Did We Overbuild Our Estate Plan?

Have previous efforts to avoid estate taxes made this family's estate plan too complicated?

- By Mark McLaughlin Co-owner of Farm Estate GPS and associate with Farm Financial Strategies. Shares in the ownership of his family's Iowa farm. farmestategps.com

The Problem:

We have four children, including a son who farms our sizable corn and soybean operation with us. Land near ours sells for $18,000 per acre. We had feared the estate tax limit would fall back to $7 million, so to protect us, our advisers drafted revocable trusts, placed our land in an LLC, and put our operation in an S corporation. We've also been gifting discounted LLC units to all of our kids to reduce our estate, which has definitely added complexity to our situation. Our trusts ultimately split everything equally between the four kids, which is the only “simple” part of our plan. The estate tax uncertainty has now been resolved. Do we really need the complexity of our current plan under the new law?

-From D.V., via email

The Solution: