Natalie Choate's Seminar Topics

Dear seminar sponsor,

Please choose a seminar topic from this list. Once you have chosen a topic, we'll send you a "Sponsor Information Sheet" with everything you need to prepare your seminar announcements and apply for CPE credits. If you don't find what you're looking for on this list, or if you have questions about these topics, please call Ian Starr at 617-439-2899 (also call Ian Starr regarding date availability and fees). I hope to see you soon at a seminar!

Natalie Choate

Retirement Benefit Topics for Estate Planning and Money Management Professionals

The Tax Pro's Guide to Stretch IRAs
The Minimum Distribution Rules: Compliance Requirements and Planning Opportunities

Case Studies in Estate Planning for Retirement Benefits
Practical Ideas for Real Life Situations

Charitable Giving with Retirement Benefits
The 3 Whys, 8 Hows, 7 Whiches, and 9 Whens

Death and Taxes: The Inherited Retirement Plan
How to Advise Executors and Beneficiaries: Estate Taxes, Disclaimers, Rollovers, and Cleanup Strategies

The 100 Best & Worst Planning Ideas for Your Client's Retirement Benefits
Over 140 Great, Not So Great, and Truly Terrible Ideas, Summarized and Rated

Planning for Retirement Benefits: Recent Developments and Current Trends
What Congress, the Courts, and the IRS Have Done to Our Retirement Plans in the Last 12 Months

Making Retirement Benefits Payable To Trusts
A Workshop for Lawyers and CPAs: Pros, Cons, and Pitfalls of Naming a Trust as Beneficiary, Including the IRS " MRD Trust Rules "

Retirement Benefits: Special Planning Opportunities
Roth IRAs, LSDs/NUA, and Pre-Age 59½ Distribution

The Following Seminars Combine Selections from the Preceding List

Estate and Distribution Planning for Retirement Benefits: the Two-Hour Seminar

Estate and Distribution Planning for Retirement Benefits: the Four-Hour Seminar

Estate and Distribution Planning for Retirement Benefits: the Intensive All-Day Workshop

Retirement Benefit Topics for Estate Planning and Money Management Professionals

The Tax Pro's Guide to Stretch IRAs
The Minimum Distribution Rules: Compliance Requirements and Planning Opportunities 1 hour*

The "minimum distribution rule" of § 401(a)(9) of the Internal Revenue Code dictate when a plan participant (or beneficiary) must begin to take distributions from a retirement plan, and (once distributions begin) how much must be distributed each year. Since deferral of income tax is the major economic advantage of these plans, understanding the "minimum distribution rules" is key knowledge for advising any retiree who has significant assets in an IRA, 401(k) or other retirement plan. Because the length of potential deferral depends on who is named as death beneficiary, knowledge of these rules is important even for estate planners who do not normally advise on "retirement planning" issues.

Case Studies in Estate Planning for Retirement Benefits
Practical Ideas for Real Life Situations 1 hour*

Learn how to integrate retirement benefits into the typical estate plan. What approaches are available for the client whose major asset is an IRA or other retirement plan, and who wants to:

Use both spouses' estate tax exemptions (the "credit shelter trust" problem)
Reduce estate taxes while deferring income taxes
Leave benefits to in trust for spouse (the "QTIP trust" problem)
Leave benefits to multiple children with each using his/her own life expectancy
Leave benefits to minor children

This presentation answers these questions, explaining the pros, cons and pitfalls of various approaches, including the conservative, the practical and the "cutting edge."

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Charitable Giving with Retirement Benefits
The 3 Whys, 8 Hows, 7 Whiches, and 9 Whens 1 hour

Help your charitably-inclined clients save money while doing good. Learn:

Three reasons to fund charitable gifts with retirement benefits
Eight ways to leave retirement benefits to charity
The seven types of charitable entities (such as public charity, private foundation, charitable lead or remainder trust); which ones are (and are not) suitable as beneficiaries
Four situations in which charitable giving helps solve benefit-planning problems
Five scenarios for lifetime giving with benefits

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Death and Taxes: The Inherited Retirement Plan
How to Advise Executors and Beneficiaries: Estate taxes, Disclaimers, Rollovers, and Cleanup Strategies 1 hour*

