Per the IRS Education Provider Standards this course must be COMPLETED by 12/31/2025 to receive credits. NOTE: Go to My Professional Profile in your CCH CPELink account settings to ensure your name, and PTIN number; matches your PTIN card
The higher estate tax exemption means many family fortunes will no longer be subject to estate taxes. TCJA raised the total amount that may be transferred without being subject to the estate and gift tax to $11.58 million for individuals and $23.16 million for couples in 2020 (indexed for inflation in future years). This means that tax planning for family wealth now focuses on how to include highly appreciated assets in estate plans, to avoid or mitigate capital gains taxes when those assets are sold.
This course covers techniques for basis planning for family wealth, including spousal transfers and marital trusts, swap powers, powers of appointment, and a discussion of which assets are most conducive to basis planning.
Publication Date: September 2022
Topics Covered
- General Tax Basis Rules
- Special Rules re: basis of property received by gift or bequest
- Rules re: allocation of basis when not all the property is sold
- Estate and Gift Tax Exemption Levels
- Techniques for maximizing basis step up upon death
Learning Objectives
- Describe estate and gift tax exemption levels after TCJA
- Identify rules that apply in determining how to allocate basis, or determine which basis to use, when not all of a taxpayer's property is transferred
- Recognize how to explain the special rules that apply to property received by gift or inheritance
- Recognize techniques for obtaining basis step ups and describe which techniques work best for which types of assets
- Identify the IRC Section that notes that a donee takes the carryover basis in property received by gift
- Identify what portion of the step-up basis is allowed if a decedent received appreciated property as a gift from a beneficiary within one year prior to death based on § 1014(e)
- Identify the downside to leaving all assets to a surviving spouse with the right to disclaim into a credit shelter trust for which the surviving spouse is a beneficiary
- Identify the power that can preserve all the gift, estate and GST tax benefits of an IDGT while also obtaining a step-up in basis at death when utilizing an intentionally defective grantor trust
- Identify the percent of an intentionally defective grantor trust that is subject to income, gift, and estate taxes
Level
Basic
Instructional Method
Self-Study
NASBA Field of Study
Taxes (2 hours)
Program Prerequisites
None
Advance Preparation
None
Instructor
Jennifer Kowal
Jennifer Kowal, JD, has been a tax professor and the director of the graduate tax program at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles since 2003. Loyola’s graduate tax program offers an LL.M. in Taxation for attorneys and a Master in Tax Law for non-lawyers. Professor Kowal teaches courses in advanced income taxation, income tax timing issues, corporate taxation, and tax research, among others. Prior to teaching at Loyola, Professor Kowal taught in the International Tax Program at Harvard Law School.
She also practiced law with the firms of Irell & Manella in Los Angeles and Ropes & Gray in Boston, advising clients on the taxation of various business transactions, including cross-border, partnership and corporate structures. Professor Kowal holds a BS in Accounting with distinction from the University of Kansas, and a JD from UCLA School of Law, where she was a member of the Order of the Coif.