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30 Apr Ep. 39 Wills and Trusts with Attorney Lisa D. Brown
In this episode, Realtor Adam Kruse and Realtor Shannon St. Pierre talk to attorney Lisa D. Brown, about wills and trusts. Find out why it is never too soon to start thinking about what will happen to your estate when you pass away.
Email questions to PODCAST@HermannLondon.com
WHAT’S INSIDE
0:47 Adam introduces attorney, Lisa Brown
1:16-Six new agents have joined the Hermann London Real Estate Group
1:40 Adam bought a house in Jennings for $5,000, put $12,000 into it, and it will rent for $650 a month
2:00 It’s fun to buy a house low and completely fix it up because you know everything is up to grade
3:03 Shannon St. Pierre is looking for a seller in the Hill neighborhood
3:44 Adam has been having some sewer lateral issues lately and fixing them can be different between each municipality
4:44 Does Hermann London share buyer needs on the Hermann London Facebook page?
6:52 Adam has hired Lisa to create a will for him previously
7:54 What is the legal definition of probate?
9:07 What is intestate?
9:25 What is testate?
9:33 Who is your heir after you die?
10:08 What is a legatee, devisee, and beneficiary?
10:29 What is the legal definition of a will?
11:05 Does a will avoid probate?
12:05 Why does a will have to go to probate if assets have already been assigned?
12:45 What is a pod (payable on death) and tod (transferable on death) designation?
13:15 What is the definition of a trust and what is the main reason for a trust?
14:15 What is a grantor and what do they do?
16:20 Why didn’t Prince have a will and what is happening to his estate?
15:55 Why didn’t Prince have a will?
18:30 Adam had a friend who had 4 sisters and it took 11 years for probate to settle her dad’s estate
20:18 What’s the easiest way to put a loved one’s name on a home without doing a refinance? Cohabitation agreement? Quick claim deed?
21:15 What is the purpose of adding someone’s name to a title?
21:37 What is a beneficiary deed?
22:25 Will adding a name to a title trigger an acceleration clause to the mortgage?
23:50 Young couples will often buy a house together but only one name will be on the mortgage
26:28 Should a married couple have their house in a trust?
30:44 How can someone gift money to their kids and not have it be a taxable event?
30:50 What is a gift tax?
33:00 What is the lifetime limit of gifts someone can give over $15,000?
33:44 How is a gift recorded?
36:55 At what age should someone get a will?
38:12 Adam’s parents made him create a will before he went on vacation
39:50 If you don’t have a will do all of the assets go to the next of kin or is it divided equally?
40:45 What is the Missouri Probate Code?
41:00 How can an investor buy property in probate?
41:54 What are some legal newspapers? What is Missouri Lawyers Media, The Watchman, The St. Louis Daily
43:50 How do use a trust to transfer property to your kids and what are the tax advantages?
46:50 In Breaking Bad, Skyler wanted to give Ted $200,000 so he could pay the taxes without getting audited so they found a dead aunt for him to inherit the money from.
48:12 Is there a lot of fraud when it comes to wills
48:46 Adam shares a story about a guy in the 1800’s who had a will with a clause that his estate wouldn’t be split up for another 5 generations. What is a spite clause?
52:15 What inspires people to come into Lisa Brown’s office to set up a will?
53:00 How does a child bring up the topic of a will to their parents?
53:25 What happens when your parents can no longer take care of each other?
54:00 What kind of end of life decisions do people have to make? Cremation? Burial? Life support?
54:55 Adam’s family talks about death like it is a new movie or like they are going to Walgreens
55:15 What are the challenges of having property in a trust? Is it easy to refinance?
56:30 How do will and trusts have to do with real estate and Realtors?
56:49 What is durable power of attorney? What is a healthcare directive?
58:10 Can someone have different durable power of attorneys for health and finances
58:38 Is it better to have a neutral third party in a will instead of a child?
59:35 How hard is it for a trustee to divide an estate up?
1:00:00 What is a personal property distribution list?
1:02:33 Who lives under Lisa’s roof?
1:02:43 When is Lisa at her best?
1:03:10 Does Lisa have a favorite blog or book?
1:03:49 What is Lisa’s guilty pleasure?
1:04:10 Who is Lisa’s mentorsand how has she thanked them?
1:05:11 Contact Lisa. D. Brown at 314-768-6893 and Lisa.Brown-ATTY@att.net
TRANSCRIPTION
Adam: live from the rooftop of the Hermann London real estate group in beautiful downtown Maplewood it’s the st. Louis realtor podcast with your host Adam Kruse…live from the rooftop of their home in London real estate group it’s the st. Louis realtor podcast welcome welcome everybody and today is podcast 39 it’s April 25th 2018 we’ve got of course my wonderful co-host Shannon st. Pierre here
Shannon: hello hello
Adam: and we’re very excited for a very special guest today we have Lisa Brown Esquire is that right
Lisa: yeah attorney-at-law that’s good too
Adam: Lisa brown attorney at law okay so today we’re gonna be talking all about probate and wills and trusts um I’d like to get my little Harmon run an update first if you don’t mind and so we just we’ve had a lot of good stuff going on with the company here especially in the last month or two we’ve had six new agents that have joined the company or it’s kind of exciting to have sort of a group together that are all on the same path and we’re gonna be meeting with them and doing some training and accountability and I’m excited for them they all kind of come from a different place and have different goals and stuff so it’s just neat to see you know what what happens with these Realtors um I like giving updates on some of my investments I bought a house and believe it or not bought it for $5,000 and we’re gonna pay about $12,000 to put into it and so we’ll have about seventeen thousand into it and it’s gonna rent for six hundred fifty bucks a month
Shannon: so what area
Lisa: yeah
Adam: it’s in Jennings
Lisa: was it an MLS deal
Adam: it was a non MLS deal it was sent to us by I guess a wholesaler so it’s just exciting to be able to buy houses for that it’s kind of sad that you can buy houses for that but it’s exciting for us to build a buy it and rent it out and we’ll make really good cash flow and by that we like buying them low like and then being able to put the work into it because then we know the house is in really good shape versus sometimes you know you buy it for more and maybe there’s an already a tenant in there or something like that but then you are constantly having to do work to it so this way we can get in there and put in new I think we’re literally doing new floors and walls and kitchen cabinets and bathrooms and all that kind of stuff
Lisa: discover any defects before you get anybody in there
Adam: yeah exactly yeah and you’re thinking how are you gonna do all that for $12,000 well I don’t think it’s a very big house and I don’t think we’re gonna be using [???] I mean I think we’re gonna go to I don’t know we’re not going to be going I don’t even know like a high-end kitchen store in town but we’re not going to go into the high-end kitchen store in town shannon I like to give a little update I know you got a new buyer looking on the hill
Shannon: Yes
Adam: last night so are you needing someone to so you need to sell it on the hill right
Shannon: yeah so we were looking for a seller on the hill and he’s really there in that 150,000 price point so I don’t think they need much it’s just two individuals so but it’s that’s a really tough price point
Adam: especially now right I have a house on the hill but I’m like man eight years ago I would have loved if sold you that thing for $150,000 but now I just think I can get a lot more for it and so okay and then have you I’ve had a lot of sewer lateral problems lately have you been dealing with any of those it’s
