Medicaid, something like that. If you need to know more about guardianship, reach out.

Frank Brunell, Lawyer. Bye.

Is it live or is it video on demand? What I try to do is film this video, direct one shot, one take, one kill, and finish the video. Now lately, I’ve been using an editor. So you’re going to hear some bells and whistles, and you’re going to see, uh, some, uh, content changes, right? The, uh, all of a sudden I’ll be speaking about two people and you’ll see Two people before the screen.

So we’ll see where that goes. It’s been very popular lately. How do I arrive at these topics? Well, I write a monthly article in a newspaper. I write a weekly newsletter and blog posts. So I’m always on the lookout for content and I take, uh, information that I learn, uh, people that I deal with, and I also field questions.

Question posed to me today was, can I make a trust? for my child. That question came with very little context. It was by email. And, uh, so it’s a great question. Thank you for your question. Now, I don’t know much about it. So let me talk about it and attack it in a few different ways. Well, a child, a minor, anyone under the age of 18 is a minor, is a child, a four month old, a two month old, a toddler, a 16 year old, all children, children are under any capacity.

A child cannot enter into a contract. So a child cannot create a trust. Now, is this a child with special needs? Would the parents be preparing a special needs trust for the benefit of this child? Could be. And that’s definitely an entire category of trusts. Special needs, so that a child can have, uh, an impaired child.

Child with developmental delays, a child in such a position can have assets inside of the trust for the benefit of the child and while permitting the parent to obtain government benefits. A different type of trust would be a trust for a parent that creates a trust and has their child as they beneficiary of the trust.

Coincidentally, I spoke with a client today that I’m preparing a trust for her and she has three children and one of the children is 16 years old. So we were figuring out, I don’t figure anything out. I present information and I allow the client to take what I, what I give them and they figure it out.

With my help, this given client would like the assets ultimately to be split in three ways. A, B, and C will get one third, one third, one third. One of the children is a minor and the share for that minor child will be held in trust until a later point. So, in a way, that’s really how I would think about the question that was posed to me.

today because it didn’t get presented in a way that I understood the person was the child of special needs. So if it’s a child that has no, um, special needs and you just want to preserve and protect the assets for the benefit of the child, well then You do it inside of a, uh, parent’s trust, and you leave proceeds, distribution to that child, uh, inside of a trust, and they could secure that at the age of, uh, they could obtain it at the age of 25 or 35 or whatever you might, whatever’s good for your situation, right?

That’s what dictates the way we provide solutions. What do you want? What do you need? When do you need it? We figure it all out. We figure it all out. Together.

Welcome to Frank Bruno Law. Welcome to my YouTube channel. I am an attorney in real life and I play one on the internet. So here I am to tell you about the channel. I practice in the area of elder law, estate planning, guardianship, and real estate. The office itself handles divorce, probate, administration, administration, all areas that you, older, younger, and deal with litigation, contested guardianships, contested divorces, contested surrogates court proceedings.

And then whenever possible and always our first option, we try to settle cases. But here on this channel, I speak about all of those areas of practice, the experiences that I’ve had. I answer questions that have been posed to me, and I provide a lot of information. My website is frankbrunolaw. com. I have frequently asked questions, I have blog posts, I have links to more videos.

Welcome. Take a look. Stay for a while. And if you have questions, reach out to me.

Factors to consider concerning elder care. Well, you’ll have your estate plan. Estate planning is the creation of a will or a trust or an overall plan and even the administration or probate of an estate. The estate plan is the plan while the person is alive and then the administration or probate would be when the person passes away.

You have Medicaid issues. Asset protection while you apply for Medicaid. and or the application for Medicaid in two settings. Community Medicaid where you’re at home in place or at a skilled level nursing facility, uh, and that’s nursing home Medicaid. You have advanced directives. These are things, the items that take place or, uh, concerned situations that take place when you have a little bit of an infirmity or a condition.

So, for example, a healthcare proxy and a living will. Healthcare proxy is where one person steps in your shoes and assists you with the determination of medical care and coverage in the event that you’re not able to have a full dialogue with a doctor. And living wills concern end of life decisions, right?

in artfully, the pull the plug document, or remove the person from artificial respiration. Then we have a power of attorney, a financial durable power of attorney, which is not an estate planning document, but it comes in this area. And we think about use of the power of attorney for Uh, one person to step in the financial shoes of another person for many different, uh, issues.

From the small, dealing with your cable provider, or your internet service, or your Microsoft account, or your car insurance, or life insurance provider. Even for health insurance, not for health care decisions, but to deal with premiums and payments. You could deal with the IRS, government agencies, social security, real property, bank accounts.

A durable power of attorney is a remarkable document and it involves the trust in another person. Not in the living trust sense, but just the good old fashioned, let’s shake hands and I trust you with my life savings type of trust. And finally for this video, guardianship issues. That’s when a person can’t really make their own decisions or live independently.

When one adult person seeks to be the guardian of another adult person and based on an infirmity, an incapacity, either one of the diseases of civilization, Alzheimer’s, dementia, or a tragic accident, car accident, stroke, something like that. So that’s a, uh, an overview on elder care. And if you need me, if you’d like to discuss this, you can always call or make an appointment, but read the website, take a look at the YouTube channel, frankbrunolaw.

com and uh, that’s it. Good health and good fortune and good wealth. Your health is your wealth.

