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HIPAA: An Overview for Young Adults
May 14th, 2025
The Federal Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA) was enacted to provide guidelines to the healthcare industry for protecting patient information and preserving privacy. This is usually a nonissue for minors because pare…
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Be Careful Relying on Life Insurance to Provide for Loved Ones
May 7th, 2025
About half of Americans have a life insurance policy. The primary reason people purchase life insurance is to fund burial and other final expenses. However, a policy can help pay for much more, such as replacing lost income, paying off debts, equaliz…
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Categories: Estate Planning
Where Is the Best Place to Store Your Original Estate Planning Documents?
April 30th, 2025
Estate planning attorneys are often asked where original estate planning documents—wills, trusts, powers of attorney, and healthcare directives—should be stored for safekeeping. While there is no right or wrong answer to the question of where you…
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Should I Include My Unborn Child in My Estate Plan?
April 23rd, 2025
Estate planning is an exercise in anticipating potential future events that could affect your plans for what happens if you become incapacitated (unable to manage your own affairs during your lifetime) and how your assets (property and accounts) will…
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Have a Harmonious Family that Does Not Fight? You Still Need an Estate Plan
April 16th, 2025
Last week, we shared tips for avoiding a will contest. In many families, everyone gets along, happily gathering for the holidays, sharing laughs, telling stories, and enjoying each other’s company. Then, the matriarch or patriarch dies. Suddenly, y…
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Four Tips to Avoid a Will or Trust Contest
April 9th, 2025
Fighting over provisions in your will or trust can derail your final wishes, rapidly deplete your financial legacy, and tear your loved ones apart. However, with proper planning, you can help your family avoid a potentially disastrous fight by helpin…
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Buying a Home with Someone Other than a Spouse? Be Mindful.
April 2nd, 2025
Rising housing costs, the desire for companionship, and the need to share resources are increasingly leading buyers to consider co-owning a home with someone other than a spouse, such as a friend, relative, or significant other. Although this arrange…
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Who Needs an Estate Plan?
March 26th, 2025
If you are reading this, you need an estate plan. Why? The short answer is that everyone age 18 and older needs an estate plan. It does not matter whether you are old or young, have built up considerable wealth or are just entering adulthood—you ne…
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The Trust Protection Myth: Your Revocable Trust Protects Against Lawsuits
March 19th, 2025
Many people believe that once they set up a revocable living trust and change the ownership of their accounts and property from themselves as individuals to their trust, those accounts and property are protected from lawsuits. This is not true. While…
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Planning for the Unthinkable: Essential Tools for Parents of Minor Children
March 12th, 2025
Approximately three-fourths of Americans do not have a basic will.[1] Many of the same people also have minor children, which underscores a major misunderstanding about estate plans: they can accomplish much more than just handling financial assets (…
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Categories: Estate Planning, Guardianship, Planning for Minor Children, Powers of Attorney, Trusts, Wills
Attorney Jana McCreary
Houston Estate Planning Attorney Jana R. McCreary has been an attorney for over twenty years, a career move she made after working for over a decade with adults and children with intellectual disabilities and mental illness. Graduating summa cum laud… Read More