Lisa: you know I feel like I go in and out of phases where the sewer lateral will be the main issue for a while not so much lately it’s not been a bad deal
Adam: that’s good it’s interesting to see all the different municipalities around town and all their little programs that they have to help pay for sewer lateral things and some of them will pay from the house out some of them will only pay on the parts of the city owns this one that we’re dealing with the city will pay for 85% of whatever the plumbers bid is but you have to use their specific plumber and it’s only on the outside of the house and stuff so sewer lateral problems are you know kind of a pain but it’s interesting because there’s a lot of times there’s sort of programs I’ll pay for it I know Mabel it has a great program for it too but they’re like get on our list we’ll get to eventually
Shannon: they say how long the list was right now
Adam: I don’t remember
Lisa: okay now I have a question just you listen to guys does Herman London have a Facebook page that people can follow
Adam: it does
Lisa: okay so when you are like looking for a seller on the hill to maybe get your buyers involved with do you put that information on the Facebook page so that people like me that follow that can share it with their other realtor friends and yes Adam I’m sorry I have other realtor friends so that they might perhaps reach out to clients they know are looking in that area
Adam: that’s such a good question it’s funny it’s funny to think about that because Shannon and I I don’t know what Shannon thought was but I’m like ah no one’s gonna like it’s just there’s so much noise out there to us because I follow all these Realtors on Facebook and everything and all I see on my facebook is people going need a seller need a buyer need of this need of that I’m like there’s so much noise that I feel like it’s just polluted but someone who’s not a realtor you probably don’t see as much about that you see like people at restaurants people brushing their teeth whatever and like right the real estate one maybe sticks out more to you think we should do that Shannon
Shannon: yeah I don’t think I think we do it when we have a listing like a seller and we do put up and advertise the property but not necessarily when we have buyers and work
Lisa: yeah because I’ve got I’ve got a friend who’s a realtor she does a lot of stuff down in in Union you know Union Missouri yeah and so she’ll put on there hey somebody’s looking for a house and such and such a school district in Union and then anybody listen that area is just like boom talk to such-and-such they’re selling their house okay so that post will just blow up so you know
Adam: that’s smart we give that a shot thank you for that [???] from the attorney so let’s go ahead and jump into the main content of the show so lisa is an expert in what is this whole kind of confusing world to me and that’s one of the reasons we want to have you here today I am interest of full disclosure I did hire Lisa to do a will for me and a trust for me and is all that part of the thing where they’re like medical power of attorney or whatever
Lisa: well your powers of attorney are separate from Mike your will and your trust
Adam: okay so I did a bunch of that stuff because I knew I needed to called Lisa and said give me the gold package or whatever I just want it all right and so I just wanted to disclose that but I think we should start off today’s show by like any legal document they always seem to start off at the very beginning with definitions okay so if you don’t mind can I ask you to define probate to define wills and defined trusts
Lisa: sure sure first of all I cannot say that I am an expert but is my main area of practice as wills and trusts probate
Adam: can I say you’re an expert
Lisa: if that is your opinion
Adam: that’s my opinion
Lisa: because you were satisfied with work I did [???] a good definition for probate is it is the process of transferring legal title from a decedent who died a person who died owning assets in their name alone that didn’t automatically transfer via like a beneficiary designation for example to somebody else so you need probate to be able to transfer that property to that person’s heirs at law which is blood relatives or or spouse or the persons named in their will and heirs and people named in the will don’t necessarily have to be the same people
Adam: okay so I think we need a whole nother list of things we need to find there but if you don’t mind Shannon can you try to say like that back in like layman’s terms what probate is to you
Shannon: so the way that I think I understand probate is I think of probate court and a judge that determining what a will is supposed supposedly saying or and or there’s no well than the dividing assets among who’s ever gonna show up or the heirs
Lisa: kinda so with probate you have two things you have intestate that’s somebody that dies without a will
Adam: okay
Shannon: so thats like friends
Lisa: right
Shannon: right now
Lisa: yes
Shannon: so which is
Lisa: yeah [???] and and then there’s test eight that’s somebody that dies with a will and your heirs obviously you don’t know who your heirs are until the day you die because you don’t know what your life situation is until that date so like if I died today my heirs would be my mother and my three siblings
Shannon: oh it’s always next of kin
Lisa: right yeah and that’s and there’s a statute that sex all of that out and you keep going so like if I if I was single and had nobody but my dog then it would go out to like aunts and uncles and cousins and and you just keep branching out on the family tree until you hit somebody and then that’s that’s the air a leg of tea or a devise II or beneficiary for our purposes is the person that is named in the will to inherit that person’s property okay
Adam: okay
Lisa: and they don’t know and like I said an heir and a legatee don’t necessarily have to be the same person
Adam: so many questions but let’s just get definitions here what is a will
Lisa: a will is a legal document that you create that you nominate who your executor or in the state of Missouri they call it a personal representative and that’s the person who will administer your assets sign all the documents to get the probate process started make sure all the assets are then distributed to the people named in the will or or to the heirs depending on the situation and then of course it names who the beneficiaries are going to be now a common misconception a will does not avoid probate
Adam: okay
Lisa: okay so like I said the will is just the document where you are restating who you trust to handle that stuff and where you want your assets to go when you die
Adam: it’s so us to go to probate but maybe probate will be a lot easier because there was a will
Lisa: right it’s right because then you don’t necessarily have the fighting between the family members oh no no I need to do this I know what I’m doing or and I don’t trust you and that kind of stuff so you know added paperwork to get the probate process started so by having a will in place you can avoid a lot of that
Adam: so people always think of I I think people always think of their will as saying who gets what right like my brother gets my car or whatever but the other important aspect of it you’re saying is not only who gets what but who gets to be responsible for everything
Lisa: correct
Adam: okay
Shannon: so then in that well though you’re naming someone to carry out
Lisa: right
Shannon: but why so why does it have to go to probate if you’ve named what you want to happen to your assets in the will and and exactly any name because they’re to carry it off
Lisa: because unless you take additional steps you are you still are owning that asset in your name alone so after you die the like say your bank account okay and so that Bank is just like okay they’ve died we have no further direction on what to do with the balance of this bank account
Adam: they won’t look at a will they want to look at something from the court well something they go
Lisa: right they need they need something so if so if you haven’t put a payable-on-death designation P OD or transfer on death Tod designation on that account the bank is just like okay the accounts closed that balance is going to sit here you know until we get some sort of court order telling us what to do with it and after so long they turn it over to the state as an unclaimed asset so that’s why you see all these commercials about you know call the state you might have money and that kind of stuff
Adam: so this it seems like this show is really all about death today but I guess I guess it’s also a lot of times it’s going to be about taxes right and I think that’s where the next topic or the next definition we want from you is the definition of trusts
Lisa: okay
Adam: that’s a lot of times about death but is that a lot of times used for taxes too
Lisa: it can be the main reason to have a trust is to avoid probate because by having your assets transferred into a trust which is an entity you’ve created that can hold all of your assets you know stocks bonds bank accounts real estate cars everything you can make it the beneficiary for your life insurance by having all of your assets in that trust then the bank knows okay hey the this assets gonna go into this trust now you know we don’t have anything to do with it
Adam: so a Trust is kind of like a fancy word for basically a company it’s a kind of like a corporation but just one person owns it or what’s the definition
Lisa: well a trust is set up by the asset owner who is called the grantor so the grantor will set up the trust and then they and then the trust document will state but you know what all your powers are is trust the grantor can also be the trustee so you continue to just manage the assets like you manage them on your own now
Adam: while you’re alive
Lisa: right while you’re alive and they are in the trust and then the trust document States out sets out your powers as trustee so what you have the authority to do with those assets now that they’re in the trust and you know you can make them as broad or specific as you need to and then of course there’s statutory things that need to be followed as well but and then the trust document will state then who the ultimate beneficiaries are so once the grantor passes away then the trust document states okay everything’s to be divided up between all my kids or it’s all going to charity or you know whatever you want
Adam: so a Trust is kind of like a will but a trust never dies right
Lisa: well until the purpose of the trust is taken care of and then it would terminate
Adam: okay okay clear as mud [???] think about all this stuff is so interesting is you need to know a little bit about it right you need to do it right you guys I have these things but that’s why you call Lisa that’s why I called Lisa at least I’m like I know enough to know I want this stuff and I don’t know exactly why or what it’s gonna do and that’s why I call you now with questions like wait should I put this in my trust or whatever and you’re like no I don’t you should do it this way or whatever buddy okay so we’ve started with their definitions and thank you for that I know that I’ve got a list of questions I’m sure Shannon does too do we want to jump into our questions first or do we want to talk about interesting stuff like prints
Shannon: yeah it’s [???] very interesting because I cannot believe that he didn’t even have a a will so he passes away and now everything sits in probate I mean he and while he is on the grand scale and we have nothing in comparison it’s interesting to watch and I think that that’s what brings these conversations to the table is when something like this happens and it’s in the public eye is why do you need a will but most people think why do I need a will I only have a house I only have a couple cars
Adam: Lisa do you think people like prints didn’t have a will because he didn’t have any smart people advising him or do you think he didn’t want to have to like outline who he was giving stuff to when he died or do you think he just didn’t think he was gonna die anytime soon
Lisa: I think she is the most
Adam: people just don’t think it’s
Lisa: just one of those you know I’m just gonna stick my head in the sand I don’t want to deal with it I don’t want to face yeah yeah yeah you don’t want to face your own mortality it upsets me or people that have small children where I have to have that uneasy conversation with them about what if something happens to the two of you you know we kind of need to name a guardian or you know you want that trust in place to hold your assets so that your minor children have somebody you trust managing your assets for their benefit that type of thing and they don’t want to think about oh my God my my kids aren’t going to have parents they don’t know
Adam: they’re like how dare you [???]
Shannon: I think there’s nothing worse than talking about your own mortality then talking about what happens to my kids if we both
Lisa: exactly
Shannon: like that is worse than right I mean that’s probably one of the scariest thoughts as a parent
Adam: but also people probably have trouble going to their parents and saying dad do you have a will dad do you have trust whatever or mom or whatever because they don’t want their parents to think you just want my money right right
Lisa: right yeah that’s that’s a hard conversation to start with your parents sometimes
Adams: I have a friend who she is one of four sisters her father died a little over 11 years ago and it was about two or three months ago they finally got everything finalized
Shannon: where’s the mother not alive
Adam: the mother was it was a divorce and stuff like that way before the father died that was like way all done with and so 11 years went on and now the sisters are not friends anymore and they don’t like each other anymore and they finally got their money but all you know like 11 years and it really the because he didn’t have a will I think it broke up their sisterhood or whatever which is probably his worst nightmare you know
Lisa: that can be it sometimes I mean even when there is a plan in place that can still create a family divide because you have the person that you know then takes over to manage stuff and they’re like I have all the power you can’t tell me what to do I’ll do things in my own sweet time and no that’s not how it’s supposed to be so that’s when you know sometimes litigation could come into play which you know I try to avoid that as much as possible because you want to keep the family Union intact as much as you can it’s just like okay you realize by suing your sister you may never talk to her ever again in your life in her lifetime are you prepared for that consequence
Adam: that’s what happened
Lisa: is there a way we can do this without ripping the family apart
Adam: yes that’s exactly what happened they got ripped apart because they all wanted money and this and that and one of them finally ended up giving in but now she feels taken Vantage of and you know it’s crazy I’m sure you hear that kind of stuff all the time
Lisa: yeah
Adam: alright if you don’t mind I’m gonna jump into some of my questions I got I asked my facebook followers or whatever to submit any questions they had okay so I have one person who said what’s the easiest way to put a partner’s name on a home without doing a refinance is it a quitclaim deed is it a cohabitation agreement etc not I’m dealing with this right now and I’m not sure what to do so this was a client of mine she bought a house and she’s living with her partner and she’s like how do I add her to this – I guess she wants to add it to the house but not to the mortgage
Lisa: okay
Adam: she doesn’t want to do a refinance because that can be expensive and probably rates her higher than when she just bought it she’s asking about a quitclaim deed which if I have my guess you’re gonna say that maybe what is a cohabitation agreement is that like a legal thing
Shannon: [???]
