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Full-Text Articles in Estates and Trusts
The Stranger-To-The-Marriage Doctrine: Judicial Construction Issues Post-Obergefell, Lee-Ford Tritt
The Stranger-To-The-Marriage Doctrine: Judicial Construction Issues Post-Obergefell, Lee-Ford Tritt
UF Law Faculty Publications
This Article tracks the evolution of inheritance law for adopted children and suggests that courts use construction approaches that worked in the context of a new understanding of the parent-child relationship as a guide to construing wills in the context of changing social and legal definitions of the martial relationship. In this regard, Part II offers a brief overview of pertinent construction doctrines. Next, Part III summarizes the history of inheritance law for adopted children. Finally, Part IV draws an analogy between the stranger-to-the-adoption doctrine and an approach to inheritance law for same-sex spouses that this Essay calls the "stranger-to-the-marriage" …
Disrupting The Wealth Gap Cycles: An Empirical Study Of Testacy And Wealth, Danaya C. Wright
Disrupting The Wealth Gap Cycles: An Empirical Study Of Testacy And Wealth, Danaya C. Wright
UF Law Faculty Publications
In an empirical study of all decedents dying in 2013 in Alachua County, Florida whose estates were probated, either testate or intestate, the data show striking correlations between intestacy and lower wealth, and testacy and greater wealth. And the demographics of those who died intestate correspond to the demographics of those people at risk of falling into the cycle of wealth-dissipation. To explore the possible effects of intestacy and testacy on wealth and property succession, I analyzed 408 estates (293 testate and 115 intestate) across a variety of categories, including wealth, age, race, sex, and marital status. All of these …
Tearing Down The Wall: How Transfer-On-Death Real-Estate Deeds Challenge The Inter Vivos/Testamentary Divide, Danaya C. Wright, Stephanie Emrick
Tearing Down The Wall: How Transfer-On-Death Real-Estate Deeds Challenge The Inter Vivos/Testamentary Divide, Danaya C. Wright, Stephanie Emrick
UF Law Faculty Publications
This Article will examine one of the most recent will substitutes, the transfer-on-death (“TOD”) real-estate deed. Nearly half of the states have recognized, through common-law forms or legislation, a mechanism to allow for the transfer of real property on death without using a will, without following the will formalities, and without necessitating probate. This new tool in the estate planner’s toolbox is invaluable: revocable trusts have proven too expensive for decedents of modest means, and wills continue to require formalities that can easily frustrate non-lawyer-drafted estate documents. But the variety of TOD deed rules and mechanisms that the different states …
Dispatches From The Trenches Of America's Great Gun Trust Wars, Lee-Ford Tritt
Dispatches From The Trenches Of America's Great Gun Trust Wars, Lee-Ford Tritt
UF Law Faculty Publications
Without question, the national dialogue pertaining to the right to bear arms and the possible expansion of gun control regulations is shaping up to be one of the more heated political topics of the twenty-first century. At the moment, fervent participants on both sides of this ongoing debate have focused a spotlight on an estate planning instrument commonly referred to as a “gun trust.” Typically, estate planning products rarely cause the kind of nationally impassioned discussion as seen with gun trusts. So why have trusts, a commonly used estate planning tool, become entangled in this lively, and often vitriolic, national …