Is it one size fits all, or is it what size fits your body? Whoa. Estate planning, will, advanced directives, or a trust. Is it a last will and testament or a trust? Is it a last will and testament and a trust? Do you need both? What’s a basic plan? A basic plan is what everybody needs. And it would say something like, and the idea is I have This.

I have this asset. I have this house. I have a bank account. I have stuff. And where does my stuff go? Where do, where do the things that I own, where do they go? How do they get transferred after my death? That’s a basic plan. Well, that’s the idea of what you do in estate planning. And a basic plan could be the use of the last will and testament.

It can also be the use of an insurance policy, and beneficiary designations, and joint bank accounts. Taking what you own during your life and passing it on to the next generation with the lease tax consequence, and keeping in mind, possibly in the future, a Medicaid program or a government program might be a necessity.

So how do you plan to take what you own? All of those factors in, um, and you can’t do, uh, some of these things with a Last Will and Testament. Then there is a trust, and the trust, generally speaking, comes in two flavors of trust. A revocable trust and an irrevocable trust. So it’s not one size fits all.

It’s what does your body fit into? What do you need? What are your circumstances? What are your requirements? What is your level of comfort? What is your level of, uh, letting go and releasing? And we talk about those things. We talk about the pros and the cons and the benefits. Often enough, I’ll say something like you trust is a vehicle.

And it’s like a four door sedan, or it’s like a tank. Going into battle, you need a tank. And maybe to get, uh, A to B, from your home to your work, you need a four door sedan. So, different, different vehicles, for different circumstances. If you need any assistance, you’d like to speak about this, reach out to my office, frankbrunolaw.

com

I received a call yesterday from a prospective client. Uh, two adult daughters were on the phone with me discussing, uh, their parent’s situation. The parent is 81 years old, uh, in need of rather immediate assistance. So, in a hospital, because of a fall, there’s a circumstance, an illness, a condition. I don’t want to get too specific and The probable path will be that this person will go from a hospital into a skilled level nursing facility.

The parent is 82 years old. No will, no advanced directives, no plan in place. I’m going to give approximate numbers. Has approximately 75, 000 in the bank and earns approximately 3, 000 a month between social security and pension retirement. So that’s the scenario. 75, 000 in the bank. That’s it. the resources, the assets of this individual, and the monthly income.

Well, according to Medicaid, those amounts in New York are too high to qualify for either the, uh, nursing home Medicaid, or even the community Medicaid, uh, waiver program, unless you use a pooled trust. So what to do? There are steps that can be taken, but this becomes a crisis plan rather than planning in advance.

The best plan would have been 61 months ago to move those assets into an irrevocable trust because there’s a five year look back. The look back happens now. Right, so if the person needs to go to a nursing home now, you look back at last year’s tax return, and last year’s income. Uh, really for the assets.

Last year, the year before, and the year before, and the year before, and the year before. Five years. The plan should have been in place for the, uh, potential, uh, necessity of going into a, uh, skilled level nursing facility. People don’t want to think about it. They avoid. They procrastinate. They just don’t think about it as well, right?

So either you’ve identified that it could be a situation and a circumstance in the future and you just avoid it. Or, uh, you don’t even think about it. So,

the children told me they did, they did think about it. However, their parent did not want to address it. So now they’re in this situation. Plan early. Put something into place so that you can have, uh, the road paved. So that you can have an ease of getting into a facility. Whereas now there’s some scrambling.

So think about that. Think about it in advance. Speak to your parent. Take the steps for yourself as well. Maybe it’s never too early to start. Maybe not.

I was a court evaluator today. That’s a role in a guardianship. That’s a role in a guardianship proceeding where, uh, and a guardianship is where one adult person is petitioning to be the guardian of another adult person. And a role in that case is a court evaluator. The court, meaning a judge, appoints a person with that title and that role to be speak with the alleged incapacitated person, interview family members, uh, to take a look at the finances and the living conditions and medical arrangements and all of the circumstances of the person and property of that alleged incapacitated person, uh, and then issue a report and testify at a hearing.

So, that’s in fact what I did. I’ll speak generally about this case. So, the guardianship presents itself by an auditory cause. That’s a case, a situation where there’s an immediate, quick turnaround. Immediate, quick. And, you know, immediate and quick sort of oxymorons in the court. And maybe even in life in general.

Because the case was filed about I don’t know, 35 days ago. So 35 days or so, uh, from the date of filing to the date of hearing, that’s a pretty quick turnaround. In real life, you might want a few days, but 35 days is pretty quick. And in that time, my role and other things are taking place and other people have different, uh, specific tasks.

But my The position that I had and the role that I had was to meet and speak with the alleged incapacitated person and determine from a non medical perspective, just as an attorney, whether or not the person had the ability to understand and request an attorney, whether they had an appreciation for their circumstances and disability, whether they were a danger to themselves or others, and from that person, and from other persons involved in the case, find out what their property was, what level of assets they had as a cursory look, and then what income they had.

So is it a pension? Is it social security? Is it a retirement income? Are they on disability? Those type of things. What medicine is the person on? Do they have a condition, a diagnosis, diabetes, um, A heart condition, do they need, uh, supplements, infusions, vitamins, do they need a feeding tube? So all of those issues.

And then a written report is done and submitted to the court. And that’s a private document. It’s confidential. So the court itself reads that document and then upon request and with permission the report could be given to other people that are involved in the case. In this particular case, I delivered the report to court and I was not permitted to disseminate that report.

to other people in the case, right? So the petitioning attorney or an attorney that might be working for another family member, fighting against it. And I guess due to the confidential nature of the report and the content of the report, it wasn’t given. And then I testified today in the narrative. The narrative is where I speak in one long stream of consciousness.

So With, uh, the ability for the court to ask me questions, make further inquiry, and for the counsel involved in the case to cross examine me. So my testimony went something like, I was appointed on this date, and I made sure there were no conflicts, and I filed the, uh, certain, uh, Um, documents, meaning that I accepted the case and that, uh, I was eligible to be appointed and I’m on a list of attorneys.

And, um, I had to, uh, speak to the issue of who was served and whether I got the documentation and whether or not jurisdiction was, uh, appropriate, meaning this was in a certain County and was the case filed in the proper County. Right, not that a person owns property in Kings County as being filed in Orange County or Monroe.

So, in this case, there was jurisdiction, then I continued to testify about who I met and what I spoke about and whether or not I, a series of other things, and then at the end, I supported jurisdiction. the petition, the application for, uh, the appointment for this person. And, uh, that was how my day went today.

So, uh, if you have any questions about guardianship, reach out, take a look at the website, see further videos, frankbrunolaw. com.

I had a consult yesterday with an adult woman that was discussing the situation of her parent, and I’d say it was her father, and she had, she let me know that he’s deeply concerned, that he wants a plan. He’s a homeowner, he has some assets. And he’d like a plan, he’s a gentleman in his 80s, and has multiple children, and this was one representative of the family that attended a webinar I gave and wanted to ask me some additional questions.

So I said, sure, I’ll give you any information that you need and could speak about the issues, and then set an appointment for her dad, he’ll come in and we’ll further discuss. A lot of adult children would like to set up a plan for their parents, and I could go a little bit, definitely provide all of the information to the family.

But I need to know that the person that will be my client has the capacity, has the ability to make a plan, knows what they want to do, and is not unduly influenced. And, one of the reasons that this person, parent was concerned, at least that was related to me, is because one of this person’s siblings passed away under 40 years old.

When you pass away at such a young age, unexpectedly, it really, it, it makes you reconsider and consider if you’ve never done it before. Your life, your circumstances, what needs to be done. And how you set up the right plan, or any plan at all, for your family. Now this person under 40, I was advised, had no plan.

Had some assets, and the family had to go through an administration proceeding. So that’s why I say everyone needs a plan. Even if you have a basic will. Upon my passing I’ll leave everything to my spouse. If that’s the case. Or, listen, I’ll even give you this concession. With a spouse, it’s easier. It’s not easy.

But if you’re unmarried, with no children. It becomes more difficult if you have no plan. You have to figure out where whatever you have goes. At least if you have a spouse, there’s an identifiable person, and you’re putting that person through a lot of grief, but it is easy. Got a plan, a will, I’d like my house to go here, I’d like my bank account to go there, I’d like my pension.

Some of these things have beneficiary designations, but some do not. You might be involved with a partner or a significant other, and you’re not married, and your beneficiary designation says a parent. Maybe you really would have wanted that. So, it at least involves a conversation. Where does the 401k, where does the IRA go?

Where does the bank account go? Where does that, right? Let’s figure it out. Slow, methodical process. Just make the inquiry, then we figure it all out. We dot our I’s and cross our T’s. And, so in speaking, about the plan for the father. It was informed by the death of a child. We want to put something into place, plan when you can, so that when the time comes, if it ever comes, we all pass away at some time, whether it’s tragically and unexpectedly, or at the end of a long life, set it up while you have the ability to set up a plan.

Not banging on the table, not making it more dire or terrible than it is. But it really is an imposition on your family if you pass away with that. Put something in place, put some thought into it, and we’ll make a plan.

Prospective client call. The will was changed. Then we proceeded to talk and have a discussion about what awareness do you have of the will? Where is the will? Has the will been produced? What do you mean the will was changed? And really the circumstances are that an older relative, let’s use grandfather, had a will.

Grandfather was A widow and had two children. The belief by one of the children is that, uh, a house and property and some assets were going to be divided into 50 50. And in fact, this person passed away in the last two months, three years ago, the property was transferred from the deceased person. They were alive at the time, right?

They just passed away now, but three years ago, the property was transferred from that person to one of the children. Not the person that called me and that property was then transferred to someone else. So there was two transfers. Well, the will wasn’t changed. The actions, the testator, the decedent, the person that made the will, the actions of that person frustrated the will.

It defeated the will because they didn’t own the house at the time of their passing. So if I say I own a property one, two, three Main Street and I’m going to give it to Jane Doe, so in the event that I pass away. 123 Mainstreet goes to Jane Doe. Now, if during my life I sell 123 Mainstreet, there is no 123 Mainstreet to give to Jane Doe.

So what I did was I frustrated the will, I defeated the purpose of the will, and Jane Doe, is out in the cold. So is there a will to be presented? Is there a potential litigation? We need better facts. We need more information and we need better facts. Was the grandfather deluded? Did he have a capacity to transfer the property?

Did he transfer for market value? Did he transfer the property, relying on his child to take certain steps? These are all circumstances we don’t know, but this. It’s probably not a surrogate’s court case because there is no asset, at least this given asset, the property, that asset isn’t, has not been in the person’s name for three years.

Could be a Supreme Court case, could be constructive trust, could be a litigation, maybe we file something to set aside the deed. There are potentially things we could do. We need better facts. This is a call I received today and I’m presenting that information now. But a lot of people, they start the call, We’ve wrote one frame of reference.