As more retirement plan owners die leaving significant plan benefits to heirs, the question of how to advise the decedent's survivors, executor and trustees grows in importance. This seminar explains:

Estate tax valuation: are discounts available?
When and how a beneficiary should disclaim inherited retirement benefits
6 differences between an inherited IRA and a regular IRA
Minimum required distributions — for year of death (and later)
How multiple beneficiaries can establish "separate accounts"
Rollovers and plan-to-plan transfers
Don't forget the "IRD deduction"
Advising a surviving spouse
Cleanup strategies when the decedent named the wrong beneficiary

The 100 Best & Worst Planning Ideas for Your Client's Retirement Benefits
Over 140 Great, Not So Great, and Truly Terrible Ideas, Summarized and Rated 1, 2, 3, or 4 hours

Your clients are bombarded with dreams and schemes designed to reduce the tax value of their retirement plans. Learn which ideas work, which ones probably don't, and which will win your client a midnight visit from the IRS. Plus, learn the tried and true estate planning practices, the nifty distribution tricks used by those in the know, and cutting edge ideas for the daring. Seminar outline provides a handy checklist of over 100 ideas — what each idea is, whether it works or not and where to find out more details; plus, thumbnail "client profiles," so the reader can go right to the ideas that his/her clients should consider. This seminar can go 1, 2, 3 or 4 hours, and can emphasize areas of particular interest to your particular audience group (such as life insurance planning, trust drafting, estate planning or lifetime distributions).

Seminar Handout Offer

If you are interested in the "100 Best & Worst Ideas" seminar but unable to attend, you can purchase Natalie's 108-page handout which summarizes 188 planning ideas your clients should consider (or avoid) for their IRAs, 401(k)'s and other retirement plans. Click here for more information.

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Planning for Retirement Benefits: Recent Developments and Current Trends
What Congress, the Courts, and the IRS Have Done to Our Retirement Plans in the Last 12 Months
30 minutes to one hour

Intended as a keynote or after-dinner speech, this seminar covers new cases, rulings, and regulations, recent and pending legislation, and any other new developments affecting estate and distribution planning for retirement benefits. "New" and "recent" for this purpose mean occurring in the 14 months prior to the seminar. This time frame allows the written outline to cover 12 months' worth of new developments, and be submitted to the sponsor 30 to 60 days prior to the event, depending on the sponsor's printing requirements. Sample new developments included for 2006:

The IRS crackdown on Roth conversion of IRA-owned annuities
Self-directed IRA investing can be safe or risky
Rev. Proc. 2005-36 breakthrough: MRD qualified disclaimer “safe harbor”
Roth 401(k) proposed regulations open door for this new-in-'06 planning option
The “toggle” trust as IRA beneficiary: does it work?

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Making Retirement Benefits Payable to Trusts
A Workshop for Lawyers and CPAs: Pros, Cons, and Pitfalls of Naming a Trust as Beneficiary, Including the IRS " MRD Trust Rules"

1 hour version: How the IRS's minimum distribution rules apply to retirement benefits payable to trusts. The five "trust rules" you must not ignore. How to be sure the trust you draft or review is "safe" under the IRS's rules. How trust accounting rules apply to retirement benefits under the new Uniform Principal and Income Act and otherwise.

This 1-hour seminar can be expanded to a 2-hour or 4-hour seminar. The expanded versions are suitable for audiences of primarily or exclusively attorneys since greater emphasis is placed on drafting considerations and technical tax issues. If you want to use the 2-hour or 4-hour version:

It is suggested that this be the only topic of the day, since these longer versions duplicate parts of other Natalie B. Choate seminars.

Contact Natalie B. Choate for brochure descriptions and CPE application timelines.

2 hour version: The 2-hour seminar includes, in addition to the above material, a review of case studies involving funding credit shelter trusts and QTIP trusts (from the "Case Studies in Estate Planning for Retirement Benefits" seminar, above); and the following additional topics: "When is 'a trust for Spouse' the same as 'Spouse'?" under the minimum distribution trust rules, and "How to Fix a Non-complying Trust" (includes: Fixing trust while Participant is living; fixing the trust after death, but before the Designation Date; Other ideas).