Lisa: I would take a cohabitation just based on the scenario you’re giving me I’m wondering if she’s talking about a cohabitation I guess the first thing I would ask is what’s the purpose of adding the title is it so that if something happens to the owner she wants to make sure her partner stays in the house
Adam: Okay
Lisa: and her family can’t come in and try to take the house sell it up from out from underneath her
Adam: good question
Lisa: you know if that is the purpose then I would recommend that the owner you know she still owns it she’s done the mortgages in her name and then you just do a beneficiary deed so if something happens to the owner the partners name is the beneficiary she inherits the house subject to any lien and then the house is hers and the owners family can’t come in and and try to sell it out from underneath something
Adam: okay thank so it yours I guess a lot of times I think these couples you know they don’t know what to do and what to say right and so they’re probably looking at it and she’s like this is my house you know and her partner probably doesn’t feel a sense of ownership of the house or whatever so the beneficiary deed may or may not solve that I guess
Lisa: right
Adam: right
Lisa: so then the next question would be no we want to own the house together because we’re partners but we don’t want that to affect the mortgage in any way so you want to make sure that by adding another owner to the house that doesn’t trigger any type of acceleration clause in the mortgage so we’ve kind of kind of look at that because you don’t want an unintended consequence just you know adding another owner to the house
Adam: is it really fair for the for the one person to be an owner and have the mortgage and the other person just to be an owner with no
Lisa: that’s their relationship between them
Adam: but could you on this some document that you’re making could you make her partner like somehow equally liable for the mortgage which is something that I have in a lot of my operating agreements
Lisa: you would have to have her like almost guarantee the mortgage and somehow I guess you would have to look at the terms of the mortgage to answer that question
Adam: okay and so you’re saying hey it depends basically your answer is depends maybe a beneficiary deed
Lisa: right
Adam: but if you want to like be on the title or whatever then there’s other options but you might want to check in to them before
Lisa: yeah the answer to a quick claim deed but you know then there could be consequences to that
Adam: with your lender
Lisa: right
Adam: and so the quitclaim deed she would take it from her name and then put it back into her name but just add another name
Lisa: right
Adam: okay and so as cohabitation agreements not it’s not a legal document it sounds like more like a little lease or something like that right
Lisa: get kinda
Adam: okay
Lisa: just with the information I’m getting
Adam: cool well I think that’s really interesting because we deal with a lot of okay I don’t need to say young I guess necessarily but couples who are buying a property but just one of them is on the mortgage
Lisa: right
Adam: and I think that person doesn’t know what to say to their significant other about that
Lisa: right
Adam: and like you want you want your partner I’ll just call it partner to feel like they have some sense of ownership in the house right and not be like I’m not helping you paint this is your house right or whatever it is and and so I think that that’s an awkward thing for people to deal with a lot
Shannon: yeah I think that that’s a very interesting scenario that that comes up a lot that I don’t know that I think about all that often because while you can add somebody to the title perhaps maybe through a beneficiary deed or quick claim but then there’s the question of the mortgage so then one partner dies the other is on the title but then it was the original owner who had the mortgage in their name and now what happens to that mortgage and even though now they’re both on the title there’s still the question of the mortgage and being that being paid and transferred into the partners
Lisa: right..that’s why the mortgage company [???] want both owners to be responsible for to be liable for the any default on the mortgage
Adam: I think this is why people need an attorney and this is why they need to really be willing to have these like super awkward conversations you know I had a friend who his wife was on the mortgage and the house and then he somehow was only on the house but then they got a divorce and so she’s now hosts for the mortgage and he just stayed living there and it’s like it’s not my mortgage right and it’s like oh my guess this is so weird I just I think they I think she ended up getting foreclosed on and you know her credit and all that stuff and he had no consequences don’t quote me on that either cuz I don’t know exactly how it all went down but it was something weird like that where man a few awkward conversations up front would have solved a ton of problems later
Lisa: right exactly
Adam: and I don’t know about anybody else but from for my wife and I before we got married we had a lot of these kind of like alcohol awkward conversations but it really was really good for us it was really healthy to have these kind of talks I think so
Lisa: right right
Adam: so I let you ask a question shannon
Shannon: no keep going
Adam: okay so should my spouse and I have our home and a trust and if you say yes then please tell me why
Lisa: well again it’s going to depend so I when I am meeting with a married couple to discuss their estate plan I look at their overall plan you know their overall picture what kind of assets do they have do they have children what are their goals as far as distribution of their assets after they’ve both passed away do they own enough assets to where there might be an estate tax consequence when after they’ve passed away so you have to factor in all those things before answering that question the easy answer like I said before is a trust will help you avoid probate so if you’re willing to spend a little bit of you know a little extra money in the beginning to get a trust in place get all your assets into the trust knowing that if something happens to either of the both of you it avoids probate and the person you’ve named to succeed you as trustee you know will handle getting everything where it needs to go then yes I would recommend a trust
Adam: do people usually wait to put their house in a trust until their house is paid off or because otherwise do they deal with the same lender problems that we were just talking about on the last question
Lisa: know you can in this type of situation and my understanding is that lenders have become more aware of trusts and that they aren’t you aren’t quick claiming your trust to like a third party that isn’t going to be liable under the mortgage you are quick claiming it to the trust that you are the grantor of so technically the ownership of the house hasn’t changed
Adam: okay
Lisa: the the the lent the borrower under the mortgage is the same person that set up the trust so they still have the same responsibilities under the mortgage so just by quick claiming your home into the trust that you own it shouldn’t trigger any type of acceleration clause
Adam: so would that have been a good solution for a person in question number one or would they not with the bank not her back not like that there was another person on the trust
Lisa: no the the person that owns the house could have could set up a trust
Adam: with both of them on it
Lisa: yeah with both of them on it and then the owner is just transferring is contributing the house to the the trust asset trust estate is what we’ll call it and then they are both you know beneficiaries under the trust so that if the owner of the house dies and still is the only borrower on the mortgage the trust owns the house so yeah I mean you the mortgage companies could still come back and say okay well you have the grantor who was also our borrower died and the house is in your trust we still need somebody responsible for paying us our mortgage
Adam: and they’d want to do a refinance of some sort
Lisa: well yeah they might want the house they want might want the mortgage retitled in the name of the trust or something so that that remaining grantor is now responsible for the mortgage so again it depends on on your lender and the terms of your mortgage
Shannon: it seems like in that first question that you have it the only the best possible depending on some of the questions you had asked earlier is putting in the trust but then it doesn’t matter if you have a quick claim deed or a beneficiary deed or a trust if you don’t have that life insurance policy or some money somewhere to pay off that mortgage that partner it’s still kind of in a jam
Lisa: yeah the mortgage company is gonna be looking for somebody to pay off the mortgage
Adam: pay it off not just keep paying
Lisa: yeah paying you know giving you because you don’t want the mortgage to be defaulted on
Adam: I like that you know your first answer was kind of like what’s there why like what’s their motive and and that’s gonna I guess drive a lot of this
Lisa: Exactly
Adam: all right so well I I sort of have the same question twice and basically how can I gift money to my kids and not have it be a taxable event and then before you answer that let me just read the other one too which is kind of well I guess let’s just keep it simple how can i gift money to my kids not have it be a taxable event
Lisa: okay any type of yet lifetime gift to your children or anybody for that matter currently in 2018 there is an annual gift credit which is $15,000 per person per gift so that means Adam you could be very generous and decide to give us each $15,000 and that will not create a taxable event
Adam: I’m sorry did you say per person per gift did you mean per person per year
Lisa: no or per person per gift per year yes
Adam: okay
Lisa: yeah so it’s kind of the trifecta so and as a married couple you and your wife could give me thirty thousand dollars in a year
Adam: okay
Lisa: and again there would be no tax
Adam: I like the smile [???]
