Blog Post Archives - Timins Law Group

Hey Expats: Come Home to Get Your Family’s Money

Posted on February 16, 2026

Hey Expats: Come Home to Get Your Family’s Money Despite the flaccid threats of political naysayers who threaten to leave the country after every presidential election (only to realize the United States is a markedly better place to live than countries with poutine, meme bans and gulags), some Americans actually do leave the U.S. on a near permanent basis. These novice ambassadors of American culture do typically maintain their U.S. citizenship for several reasons, some of which have to do with maintaining some financial benefit. But being an expat – or having an expatriated citizen be a beneficiary or fiduciary of your Estate – can lead to a lot of Estate Planning challenges, and post-mortem difficulties that

New York’s Proposed “Right to Die” Law is Lame

Posted on January 8, 2026

New York’s Proposed “Right to Die” Law is Lame We don’t have a choice to be born into this world, and until recently people were not even given the legal right to leave it on our terms. People helplessly watched their mentally competent loved ones physically suffer during their last few months of life with no right to end their pain. And while society’s opinions regarding more liberal end-of-live options changed long ago, countries and states have only recently passed laws regarding a human’s right to face their death on their terms. After a moral grudge match between two diametrically opposed philosophies, in 2025 New York’s assembly finally pushed through a right to die bill, which languished for months,

No Country for Old Men: Don’t Name an Elderly Executor or Trustee

Posted on November 26, 2025

No Country for Old Men: Don’t Name an Elderly Executor or Trustee While I don’t have a lot of new material to share during my first consultation with prospects, a popular one-liner I use is “You’re not old until you are 92.” And while Christie Brinkly will be hotter than your college girlfriend and Chuck Norris will still be kick blasting 2x4s when they are nonagenarians, EVERYONE ELSE in their 90s is OLD. And being elderly and an Executor or Trustee can be a bad combination for both fiduciary and beneficiary alike. In a world where we speak in real time with people 10,000 miles away, transfer millions of dollars with a tap on our cellphone, and travel

ANOTHER Reason Wills are Cruddy: Testamentary Trusts

Posted on September 26, 2025

ANOTHER Reason Wills are Cruddy: Testamentary Trusts Yep, I’m here to bash on New York Probate and Wills again, so if you love large legal fees, Court intervention and long waits for unnecessarily complex services, you may want to start watching your favorite rerun of Better Call Saul now. What would you say if I told you that after going through the many annoyances of Probate you may still be stuck working with the Court for another 20+ years? I’m guessing the words would be colorful, like the post credits scene of that night in college you tried Jello shots. Yes, when you use a Will to protect assets you transfer to other friends and family members, your

TREAT YOURSELF: Order Extra Death Certificates

Posted on August 14, 2025

TREAT YOURSELF: Order Extra Death Certificates Sometimes the only good thing to come from a person’s death is the money they leave to others. So why do so many families get gun shy spending a few extra dollars for what is arguably the most important document of that person’s post-mortem affairs? It’s totally normal, and always to your benefit, to order many more Death Certificates of your departed loved one than you think you will need, preferably sooner rather than later. Death Certificates Transfer Everything Aside from joint accounts, you cannot transfer any property from a deceased person’s assets without a valid (and usually original) Death Certificate. Times you will likely need a Death Certificate to

Pregnant and Brain Dead: How to Make Your Living Will Effective

Posted on June 27, 2025

Pregnant and Brain Dead: How to Make Your Living Will Effective The heart wrenching story of Adriana Smith exhibits both the legal limitations placed on Living Wills, and the impossibility of planning for every potential end of life decision we may have to face. Adriana, aged 30, went from having headaches one day to experiencing deadly blood clots in her brain the next morning, leaving her brain dead. To add to this tragedy, Adriana was well into her first trimester of pregnancy and under Georgia state law could no longer have her life support terminated due to the state’s abortion laws (and no, this article is not going to discuss abortion law, no no no). And while Adriana’s

When Bill Met Jordan: Does Dad Really Need Protection From Himself?

Posted on May 8, 2025

When Bill Met Jordan: Does Dad Really Need Protection From Himself? It sounds like the most exhausting romcom script a Hollywood agent has to read since the script where Adam Sandler tried to date Jennifer Aniston for a seventh movie: Aging, successful NFL coach is on a flight, sits next to college cheerleader, orders her a Cherry Mojito, and every category of “journalist” gets a seat at the dinner table. Cheerleader (starring Jordan Hudson) starts dressing scantily and acting like a boss, Coach (played by Bill I’m-Still-Pinching-Myself Belichick) is allowed to visit her dorm room and stream Netflix and stuff. Tabloids and families shriek “Dad is falling under the spell of Young Girl,” Young Girl exerts more influence, buys

PROTECT YOUR MONEY BY FREEZING YOUR CREDIT NOW

Posted on April 3, 2025

PROTECT YOUR MONEY BY FREEZING YOUR CREDIT NOW Your personal financial information is worth stealing. And it is also worth defending. The unfortunate truth is you cannot stop your identity from being stolen, but you can still protect your credit and money when your identity is stolen. We all go out of our way to defend our Social Security Number and credit card information, we do not answer phone calls from Wichita or Biloxi or Chevy Chase (the place and the person), and we uncontrollably yell at ourselves with crazy eyes in the mirror every time we open an email attachment from a suspicious address. Sadly, while we are doing everything we can to protect our financial information,

Don’t Let Aunt Mildred’s Photo ID Expire

Posted on December 20, 2024

You will need valid photo identification for the remainder of your life. From signing legal documents to opening new bank accounts, government offices and financial organizations require valid picture identification to legally transact business. So it is concerning to learn that most elderly individuals do not have any valid photo ID, and downright frustrating to realize this lack of legal photo identification can cost families tens of thousands of dollars during the last years of their loved ones’ lives. As we age, our photo identification expires and is not renewed for mostly predictable reasons: People no longer plan on traveling so they do not renew their passport, they move in with a family member or to an assisted living

Living Wills in New York May be Useless

Posted on November 14, 2024

There are few rational reasons to having a Living Will in New York, almost no legal benefits to having one, and Living Wills may cause more confusion than guidance in your final days of life. There are several misperceptions concerning what a Living Will actually is. For starters, the very name “Living Will” is a misnomer: It is neither a living document (because it discusses your desire to have someone “pull the plug” on life sustaining measures), nor is it a will (a document which distributes property upon your death). Some people refer to this document as an “Advanced Directive”, but I am pretty sure the Advanced Directive is a Star Trek term regarding Captain Kirk’s alien kissing fetish or