4 hour version: The 4-hour seminar includes in addition to the above material, intensive review of two difficult trust income tax issues, namely:

INCOME IN RESPECT OF A DECEDENT (IRD). No stepped-up basis for IRD; When IRD is taxed; Drawback of making IRD payable to a trust; Tax treatment of IRD paid to an estate; Assignment of the right-to-receive IRD; Letter rulings allow fulfilling pecuniary bequests with IRD; and the income tax deduction for estate tax paid on IRD, and how the deduction relates to trust accounting.

THE SEPARATE SHARE REGULATIONS. This portion includes some of the material from the “Advanced Charitable Planning Workshop,” namely: Advantages of naming charity as beneficiary directly; If benefits pass to charity through estate or trust, not directly; No DNI deduction for distributions to charity; allocating IRD that is corpus under the separate share rule — If governing instrument requires funding bequest with IRD; If there is no authority to fund disproportionately; If fiduciary has authority to pick and choose; Avoiding deemed allocation by assigning the benefits; Deduction if distribution to charity occurs in a later year.

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Retirement Benefits: Special Planning Opportunities
Roth IRAs, LSDs/NUA, and Pre-Age 59½ Distributions 1 hour

The Code provides special favorable tax treatment for Roth IRAs, lump sum distributions and distributions of employer stock from retirement plans. This seminar explains how these special planning opportunities can help your clients beat the high tax cost of retirement benefits, PLUS how to get money out of a retirement plan before age 59½ without paying a 10% penalty! Learn about:

Roth IRAs: Who qualifies and who benefits (including new income test for 2005)
"NUA" treatment for employees who receive employer stock from their retirement plans
10-year averaging and 20% capital gain tax for retirees born before 1936
The 10% penalty for pre-59½ distributions, and how to avoid it

The Following Seminars Combine Selections from the Preceding List

Estate and Distribution Planning for Retirement Benefits: the Two-Hour Seminar
2 hours

This seminar combines two other Natalie Choate seminars, namely, "The Tax Pro's Guide to Stretch IRAs" and "Case Studies in Estate Planning for Retirement Benefits." This provides a sound introduction to the issues involved in estate planning for retirement benefits.

Estate and Distribution Planning for Retirement Benefits: the Four-Hour Seminar
4 hours

This seminar combines four of the one-hour seminar topics listed above:

The first two hours are a combination of two other Natalie Choate seminars, "The Tax Pro's Guide to Stretch IRAs" and "Case Studies in Estate Planning for Retirement Benefits." This provides a sound introduction to the issues involved in estate planning for retirement benefits.

The second two hours provide more information on special topics selected by the sponsor. THE SPONSOR MUST CHOOSE TWO OF THE FOLLOWING ONE-HOUR SEMINAR TOPICS:

· Charitable Giving with Retirement Benefits

· Death and Taxes: The Inherited Retirement Plan

· The 100 Best & Worst Planning Ideas for Your Client’s Retirement Benefits

· Planning for Retirement Benefits: Recent Developments and Current Trends

· Making Retirement Benefits Payable to Trusts

· Retirement Benefits: Special Planning Opportunities

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Estate and Distribution Planning for Retirement Benefits: the Intensive All-Day Workshop

This is an intensive course designed for professionals who are experienced in general estate planning and wish to add to their expertise with in-depth knowledge of how to integrate retirement benefits into clients’ estate plans. Designed to be taught from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. with three 10-minute stretch breaks and one 50-minute lunch break. Course provides eight 50-minute credit hours; can be shortened to 5 hours and 40 minutes.

Material covered is a combination of the following seminars (described above):

· The Tax Pro's Guide to Stretch IRAs

· Case Studies in Estate Planning for Retirement Benefits

· Charitable Giving with Retirement Benefits

· Death and Taxes

· Making Retirement Benefits Payable to Trusts

· Special Planning Opportunities

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Natalie Choate's Seminar Topics

Retirement Benefit Topics for Estate Planning and Money Management Professionals

The Following Seminars Combine Selections from the Preceding List

Other Topics

For Professional Audience

For Non-professional Audience

Retirement Benefit Topics for Estate Planning and Money Management Professionals

Seminar Handout Offer

The Following Seminars Combine Selections from the Preceding List

Other Topics

For Professional Audience

For Non-professional Audience