Shannon: so it’s no tax to you and me who receive them
Lisa: no tax to anybody
Shannon: beg do they get to deduct that from the taxes so if you make a hundred thousand you gift fifteen thousand is now your actual income eighty-five
Lisa: no because that wasn’t a charitable gift
Shannon: okay
Adam: so I’ve already paid taxes on it my bank kind of pay tax on it you’re just saying you’re not having to pay taxes on it now that you’re receiving it as income
Lisa: right no it’s not it’s not income it’s a gift
Adam: Right
Lisa: but you’re not having to pay tax on it right
Adam: okay
Lisa: because it falls within that yearly credit
Adam: so I can give the question was how can i gift money to my kids and I have to be a taxable event you’re saying it doesn’t matter that it’s your kids and the question could have really been how can I gift money to anybody and have it not be taxable event and you’re saying give them give anybody fifteen thousand dollars per year that’s not textual
Lisa: right now if the gift is more than fifteen thousand dollars in a year you have what’s called your lifetime gift tax exclusion which for 2018 is ten million dollars indexed for inflation which is somewhere in the neighborhood let me find that 11 million $180,000 so he over your lifetime as of this year you can give gifts of 11 million $180,000 so if I were to pass away this year the IRS would look at all the gifts I’d give it one of my lifetime to see if it exceeds that it happened I promise
Adam: every time I give fifteen thousand dollars how is that recorded that’s on [???]
Lisa: the fifteen thousand dollars doesn’t go against that lifetime exclusion so that doesn’t create the need to file a gift tax return so anytime you go over that fifteen thousand dollars in a year you want to file a gift tax return showing okay no no I gave twenty thousand dollars to this child well the first fifteen thousand goes to my annual so I’m only filing that five thousand against my lifetime exclusion so you want to get that gift tax return going which will get that statute of limitations going on that gift tax return filing so that after X number of years goes the IRS can’t go back and say hey wait a minute you know we forgot to tax you on that you’re like well no it’s it’s all good [???]
Shannon: so the person receiving the gift do they claim it on still yet on the TAT their taxes as a gift they don’t know they report it anywhere they just go and put it in some
Adam: if it’s under 15
Lisa: well you know even the person receiving the gift they don’t have the reporting responsibilities it’s the person making the gift that’s so if you give me twenty thousand dollars this year you’re going to file a gift tax return on that five thousand dollars showing
Adam: and you gotta file nothing
Lisa: I got file nothing
Shannon: and then but if he does fifteen thousand does antha file any kind of gift there
Lisa: no because then he’s gonna take against that life time Oh women so your question again
Shannon: so even if he if he saves within the minimum does he still do you still have to file a tax and you know tax
Lisa: no you would only want to file a gift tax return if you go over that $50,000
Shannon: okay
Lisa: right
Adam: but so then if gift $15,000 to you and then you get audited aren’t they gonna say where did you get this $15,000
Lisa: I’ll say it’s a gift and they will it shouldn’t trigger an audit because I am NOT reporting in any place it is a gift [???] the purpose of this annual credit is for all the you know parents and grandmothers out there that give you gifts every year for your birthday or your graduation or confirmation
Adam: very generous
Lisa: you know they don’t know they used to call it a little Olli I believe it was called a little old lady tax or something like that I remember one of my old bosses saying something like that that’s the purpose of this annual exclusion so when you get that birthday gift you know say somebody gives you a CD they spent $10 on that CD technically that’s a $10 gift to you so that would go against that $15,000 you know yearly credit so but obviously you know the IRS isn’t gonna be tracking down every little lipgloss and you know the chocolate bar you’ve given somebody so so they’re gonna look at your cash stocks things of that nature but again if you stay under that $15,000 there’s no reporting requirement and there’s no tax
Adam: I hope mom and dad are listening… all right so next question we got is do I really need a will at my young age and how much will it cost me but if you don’t mind Lisa I’d rather if you don’t talk about like how much stuff is costing they can just call you and
Lisa: sure
Adam: you’ll figure that out right
Lisa: right
Adam: but I would say I didn’t find it to be too expensive right I thought it was worth it I don’t want you to have to talk about how much you charge anything on the radio or on the podcast but do I really need a will at my young age
Lisa: again it’s going to depend on your overall picture so I would sit down with you go over all the assets your own again what are your goals with them and then go up with you come up with a plan for you a will may not necessary like I said before a will doesn’t avoid probate but there are things we can do treat your assets in a way to help you avoid probate and then we might want to put a will in place just as the safety net so again you’ve got your executor named and your beneficiaries named to avoid any headaches I with probate
Adam: I went on a trip a couple three years ago or something like that and I’m gonna go to Florida to visit my buddy or whatever and I get this email from my parents like the day before I leave and they’re like Adam we really think you need to make a will before you go on this trip and I’m like what kind of woman are you giving me for this trip right so I had to like you know if I found something online or whatever and I just made one just to make them happy but we’ve obviously made up like a more professional one at this
Lisa: Right
Adam: because I don’t think mine listed who was supposed to the person who was gonna have to deal with it that we talked about earlier
Lisa: right so so let’s say we’ve got a single person you know pretty you know good income that they might own a house have maybe an investment account I won’t name many houses view an investment account with some you know have there been you know checking and savings account with a bank you know I would say oh you know again single no children I would say okay well we can do a well but again you won’t won’t avoid probate so if it’s simple that you want to make sure you know your sister gets everything then we can do a beneficiary deed and you name your sister on your house so that something happens to you the house will go to the sister and avoids probate on your and investment account where wherever you might hold that you can put a beneficiary designation on that account which is like that POD or TOD we talked about earlier so again everything will go to the sister avoid probate same with your regular checking or savings account you can put a POD or TOD on it and then again and avoids probate and everything still gets to your sister which is what your goal was
Adam: when you died
Lisa: yeah
Shannon: so if you
Lisa: pass away
Shannon: so even if you don’t do a will does everything a hundred percent of assets transfer to just the necks of Ken and or is it equally divided between anyone
Lisa: again that depends so if you pass away without a will and all your assets in your name alone then we’re gonna take a look at who your heirs are so if there’s a surviving spouse and that’s it the surviving spouse gets everything okay if there’s a surviving spouse and children then everything’s divided up between the spouse and children and then we have the question about are all the children from the marriage or are the children or any of the children from a pre-existing relationship and in that case sometimes the spouse gets a little more off the top before then everything split evenly between the spouse and the kids
Adam: there’s a kind of it’s sort of up to the judges discussion
Lisa: no this is all set out in a statute this is the Missouri probate
Adam: in it so it’s not like it’s up to the judges discussion and whoever has the best lawyer
Lisa: no
Adam: wins
Lisa: no this is all Missouri statute
Adam: okay well I’ll keep going on my list how can I buy property in probate and then they said oh wait what’s probate but we already answered yet so how can I buy property in probate
Lisa: okay so are you saying you
Adam: that questions probably confusing to you cos like what but I think people have heard they go to seminars they do all this stuff and they you should buy a property and
Lisa: I gotcha I gotcha so like if you are an investor and you’re looking to buy property to like what you were talking about with your your house and Jennings earlier you bought the property you’re gonna rehab it and then and then sell it and you found a house that is currently in probate because the owner died you can contact anytime a probate estate is open there is a publication and a local legal newspaper in Missouri it’s through Missouri law or in the st. Louis area it’s through the Missouri lawyers weed Missouri lawyers media which is st. Louis County in or
Adam: The Watchmen or something
Lisa: the watchman’s another one I think in the city it’s the the one that publishes all the city stuff is the st. Louis daily and so they will print something that says hey somebody passed away on such-and-such a date and the state is now open here’s the executor here’s the attorney for the executor and that’s when you know somebody would contact either the executor or the attorney usually the attorney to say hey we’re interested in buying that house
Adam: oh there’s no process for it you’re just reaching out to it
Lisa: yeah you just reaching out like because I handle a lot of probate stuff I get postcards and letters all the time oh we’re so sorry for your loss hey we’d like to buy that house
Adam: and you’re thinking no I’m just gonna call you now he’ll buy it
Lisa: and so well it you know if it depends on what this scenario is so sometimes the house is going to be inherited by the heirs so there’s no house to buy if if the executor or and/or the heirs you know if they’re the same person need to sell the house but they already have a realtor I let them deal with it if they ask for my recommendation of a realtor I give them several choices you know who to go with and then you know they can reach out to you know Adam here in Herman London [???]
Adam: and two choices for you
Lisa: right exactly so and go from there
Adam: okay so people if they want to buy houses in probate they can get one of those newspapers you’re talking about and just start contacting probate attorneys
Lisa: right
Adam: essentially
Lisa: yeah
Adam: okay this I think this one sort of relates to the gifting money to kids thing please ask about the transfer of property via trusts to next generation and tax advantages disadvantages and let me break this question down because I think this was related to the question of hey I want to buy my daughter a house for $300,000 and am I gonna have to pay taxes on that and can I just give to the house or how do we do this so that’s about transfer property via trust to next generation and tax advantages disadvantages are one of our Realtors called me the other day and basically said I’ve got it lady who wants to buy her daughter a house but it wants to avoid taxes what can I do and I was like conveniently I’m gonna be doing a podcast about this right but I was wondering can they do they just put the house in a trust or whatever and so I’ll let you talk now
Lisa: okay again I think it’s going to be you know it is mom and our mom and dad buying the house for the child but they want to own the house but eventually the child get it or do they are they just shelling out the money and the child is going to live there so basically mom and dad are going to hold the mortgage but child will be living in the house
Adam: in this case I think mom and dad have the cash
Lisa: okay
Adam: and the child they just want to basically give their child a house
Lisa: okay so so yeah if they basically shell out the cash but the title was taken in the child’s name then I believe that would be a gift
Adam: that would go towards their lifetime
Lisa: right so that would go against their lifetime exclusion and
Adam: so the there’s well you probably want to talk to them and know their exact situation but it sounds like there’s really no reason for them not to just hey here’s $300,000 daughter you know you’ve been great and let her buy the property in her own name
Lisa: right way to do it again you know always consult with a CPA on this type of stuff to make sure there are any text consequences that I am forgetting to mention that’s always a good thing when you’re making a major transaction like this
Adam: by the way if you don’t mind can’t we’re kind of been nearing the end I guess are sort of in the middle end of the show here can you give your contact information how do people get ahold of you
Lisa: sure sure I’m Lisa Brown I’ve got my own law firm I’m on Hampton Avenue in South st. Louis my phone number is 314-768-6893
Adam: 314-768-6893
Lisa: right
Adam: and you were giving us trouble about our Facebook earlier do you have a Facebook or no
Lisa: I do have a Facebook for my law firm
Adam: Okay
Lisa: the law office of Lisa D Brown Lisa
Adam: okay so I want to ask I guess I’d like to give little examples you you mentioned earlier about how things go to the next of kin and all that kind of stuff are you a Breaking Bad fan
Lisa: no I have not watched that show
Adam: No… Shannon
Shannon: oh my gosh
Adam: okay so in that show they wanted to give what was Skylar’s boss’s name I forget his name now of course for my example but they wanted to Ted Beneke they wanted to give Beneke like $200,000 or something like that so that he would pay these taxes so they didn’t get audited it was this whole crazy story but so they what they did is they had an attorney contact Ted Beneke and go hey your great aunt Martha just passed away and he’s like I don’t know about a green Aunt Martha and they’re like yeah great Aunt Martha who lived in Luxembourg or you know she passed away and you’re next in line right and so they were just trying to give him the money so he would pay this but that’s kind of how that would work I guess they would if Great Aunt Martha had no will and they would just find the next living heir there heir our area interesting
Lisa: yeah yeah if you in heir property there’s no tax on you inheriting property because it’s not income to you and you get in depending on what kind of asset it is you get a step-up in the basis on that property so you know if you then turn around and sell it because you don’t need another house or something like that you should recognize you should not incur any type of capital gains tax on doing that
Adam: is there a lot of fraud that goes on with this kind of stuff they I mean you don’t know about it but uh
Lisa: none that I am aware of obviously I can’t can I do not condone any type
Adam: of course of course yeah so do you have any interesting like stories you can share or I was reading this this interesting story it’s a little bit convoluted those but if you had any do you have any interesting real-life stories just to throw you on the spot
Lisa: then I can really talk
Adam: oh really okay okay [???] okay I read an article about a guy who I guess in like the early late 1800s or something like that he passed away but his will said it was said something crazy like his once his last living fifth grandkid or something like that passed away then they would split up his what he called his estate
Lisa: okay
Adam: and so he had like a hundred million dollars
Lisa: okay
Adam: which is a ton you know even for the its ton of money back then I mean not so much now right but it was I thought the article was super interesting because over the years like all these people tried to challenge it and they all wanted the money you know and the same type of thing it’s like why did he do that well he must have hated this family or something like that because it ended up causing all of these people to hate each other over the years you know it’s like why won’t you just got anything no one got anything he was super rich and then no one got anything they all had to live well I don’t want they all had to make their own money their whole life and then all of a sudden has like great-great-great great-great granddaughter I’m sparing the details cuz I don’t remember the exact details but all of a sudden his sixth great grandchild or whatever was all of a sudden like though I think there’s like five or six of them left though the one person died which triggered that anyone who is alive now got their portion and so all these random people like five or six people has got millions and millions of dollars
Lisa: and we all kind of dream of that right
Adam: yeah yeah I mean but it’s it’s just it’s just an interesting story and I guess I I’m curious about why people do stuff like that