Oh, the will was changed. In this case, the will was not changed. The circumstances that surrounded the will change.

Three documents that your parents need now. Power of attorney, health care proxy, and a HIPAA waiver. Why? Well, you want to help your parents. Listen, these documents are good for anyone. I’m specifically speaking in reference to an elderly subset. Persons that need assistance. And any other person that may become incapacitated. or has trouble hearing or an infirmity or a condition that perhaps interferes with their ability to discuss things with their healthcare providers and their financial issues. So a power of attorney is a document that allows one person to step into the shoes of another person for issues related to finances. But that’s a broad category. So you could deal with a person’s insurance company and The insurance company for car, home, auto, life. You can deal with the IRS. You can deal with their attorney on certain designated issues. You can deal with government agencies, Medicaid, programs, a wide variety. You know, their phone provider, Time Warner Cable, Spectrum, whoever you need to deal with. Healthcare proxy. When there is a crisis situation, it allows a proxy. to step in the shoes of the person and have a dialogue with their medical provider, Quest, or even authorize procedures. And then the HIPAA waiver. Well, the reason we may need that is because in this age of privacy, the HIPAA, H-I-P-A-A, waiver allows you to authorize a person to get and review and obtain and see your medical documentation. So that’s all for now. Get these forms. They’re useful for your parents and they’re useful for you to have as well. And it doesn’t have to be an adult child for a parent. It could be a spouse having it for a spouse. It could be a long-term partner having it, right? So a variety of uses for these several documents.

Should you place your home in a living trust? Yes, why not? Well, there are many reasons to do it. A home is oftentimes the largest asset a person has, and it’s important for the person that owns the home to direct where that property should go after their passing. Many people want to keep it as part of an estate plan. And a living trust, a trust that you create while you’re alive, is one of the best options to get that property from your name to your loved one after your passing. It also allows incapacity planning, meaning if you own the home and have a circumstance where you’re incapable of handling your own affairs, well, your trustee or your successor trustee can take care of the home. So that’s a great reason to use a trust. It also will allow you to avoid probing. So those are some of the several highlighted reasons to have a trust. Some questions I get are, if I have a mortgage, can I place my home into a trust? Yes, you can. It does not activate the due on sale clause. It is not a sale as categorized as a sale. It’s a transfer. It’s a permissible transfer. And can you obtain a favorable mortgage if you have a trust? Well, you have to check the lenders. You definitely can keep the same loan. You can even refinance. But once you have the home and trust, you have to search out for the best rate for a property that’s owned by a trust. It is possible. You can refinance. If you have any questions about this, please reach out. Take a look at the website, frankbrunolaw.com.  

Answered                      Frank Bruno Law is where you can find all of the answers to many of your problems. What do we handle there? There is information on estate planning, elder law, guardianship, divorce, and real estate. Yes, so many things. And yet we have an emphasis on those areas of law. It’s myself. and an associate, several other attorneys, several paralegals, and we work together as a team. I’m the chief attorney on issues related to guardianship and estate planning and issues related to elder law, which is a broad spectrum of, I don’t know, interrelated laws. I also take on court appointments in surrogates court. We probate and we do divorce and we handle real estate. Why do we do those things? In life, I’m trying to do interrelated. They’re interrelated. In estate planning, we take what you have while you’re alive and we make a plan to pass it on to your loved ones, your spouse and children, your friends and family, your house of worship. And that involves the use of an estate plan. What is that? Well, it’s a plan for your estate. It either could be a trust, it could be a will, it could be by specific designations on the various documents. And if we utilize a trust, they come in two flavors, irrevocable and revocable. There are special needs trusts, but that’s not part of this conversation. So when we utilize a trust, we take the assets that you have, which oftentimes include real property, a house, an apartment building, a commercial property, and we take the deed and we transfer it into the trust. That’s why we do real estate. I represent trusts that sell property. I represent trusts that buy property. I represent persons that transfer property from their individual name into their trust. So it’s sort of interrelated or at least adjacent. Real property is estate planning adjacent. And then because we handle litigation, we handle divorce and guardianship litigation. You might say guardianship, but no, Well, oftentimes they’re the same population. Children that are fighting over their parent are the same people that as parents fight over their children. That’s a conundrum. But it’s families fighting over family members. Yes, it happens in family court, in Supreme Court, in divorce matters, in Supreme Court for guardianship cases, and in the surrogates court fighting over a loved one’s money. It happens in all of those places. And we follow the cases and we We handle the cases across the several areas of practice and the several courts. So if you need us, we’ll be there. Check it out. FrankBrunoLaw.com. Thank you.      

