End-Of-Life Archives - Law Offices of Daniel Timins

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

Don’t Die Alone in Your Apartment

Posted on October 3, 2024

Few of us choose when we die, but where we die can raise difficult legal consequences. Your family may face legal hardships when you die alone at home. If you are the sole resident of your home and die in the home alone, several parties – including the local police – show up to remove your body and “police tape” your front door. This is the equivalent of having yellow and black “Crime Scene” tape around your home. Once this happens, if your family enters your home they could face criminal charges. While the authorities will take steps to safeguard your pets, everything else in your home – from your jewelry and personal belongings to prescription drugs – are just

Hey, Mom & Dad: No One Wants Your Stuff

Posted on August 7, 2020

No one wants your stuff after you die. Your restored love seat from 1894, your 3rd generation silverware and fine china dining set, your mud-stained Jimi Hendrix t-shirt from the Monterey Pop Festival, these cherished items that gave you cherished memories and a sense of purpose on this planet are little more than garbage and a hinderance in the eye of other people. So why is it some people go to such great lengths to leave certain items of personal property to specific individuals? Case in point: I met with a couple who squabbled amongst one-another how to split up the family artwork. These people were not art collectors, they were average Joes and Janes who on a whim bought stuff

Landlords: Beware of Old, Loner Tenants

Posted on April 28, 2020

New York landlords can have a lot of problems with older tenants. Not only do older tenants often have stabilized rents which leave the landlord with a 75% haircut on the rent they collect, older tenants also tend to call in more complaints against their landlords. And just to stick it to their landlord one last time, older tenants often make it impossible for the landlord to re-lease the apartment for months after their deaths. I know, crying for landlords is like crying for the football fan at the Superbowl because he is watching from a luxury box on the 40-yard line instead of the 50 yard line. And I am probably not going to earn a lot of street

Dead Before His Time: Kobe Bryant and His Possible Estate

Posted on January 27, 2020

I remember being a college student when I first saw the future phenom of the Los Angeles Lakers play for the first time. He was 16 years old, grew up in Italy, seemed like a good kid, and his relentless drive to win was only equaled by his controlled contorting drives to the basket. I lived in Southern California when Kobe, Shaquille O’Neal, and a host of great supporting players won the Threepeat NBA championships of the 2000s. It was a well-known fact that Bryant’s Give-ME-The-Ball style of play, insistence on taking impossible shots and general separation from his colleagues made him incredibly unpopular with his teammates, but he sunk the big shots and the endorsements came pouring in. Kobe

The Many Risks of “Deathbed” Estate Planning

Posted on August 30, 2019

I can appreciate that planning for your own demise years before your death is not as exciting as planning your next K-Pop karaoke face-off (or any other activity imaginable for that matter). Yet many people fear death so much during their healthy and convalescing periods that they take no estate planning actions whatsoever in the hopes that ignoring this 12,000 pound gorilla will make it just go away. It doesn’t, so many estate planners are – frankly too often – called in during a new client’s final living days to draft their Will, create and fund trusts, or update beneficiary designation forms. These last-ditch “Deathbed” Will signings do not achieve their desired end result an inordinately-high amount of the time

When Should I NOT Act as Mom’s Executor?

Posted on May 10, 2019

When your mom passes away with a valid Will and property being transferred by that Will, the Will is submitted to the Court who appoints an estate representative to wrap up her final affairs. This person or company – almost always named in the Will – is known as the Executor, and has the ability to do everything that your mom could do during her life: Collect her assets, pay creditors, review all of mom’s financial records and statements, file income tax returns, order her medical records, distribute her property as mom’s Will states, and even clean out mom’s closet (which she likely neglected to do before she died since, you know, she’s now dead). We say an Executor “steps

Unsigned Wills Are Meaningless (and Photocopies are Not Much Better)

Posted on April 10, 2019

I like to remind people that the laws regarding modern U.S. Wills, not only predate the founding of the U.S., but actually predate European discovery of the Western Hemisphere. In Olde England in the city of York having a signed, witnessed piece of paper instructing how you wanted your property to be distributed after your death was often the only way to ensure your desires were fulfilled. Original paper mattered back then – there were no other recording devices or accounts with beneficiary designations – and witnesses would later attest to the fact they had seen you sign said paper instead of someone else. And original, signed paper still matters for several legal documents today, including your Will. The issue

Facebook After Your Death: Enter the “Legacy Contact”

Posted on August 24, 2018

My Grandpa Joe died in 2012 at the age of 90, but before he passed he was able to figure out how to set up a Facebook account – no small feat for a man born before the invention of refrigerators, Ford’s Model T and frozen food. So, you can imagine my surprise when my Facebook account suggested I might want to “Friend” my grandfather in 2014. While Friending a deceased individual seemed novel, I sensed that continuing our actual relationship was one of the few things beyond Facebook’s ability to monitor. But while the law has slowly figured out that an Executor or Administrator of your estate is legally permitted to access your personal email and social media

The 4 Ways (and Best Way) to Leave Property Using Your Will and Trust

Posted on June 7, 2018

If you have not already, one morning you will wake up and finally accept the fact that one day you shall die. Not an easy thought but coming to this inevitable conclusion earlier in life has the benefit of allowing you to plan for the things that remain when you pass: Your family, friends, legacy, and money. And while you can use accounts that name beneficiary designations to transfer some property – such as retirement plans, life insurance, and transfer-on-death accounts – only Wills and Trusts allow you to transfer property at the point-in-time you desire (such as a beneficiary attaining a certain age), and include protections for beneficiaries (from creditors, spendthrift behaviors, special needs and addiction). But how much