Lisa: you know no it could be any number of reasons you know maybe they were shoebox you know Kleenex boxes for shoes
Adam: maybe they’re crazy so too something is there I guess there’s a lot of people that are because
Shannon: I think it’s kind like a Warren Buffett thing um he his money is not going to be passed down to his family it’s going to be donated and other trusts as that for foundations right
Lisa: well yeah I’ve heard like the chef Gordon Ramsay is doing the same thing he’s just like oh no I’m not leaving my stuff to my wife and kids they need to yeah logic is I came from nothing I made something of myself I want you to have an experience as well so you know I’m leaving this money too
Adam: I thought even we’re still giving his daughter like some money she’s just not gonna get like a hundred billion
Shannon: I think it may be there might be some small payout but in the big scheme of things considering he’s worth dollars most of its actually just being given away because he wants you I mean you have to his mindset is to live simple he still lives in the house that he bought in the 70s before you started to really make his money so I think it’s I think I can see a lot of people having that mindset where it’s I made this I don’t want to just hand it over
Lisa: all right
Shannon: you need to go make your own
Adam: Lisa if if someone lives listening and they I mean if they don’t have any of the stuff obviously they should just call you right but if they know that their parents for example don’t have any of this stuff is there any sort of good way to bring up the conversation or do you know like
Lisa: it’s really on your family dynamic a lot of times what Spurs people to come into the office is they have just experienced it within their own family like you know their parents have just passed away or a sibling or a good friend just passed away and they see what somebody’s family has gone through because there was no plan in place and they don’t want their own children to deal with that so that is what gets them into the office
Adam: that’s what gets the parent in but if if I know and this is not true for me but if I knew that my parents had none of this how do I bring it up to them tell him a story about my friend whose parents had the trouble
Lisa: yeah thank you yeah just she’s like you know mom dad I’m not trying to pry into your business you don’t have to tell me anything but you know have you thought about what will happen to everything when you pass away or better yet what happens if you become disabled and the two of you can’t take care of each other you know I if you don’t have a power of attorney in place I’m gonna have to go to court and be appointed your guardian and then I have to report to the court every year about what I’m you know how I’m treating you you know do you do you want that you know because then everything you own becomes public knowledge do you want all your friends to know you know what I’m doing with your stuff
Adam: so they can start it with the conversation that’s kind of like you know do you want to be cremated or buried right like if you’re in a coma do you want me to pull the plug or not and then like oh we should probably do this all written down let’s called Lisa and then while they’re sort of in that conversation they’d start talking about their wills and all that kind of stuff
Lisa: exactly
Adam: okay
Lisa: yeah
Shannon: I mean I think that’s a valid question for any child the parents is what do you want
Adam: yeah
Shannon: in those situations and after you pass away how am I supposed to carry out any of this or what is it and how do you want it
Lisa: yeah if I don’t know what your wishes are I can’t follow them so it’s important that we discuss this so that I treat you the way you want to be treated when you can’t tell me how you want to be treated
Adam: man some people just don’t talk about it
Lisa: right very uncomfortable
Adam: don’t talk about death like you know anything like that my-my wife points out that it’s really like she says that my family talks about death as if we’re like talking about a new movie or we’re talking about going to Walgreens or something but we’ve just been to so many funerals and my dad’s family was really big so it’s like it’s I mean I’m not going to say it’s not a big deal but it’s more easy I guess it’s more easy for us to talk about it
Lisa: yeah
Shannon: so we know a lot of the advantages of having the will and more more so the trust what are the challenges of having pretty in a trust can you can you easily refined can you get a home equity line of credit if the properties are the trust nature can be
Lisa: there can be challenges there sometimes if you own your real estate in a trust and you want to refined it the lender will want you to take it out of the trust before you you know though they’ll do all of that and then once you’ve refined it it can just be put right back into the trust so if you think you are somebody that’s going to be refined you know quite a bit over the lifetime of the ownership of the house then we could do and instead of having the house own the trust just do a beneficiary deed so that you still own the house but then if something happens to you the beneficiary deed kicks the title into the trust you still avoid probate it still ends up in the trust but then you’re not taking the house in and out of the trust every time you want to refined
Shannon: it’s a same thing with a HELOC home equity line of credit
Lisa: right
Shannon: okay
Lisa: yeah it just depends on the individual lender really
Shannon: okay
Lisa: what their requirements are
Adam: you know I’m sitting you’re going how exactly there’s all this tighter real estate because it’s a realtor podcast you know but I think it it ties in so many ways and just just from a simple realtor perspective a lot of times we go on a listing appointment and the house is not owned in someone’s name it’s owned in a trust I think it’s good for our Realtors to know what that is right and we didn’t ask you to define what a power of attorney is and will you define that real quick
Lisa: sure a power of attorney or a durable power of attorney is a document you would put into place where while you were live if you become disabled or incapacitated whether that is permanent or temporary you have named somebody you completely trust to step into your shoes and make decisions for you that you would normally make for yourself you just don’t have the ability or the capacity to do so at that given time and that could be anything from managing your day to day Fair Affairs you know making sure the electric bill gets paid or the dog gets to the groomer or gets to the vet or you know if it comes to health you know talking to your doctors about your just your day to day care or you know it could be you know an end-of-life decision
Adam: so the power of attorney or is there a difference between power of attorney and durable power of attorney
Lisa: well a durable power of attorney is what you want because it survives the incapacity
Adam: okay
Lisa: so and so you have a power of attorney that are a durable power of attorney that would cover your financial affairs and then you have a separate document which would be your healthcare directive
Adam: but they’re still they can still be that would still be called a power of attorney our durable power of attorney that’s over your health care directive
Lisa: right yeah it’s a durable power of attorney for healthcare which includes your healthcare directive
Adam: but you could have one person who’s a durable power of attorney over your finances and a different person who’s durable power of attorney over your healthcare
Lisa: sure
Adam: okay
Adam: interesting
Shannon: so um last question of my part is it better like we have mentioned more than a few times how families are divided upon the death of a relative or a parent so is it better in a will to have maybe a third party or neutral party as a trustee versus maybe a sibling cuz like in your scenario I guess I’m guessing one of the four sisters that you’re talking about earlier was one of them a trustee
Adam: they weren’t and they had it was just like one of the dad’s friends was the trustee
Shannon: okay so kind of neutral party
Adam: it was a neutral party and in some ways that was better but in some ways it was worse because he didn’t have a whole lot of motivation to actually do anything about it and so they’d be like okay we’ve come to an agreement like you know take the next step whatever
Shannon: [???] they actually take action so the attorneys and say this is what they want to do let’s do it but do it [???]