I had several client consults, one about divorce, one about guardianship, and one about estate planning. I handle those areas in the office with the assistance of my associate and a few other remote attorneys, something like that. So let me go over the guardianship. Now, the person that called me had been or is the caretaker of their parents. This person is taking care of their parent through the use of a power of attorney. transferred the house to themselves directly, took money out of the parent’s bank account, and transferred it to that person, to himself directly. Now, this was done through the advice and consent of an elder law attorney, not me, another attorney that took these steps in advance of filing an application for Medicaid. And the reason is as the caretaker child of a parent, there’s a legally permissible method to permit you to file for a Medicaid application and transferring the assets. Now, what is the problem? Well, that in and of itself could be a problem if the assets were transferred with the use of a power of attorney and the parent did not have full capacity, did not have the ability to reason and think and transfer. And what is the intervening event? There is a second child of this parent. So the other child is now up in arms stating, you’re looking to… knock me out and take all of our parents’ money. So this was the conversation. This was the exercise. Do we file now for guardianship or do we attempt to withstand a filing of a guardianship petition from the sibling? What are the repercussions? Is it better to wait and let this person assert or allege that you’ve taken this misconduct? and then defend with, well, this was under the advice and consent of an attorney and our parent is still alive and this was a reasonable transfer. Does that argument hold water? Does it make sense? Is it the appropriate approach? What about if the person that had made these transfers files for guardianship? Well, can you withstand the court? Will the court, will any persons involved in the court, will any attorneys for any of the other notice participants Well, they say, hey, that transfer was impermissible. Transfer the property back to parent. These are the considerations. They’re very fact specific. And we need to take a look at what was done, when it was done, why it was done. And in reality, whether there’s a divorce or guardianship or any other kind of litigation, those are valuable questions. Why was it done? When was it done? How was it done? And why was it done? When, why, how? The three whys questions.

Deadlines abound. If you send a demand letter, it gives an expiration date for you to receive back documents or an action to be taken. If you have a client buying a house, you have to get a mortgage. If there’s a mortgage contingency clause, you have to get a mortgage within a certain date. If you’re setting a closing, there’s an on or about date or an on or before date or a fixed date if it’s a time of the essence. declared in advance. So deadlines. If you have litigation, you’re filing for a divorce, there’s a summons with notice. The other side has to reply within a certain period of time. If you do a summons or complaint, the other side has to submit an answer. And that’s the document. It’s called an answer within a certain period of time. If you file a guardianship case, all guardianship cases start with a rapid pace and you file by order to show cause and there’s a date set at the outset. Deadlines are all around us. Now, does that mean that you can’t get extensions or delay? And if there are so many deadlines, Why do court cases last so long? Well, they really do. They really do for a variety of reasons. So a counsel may ask for additional time to submit documents or prepare documents or to obtain information. There may be a discovery period of time. Discovery is where information is exchanged and you take the process of discovering information some of the underlying facts. And that takes a certain period of time with some extensions. There may be depositions. Depositions are where opposing counsel questions my client and other witnesses and vice versa or reversal of fortune. I get to question the other side and other different witnesses. Even when a case is concluded and There’s been closing arguments. Oftentimes there are summations. Summations are the written, each side makes written arguments where they advance their positions. And there’s time provided for that. Matter of fact, I’m involved in one such case. to submit their summation and the other side consented because they need time as well. So this happens all the time. Deadlines, you can’t blow a deadline. You can’t miss a deadline, but you can request an extension of time and with good cause. And I’m a busy person. That might be, I mean, if that’s the application, I need more time because I’m busy. I don’t know. That may or may not fly. But if you then explain this trial came out, came about, this other circumstance happened, this illness, this condition, some of the stuff of life, legitimate reasons to request an extension. Deadlines meet and exceed. Expectations.

I received a waiver of citation. What do I do? Well, as in all things law, it depends. So let me give you the condition precedent. The situation that caused you to get. Someone passed away. And if there was no will, you might be entitled to inherit. So someone passed away with a last will and testament. And inside of a last will and testament, there is an executor. The executor has to get appointed to handle the affairs of the estate. To take assets that were in the individual name of the decedent. the person that passed away. So they have a house, they have a bank account, stock, bond, brokerage account, something in their name, an asset in their name individually, and it’s stuck frozen in that person’s name. So the executor of the will has to get appointed to become the fiduciary, to become the responsible party for the estate, to handle those affairs, the matters related to the estate. And part of the court process is you can file a citation. That’s like the, hello, there’s a court proceeding, right? You’re citing someone to come to court. The alternative to that is that instead of citing the person, sending out legal process, you can send them a waiver. And they say, I consent to this person being the executor. I’m not going to object to the will. There’s that scenario. And then there’s the cousin to that scenario. If a person passes away without a will, a loved one, a family member has to file to be the administrator of the estate. It’s a cousin of the executor. It’s the same type of role, same fiduciary responsibility, taking care of assets that were in the name of the deceased person, taking care of the affairs of the estate. But instead of being an executor because there was a will, you’d be the administrator in an administration process when there’s no will, that person died intestate. So a citation, we’re filing papers to administer the estate or the proposed administrator can send you a waiver of citation where you say, I consent. I have no objection to that person becoming the administrator and I think they’ll do a fine job. So what would you do if you received a waiver of citation? Go in full circle. If you had no objection to the will and you trusted that person and you thought the will was done in a valid way. Then you sign the waiver. Return it to the attorney for the estate. And by the same token, if you are satisfied that the person that’s the proposed administrator can do a fine job and you have no objection to that person handling the estate administration, then return the waiver. If you want to object to a will, if you want to fight the will, reach out. If you want to consent to the will, you just want to make sure that you’re all of the I’s dotted and the T’s crossed, reach out. As you can see, whether you want to fight or whether you want to consent, you should reach out to me.

Blended families, when done right, supply joy for all. But when you don’t land properly, it produced their own sets of difficulties and circumstances. Because if you have children from a prior marriage and you don’t properly plan well, what could happen? And what do I mean by don’t properly plan? Well, it’s layers of plans and levels of lengths and an array of plan if you have none. So you’re at zero. If you have a A will, you might be at a 7.5. And if you have a trust, you might be at a ten. So in this little story at ten is ten is really good. Well, if you have no plan, you follow the plan of New York State that’s intestate. And if a person passes away their asset, any asset they have in their individual name goes to their spouse and their children, spouse and children receive. So now what happens if a person is married and they have children from another relationship? Still their kids? If you own a house, that house, go to your spouse partially and to your children partially, but the spouse won’t.

