Columnists: Blackman
My take on the future of your liquid capital
This article was written while burning the midnight oil because about 95% of this column's readers, who call me just to ask a question or actually become clients, have investments, and a significant portion of their wealth has been pummeled by the Wall Street meltdown. ...
Some advice to the presidential candidates
Politicians - the Washington gang, including the House, Senate and President - are forever talking about raising or lowering the income tax rate. It's...
Supreme Court Deals Blow to Most 401(k) Plans
Do you own all or part of a business that sponsors a 401(k) plan for your employees? If so, this column is a must read. You won't like the liability position the U.S. Supreme Court has hung over your head. But, as is often the case, adverse circumstances bring opportunity. The end of this column tells you how to take advantage of this opportunity. ...
The Tax Game is More Than Just Beating the IRS
I recently read an article titled “What Makes for Success?” by Kemmons Wilson, the founder of Holiday Inn. In it he said, “It is great to attain wealth, but money is really just one way — and hardly the best way — to keep score.” ...
The Right Way to Value Your Family Business
Do you own all or part of a closely held business? Like it or not, some day you'll have to value that business. ...
Learn the Strategies for Beating the Estate Tax
The typical reader of this column (we'll call him Joe) who calls me for estate-planning help has two basic characteristics: First, he has been successful...
Two very differing business succession plans
It's true: Real life is stranger than fiction. Here are two true client tax stories with almost identical facts involving transferring a family business...
Buy-sell agreements: how to do them correctly
Do you have a buy-sell agreement or are you thinking of signing one? Most buy-sell agreements (B/S/A) happen like this: You meet with a lawyer and have...
Your IRA just got better much better
Three cheers! Now you can, under new rules, use your IRA and other retirement plans to make your children and grandchildren very rich. Later, I will explain...
The great (inadvertent) 401(k) rip-off
Raise your hand if your company has a qualified retirement plan (QRP). Your QRP can be a 401(k), profit-sharing plan, SEP-IRA, pension plan or any one of the many other QRPs. If so, listen up. Chances are this column is going to make you and your employees money — lots of money....
How to Win the Life Insurance Tax Game
Enriching the IRS with your life insurance dollars — death benefits — at your family's expense makes my blood boil. Turning the insurance tax table on the IRS makes me one happy camper. You too can join the tax-saving fun. Become a happy camper....
Turn your home into an investment profit center
The key to successful tax planning is learning how to select the best tax-saving strategies to accomplish your specific goals. My job is easy pick the...
How you can enrich your family and charity too
Patrick Henry once said, I have but one lamp by which my feet are lighted, and that is the lamp of experience. After years of working in the area of wealth...
Think Your Kid's Stock Will Survive A Divorce?
By Irving L. Blackman Tax Authority Are you thinking of transferring stock to your kids, or does one or more of your kids already own stock in your closely...
How the IRS clipped the Yankee Clipper
IT'S JUNE, SO let's talk baseball. Unfortunately, this is a story about a strikeout. Joe DiMaggio, unquestionably one of the great baseball legends of...
Industrial Strength Succession Planning'
RAISE YOUR HAND if you are the owner (or part owner) of a successful family business and someday you want your kids to step into your shoes. Let's be...
Industrial Strength Succession Planning'
RAISE YOUR HAND if you are the owner (or part owner) of a successful family business and someday you want your kids to step into your shoes. Let's be...
The best retirement plan I have ever seen
MENTION RETIREMENT to any group no matter how young or old and the knee-jerk reaction is almost always the same: Stuff as much as you can into a qualified...
Saving widow from an estate planning misstep
TRY THIS REAL-LIFE story of a tax disaster. Joe died, survived by his wife Mary, four grown kids (one Sam managed Joe's family business, Success Co.)...
The best way to attract and keep great people
Our Typical Consulting assignment is to put together a wealth transfer plan for a successful business owner. Invariably, the client brings up two critical...
Did your lawyer (inadvertently) rip you off?
JOE, A 63-YEAR-OLD reader of this column from Iowa, almost cried when talking to me on the phone. "I still want to kick myself for thinking my estate...
Retirement plan rescue' saves a ton of taxes
RAISE YOUR HAND if you have a "substantial amount" in a qualified retirement plan such as an IRA, 401(k), profit-sharing plan or the like. For our purposes,...
TIPs column so popular it hit No. 1 on Google
BY IRVING L. BLACKMAN TAX ACCOUNTANT THE PURPOSE OF this monthly column always has been and still is simple: to show you, my readers, how to save taxes...
Turn insurance mistakes into tax-free wealth
IT'S FRUSTRATING. Year after year our office is asked to give a second opinion on the completed estate plans of owners of family businesses. It is rare...
Think fast, what's your business worth?
GIVE THE RIGHT answers and you can win big bucks on many TV game shows. Typically, the host only allows about 15 seconds for the contestant to give the...