Lisa: like the friend created more headache then [???]
Adam: he wasn’t hoping to seem like he was really hope
Lisa: yeah
Shannon: for the trustees say here just divided up four ways equally and let’s all be done with this
Lisa: it’s just a matter of you know how motivated the trustee is to get the get the job done so if you know the it’s a matter of just dividing everything up you know after you’ve paid any final expenses of the decedent or anything making sure everything’s divided up that’s all the trustee has to do is just sign whatever paperwork’s necessary to get it done
Shannon: that seems like it seems so very simple [???]
Lisa: if you don’t you know have a horse in the race you aren’t a beneficiary you’re not related to these people you may think well I’ve got my own family to deal with they can wait and so you you know you’re not getting it done as timely as everybody would like you to and
Adam: it’s not just for siblings and a bank account sitting there with a hundred thousand and it’s just so obvious that each one gets 25 like in this case like that well dad had promised me this and well dad had promised me this and I get this jewelry and you get this asset and you know it was like this whole thing and they so it wasn’t just a you know even amount of money that they could just divide by four it was all this other stuff involved
Lisa: right that’s well in Missouri you can have what’s called a personal property distribution list where under statute you can make a list of your personal property like jewelry anything that doesn’t have a title to it or isn’t cash you can say okay you know mom wants to make sure her wedding ring goes to this daughter or granddaughter so you can make a list of all that and sign it and date it and then your executor or the trustee you know looks for that list and then follows it and you know that can be updated and changed as often so that will take away a lot of that
Shannon: so that’s a saying I want my assets all of if something happens to me and my husband husband to be divided equally between my two children right now you’re going well
Lisa: what about the household comment
Shannon: what about this what about that you know and so it’s yeah like what the furs what about the you know it’s right
Lisa: that’s why I’m like okay so are there any family heirlooms in the house that you know somebody would want to take care of like my own personal thing is we have this giant cedar chest that has it has always been around since I was a kid when I was in trouble I used to hide in it thinking nobody’s ever gonna find me in here and I actually have my name written in it and crayon you know and so it’s like literally my name’s on this I get it when mom dies and that’s all I want you guys can have everything else I just want the cedar chest so yeah but if every if everybody agrees on stuff it’s great but the more direction mom and dad give the less you know confusion it’s going to create
Adam: all right if you don’t mind we have five questions that I like to ask every guest
Lisa: now
Adam: okay and so do you mind if I just jump into those before we wrap up odd cast all right who lives under your roof
Lisa: who lives under my roof my mom and two dogs
Adam: okay good where are you your best
Lisa: where am i my best
Adam: I can always tell who’s listened to the podcast before that’s good that’s fine
Lisa: I don’t know I like to think I’m my best in any given situation no I was a little nervous today with it being my first podcast
Adam: I think you did great by the way
Shannon: very good
Lisa: whenever whenever I’m relaxed and Phil a tease I’m it on my best
Adam: okay do you have a favorite blog or podcast or anything like that
Shannon: besides ours
Lisa: besides yours no I can’t I mean I follow different like estate planning lawyer type blogs and things to kind of keep me updated with stuff but I don’t have a favorite necessarily
Adam: do you have like if some sort of favorite book let’s do
Lisa: a favorite book a favorite book my all-time favorite book I have to say it’s gone with the wind also my favorite movie
Adam: okay good I like to push on that way one of our guests told us about a podcast named called serial a lot this was a long time ago and I loved it so I like to push and see if you know I can get something what is your guilty pleasure
Lisa: my guilty pleasure any particular category or
Adam: whatever you want the world to know
Lisa: I’d like to listen to boy bands in sync
Adam: do you really maybe you might not want to share that one who is your mentor and how have you thanked them
Lisa: I had to mentors predominantly they were the gentlemen I worked for Jim solder and Jim herd who have both passed away Jim hurt just recently and they were just fantastic men to work for
Adam: did you ever thank them
Lisa: yeah
[???]
Lisa: they originally hired me as the receptionist for the firm and as I finished college in law school at night working for them during the day they eventually made me their associate and from tints and purposes I inherited the firm and keep it going so all the client a lot of the clients I have now or clients they had but so I like to think I’m continuing their legacy
Adam: all right so Lisa D. Brown if you find any on Facebook can we have your phone number again
Lisa: 314-768-6893
Adam: and then I noticed you didn’t give out your email for all the Millennials listening who don’t want to talk on the phone
Lisa: my email address is Lisa.Brown-ATTY@att.net
Adam: okay well good thing this is recorded they can rewind that thank you so much for being on our show today we really appreciate it I’m sure I’ll be referencing this over the years and sending people the link to this podcast so we really appreciate it and everybody who’s listening thank you very much if you have future questions or guests that you think we should have just email us PODCAST@HermannLondon.com don’t forget to like us on Facebook and all that stuff and take it thank you