That spouse may not want want to have shared and fracturing that sentence. Perhaps that spouse doesn’t want to provide for your child or the reverse. What would happen if you have your name on the deed with your spouse, but you also want to protect your children? You need a plan. So what are the things to do to figure out where things are going to go and how you want them to go and what to do? Well, speak to an estate planning attorney, this guy. Speak to a state planning attorney and let that attorney know what’s good, what it is that you’re looking to do, and then we can have a conversation about what would make the most sense for you and speak to your family. Let them know this is what I intend to do. I’m going to provide for my spouse for a period of time, and then the house is going to go to you children. I have money in a bank account that’s going to go children. And I want this other specific asset to go here or there.
Right. So for an attorney to speak to your family, think about the plan that you want take care of. Don’t just set a plan. Set a plan, but then don’t forget it. Don’t forget to review it or look at it again. Periodic and frequent reviews of your plan make sense. Either both with an attorney or on your own. Just looking at your plan and looking at your family dynamics. While I was providing for this person and now we’re not so close. So I want to remove that person or give that person something like that. And if you have minor children, name a guardian for your children, especially if they are children of a blended family. You want to make sure that they are taking care of it. So those are just some of the things that I’d like you to think about when you have a thank you.

Americans do not want to think about what happens when they pass away, when they die, when unfortunately they do not live forever, at least not yet. In a Harris poll, because we always believe in polls, it has been realized that more than 50% of all Americans do not have a will. I do not know the statistics in other countries, but in America, overall, 50% do not have wills. No estate plan in place. no trust, no plan for when you pass away. And in certain minority communities, one in three or one in four people have a will. So give you the overall statistic. And in some segments of the population, it’s even more people, a higher percentage of persons not paying attention to what happened, not thinking about it. Why not? Well, at the outset, it involves a difficult conversation, a difficult thought process, coming to terms and to grips with your own mortality. Who wants to think about it? Well, My suggestion is, my counsel, my directive is that you think about whether it’s difficult or not, uncomfortable or not, because you’re not thinking about it for yourself. Because when you’re dead and gone, mostly everything doesn’t mix up. People keep on going, right? So your spouse could unfortunately be that they’re… I guess that’s a tricky thing, right? If I pass away before my spouse, it’s boohoo for me and better for her. But how can I say, unfortunately, that the spouse outlived you and that doesn’t work, right? The point is, at some point, if I pass away before my spouse, she has to think about, she’s the one with the problem. Or, it’s not me, I’m somewhere else. Not down below, it’s gonna stay in the ground. I guess it could be on a wall too. But if I’m not around, it’s the loved ones that are left with the pieces to pick up, right? I don’t wanna be too melodramatic. I’m already melodramatic enough. The plan allows a person to, your family members, your loved one, the people you care about, allows them to pick up the pieces seamlessly. Check to create a plan. That’s what it has to do. Please think about that.

A friend of mine wrote an article on leaving the original documents with your attorney. And it’s because he had a cautionary tale where a person was going to leave assets to a specific individual. That individual did not reside at home and upon the passing of the person, other family members, this is the accusation, allegation, contention, that other family members that had access to the home made that will disappear. I don’t know if that’s accurate supposition. This person doesn’t know it, but it at least is a reason for why you might want to have your original documents remain with the attorney so it’s there and safe, keep safe. And that’s because in New York, there’s a requirement that the original will be produced for probate original, not a copy. If you cannot find the original will, the presumption is that test date or the The person making the will destroyed, ripped it up and didn’t want to use it. I received a call today from a client, a past client that I had done a will for several years ago, older person. She told me that circumstances have changed. Her given situation is that she is not presently married, has no minor children. So she is providing to nieces and nephews, friends, charities, a number. And her circumstances change. She does not want to provide for the persons that she previously provided for. So I do not have original will. And she acknowledged that. I said, you left my office with the original will. Yes, I do. I have it. Yes, I did. I do have it. We didn’t speak in that kind of click-clack talk, but she has it in theory. Look, in actuality, she could rip up that will if she really didn’t want to give to person A, B, or C. That leaves her with no will. And as a person that’s single, right, a divorced person is considered single. A widowed person is considered single. A single person with no children, well, then other relatives that she may or may not have an interest in providing for would be. receive money or benefit on her assets. But if she definitely doesn’t want it to go to person A, B, and C, well, just don’t have that original will anymore. It’s not the best advice. It’s practical advice. If you rip it up, then you have nothing else in place. And it’s your money, your assets, your legacy, your bequest. If you don’t want to give to person A, B, and C, you’re not required to. It’s your stuff. Rip it up, but then make a new one. Give it to person X, Y, and Z, or this particular charity, or… I don’t know, your favorite cause. Or real flesh and blood people that are presently in your life, you know, that have deep meaning to you. So if you need assistance, frankbrunolaw.com.

Welcome to this video, the highlight of my day, and I hope to make it the highlight of your day. What can we speak about today? Well, my idea was to speak about the intersection of elder law, guardianship, and estate planning. You do three things? Yes. And a few others in the office with the assistance of several paralegals, several associate attorneys, and myself, and a receptionist too, and an assistant. The whole team, you’d be amazed. What is estate planning? Well, the idea behind estate planning is… These are going to be short, brief summaries so you see how they interact with each other and how we work in the office. Estate planning, in summary, is taking what you have acquired during your life and passing it on to the people that you love.
Family, friends, church, synagogue, mosque, hospital. And then when does that happen? Well, it happens upon your passing. But if you use a certain type of strategy, perhaps a trust, you can plan. plan also to give away things. You could always give away things during your life, right? Take your house and give it to your child. Does that make sense? Does it not make sense? We can discuss those things. Take money and gift it away. You can do that as part of a strategy. Might make sense. But then what would happen if you became incapacity? Who’s going to handle your affairs, your home, your business, your life? your accounts. Well, we put a plan into place. So that’s the broad category of estate planning.
If you fail to make a plan and there’s an incapacity, some circumstance, a tragic event, and they’re always tragic, a car accident, a stroke, another kind of injury, or the onset of one of the diseases of civilization of Alzheimer’s or dementia. Well, if you have an incapacity, who can handle your affairs? Is that plan in place? And if If there’s no plan in place, then you need a guardianship. Guardianship is the court process where one adult person applies to be the guardian of another adult person. The statute is not specific to age. It skews older because more often than not, well, and it can affect young or old, perhaps someone with a significant developmental disability, an adult person might want to become the guardian for their 19-year-old child.
that child is now legally an adult. That’s one area or one area of guardianship. And then the other, again, it skews older because of the onset of dementia or Alzheimer’s or a condition like that, where perhaps one adult person is seeking to be the guardian of their adult parents, right? So a 50-year-old child seeking to be the guardian of their 75-year-old parent, or as I’ve had people in their 60s looking to be the guardian of a parent in their 80s, about a 20 year difference. There are people that have had children younger than 20, typically 25, 30 years, and that trend is going old. So the general category was elder law. Those are issues that affect the elderly, and then guardianship and estate plan.
If you have any questions about this, check out the website, frankbrunolaw.com. Plenty of articles, blog posts, informational points, And the website has, besides vlogs, it has videos. Please take a look around. If you have a question, reach out to us. FrankBrunoLaw.com. I’m trying to shut you up. Doesn’t want to go. I guess just stay with me. All right, here we go. 

In custody cases where one parent is seeking to enforce a period of parenting time that was existing and by order of the court, and there’s another parent trying to stop or prevent or limit the visitations of that other parent. Well, you get to see that all the time in family when there’s no danger or inappropriate conduct. And inappropriate’s a big spectrum, right? But if it’s safe for your child to have a visit with the other parent, they’re supposed to call at 7 p.m. and they don’t call at that 7.15 appropriate. What if they call 7.45? Less appropriate, but maybe a job. What if they’re supposed to call at 7 p.m. and they call at 8.45 p.m.? What do we do? Should the one parent enforce the phone call time and say, calling, it’s out of bounds, can’t call at that time? Or should they field the call, maybe run interference, ask if the call could be made or let that call go, proceed maybe for a minute or two? I don’t know. How do you navigate? We are confronted by this type of activity all the time. Is the parent that’s not calling timely? Is it a matter of work? And maybe that telephone call shouldn’t have been directed to be 7 o’clock. Maybe it should have been directed to be 8 p.m. Maybe it should have been 8.30 p.m. Also, it depends on the age of the child, right? If the child is four or five, what if the child is 12 to 16? Thinking an 8.30 call or a 9 p.m. call is fine. I have a 16-year-old child. I have a 19 and a 21-year-old, but my 16-year-old is not in bed at nine o’clock. You have to work with the other parent and the parent should honor the order. So I see it from both ends. The parent that is trying to enforce a period of parenting time, that parent should do everything they can do to comply with the order. And make the phone call and step out of work or get out of work and call on a cell phone, right? Seven o’clock, whatever they have to do. Because when the court ordered that there should be phone calls at seven o’clock on a given day of the week, that was your opportunity to say, no, seven o’clock, I’m at work or I need it to be 730 or 830, some other time. But if that order went into effect, then the last court should honor it. And conversely, the parent that is exercising custodial control, well, maybe they could be a little bit lenient with the times, maybe a little bit forgiving. But of course they’re not going to be forgiving because that’s why they’re in court fighting over this and other things.

What does any litigant want? What does any lawyer want in a contested court matter? You want the opportunity to be heard. If I’m making an argument on behalf of my client, my advocacy is what I want the judge to listen to, to hear, to feel, to resonate with, to vibe with. I just want a shot. Allow me to make the argument. Let me advance the position of my client. But then let the other attorney make an argument. Let that person advance an argument, right? Perhaps what I’m discussing is sometimes a judge will step on your feet or silence or be abrupt or not listen. Please allow me to make the argument. Then give the other side an opportunity to make the argument. That’s beneficial for me. I get to hear the argument, the position they advance, the articulation of the position of the person and the rationale behind it. Perhaps listening to that can assist me in settling the case. It can assist my own client in hearing the argument advance. They can see how persuasive it is. They can understand that the argument resonates with the judge if the judge is swayed by that argument. So it makes sense if this emotion and also oral argument allow us to argue the case. It makes sense. I dislike when judges curt or short and doesn’t want to hear the counsel I’ve heard enough. Well, you should hear it. Allow me to say it. I’m not going to be rude or discourteous or infringe upon your time. I just want to advance the argument once. And with that one time, I will convince you of the merits of my client’s position.

I was in court today on a real estate litigation matter and I was involved in the case and a colleague of mine, a friend for a long time, was there as well on a different case and we were having some conversation and people were up in arms about different aspects of their own given cases and there was some heightened emotions and My colleague said to me, you know, Frank, when you’re involved in your family, family law work or your guardianship works, as I see you as a healer, you bring that that sense. And here in this part, it’s all blood and guts. It’s all about dollars and cents. It’s all about the money. There’s continued negotiation, continued this and that. Right. So there’s a time and a place for aggressive, heavy hitting litigation down and out, blood and guts. And then there’s a place for meeting of the minds coming together. Simplicity. I don’t know if that’s even the word, but just a feeling where we have to meet somewhere. Can’t be everything you want and can’t be everything I want. It can’t be heads you win, tails I lose. It has to be better than that. It has to be, right? That’s the family mantra in 2024. We have to do better. And people, in your litigation cases, when we’re looking to resolve matters, we have to do better. Come to terms.

What is your process? Well, my process is when? Well, when I receive a telephone inquiry about a new case. Depends on what the new case is. So if it’s a transactional arrangement, my sister would like to buy a house. Can you be the attorney for my sister? Yes. I get calls like that all the time. I always wonder why. I guess it’s to be helpful. I wonder why the person themselves is not calling me. calling for my mother, calling for my sister, calling for sometimes even a friend. And I provide the information because it’s good for that person to know for future dealings with me. And if it’s not a situation where I really have to understand facts, I guess I always need to know facts, but if a person says, my sister’s looking to buy a house, can you be her attorney? Can you tell me a little bit about it? Well, sure, I could do that. And then I go through a little bit of a explanation. You may know the attorney for a seller prepares the contract sale. That attorney forwards it to the attorney for the buyer. The attorney for the buyer will review it alone and then review it with the prospective buyer to discuss terms, circumstances, confirm information. Is this the property address? And is this the price? And is that how you spell your name? What is the down payment? And what are your terms? Where are you living now? What are you looking to… When are you looking to close? You know, all of those circumstances. Then describe all of the issues related to contract. And then besides telling about the process, you know, from contract to closing, you independently seek a mortgage. I searched the title. We then speak about issues such as costs, cost of the attorney, the cost of obtaining a mortgage, the payment of the bank’s attorney, the closing fees. Did they have a realtor that buyer themselves were paying? inspections, survey. We talk about it all. And that’s it. That’s the process. That’s my process. That’s how I, in that specific area of practice, that’s how I go through these one by one to discuss what we do and how we do it. That’s my process.

Where is the probate court? Well, in New York, we call that the surrogates court. And the surrogates court is located on the sixth and seventh floor of the Supreme Court building. In Brooklyn, there’s a physical location also housed within another large. The surrogates court, for all of its jurisdiction, control, and power governing the end of life issues related to distribution of assets after a person has passed away, well, It can take place on a smaller scale than courtrooms and floors and floors of real estate infrastructure. So the court itself concerns itself with administration, probate, countings of those issues, and kinship. Any issues related to how you get an asset from a person’s name upon their death to a next of kin or a beneficiary or a distributee takes place. Some people try to bypass that court. They don’t want the involvement. They don’t want the public involvement. knowledge of their assets, their circumstances, and where money goes. So that category of person will use a trust. A trust is a private document that takes place, a living trust takes place while a person is living, living trust. And that is a set of instructions or rules. It’s a legal document that is, when done correctly, valid during the person’s life and has great effect during their life and after that, provided that the trust has the assets funded within it. So if I have a trust and a separate property in my individual name, the trust won’t govern, control that property until the property makes its way into the trust. So from all the way back to the surrogates court, there is a surrogates court in every county. In Queens, it’s physically located inside the court. Other counties have the surrogates court located elsewhere. Oh boy. But the question was, where’s the probate? Well, other places and other locations and other states call it probate. But in New York, we call it the survey. I think that’s it for now. And if you have questions about where the court’s located or how you file something, whether it be probate, probate or an administration or an accounting, or you have the need for a kinship, please reach out, give you a call. We’ll speak about it. Your people will connect with my people and information and assistance will be had by all.

Why do lawyers stand in the way of settlement and resolution? I don’t know why. And I don’t even know if that’s accurate. Although it feels directionally accurate, it sort of feels right that some lawyers do actually prevent their side from settling. And that could be. And that’s perhaps a topic for another day. What I often find is that a person involved in litigation blames their own lawyer. I agree with you, but my lawyer says I can’t. I’m almost, you know, I’m almost okay with, you know, taking that clause out, but my lawyer says I need that. For my own protection, really, so we have to leave. Or I would give you more time, but my lawyer says, or some portion of that. A person uses the excuse of the lawyer or the threat of the lawyer as a way to get some perceived or or realized advance. I really want to make fee payment in this agreement or I really want this kind of notice provision. That’s what I want. I’m going to say that’s with my lawyer and that the lawyer won’t agree or let me resolve the case without that power being in there. Listen, that’s part of the negotiation as well. It’s part of resolution and possible settlement talk, but it’d be nice if people could just be direct. Really, I think you should give me 48 hours notice. You shouldn’t just be able to call two hours, right? Or you should let me know about a change in schedule as soon as you know and not wait until the last minute. So, Sometimes lawyers put their kibosh on an agreement or a settlement and sometimes they just get blamed for it.