Hawkins Law PC - News

Hawkins Proposes Farm-Friendly Death Tax Reform

Jeff Hawkins has proposed Indiana legislation that would allow farmers to arrange land holdings with limited partnerships and limited liability companies with softer inheritance taxation. For now, a farmer may violate his loan agreements if he transfers a mortgaged farm to an FLP or LLC. Jeff co-authored 2009 legislation that would let the farmer arrange the transfer without violating loan agreements, but Indiana would tax the transfer to death. Stay tuned for more information about this important tax legislation proposal.

Jeff Hawkins Participates in ISBA Meetings with Indiana Agencies

Jeff Hawkins and several other Indiana State Bar Association (ISBA) lawyers met with key representatives of the Indiana Family and Social Services Administration (FSSA) on Wednesday morning, August 10, to negotiate 2012 legislative proposals concerning how FSSA collects money from families of nursing home residents after the residents' deaths. Later that day, Hawkins joined a second ISBA team in a meeting with the Administrator of the Indiana Department of Revenue Inheritance Tax Division to discuss how Indiana taxes Indiana trust distributions after the trust creators' deaths. Both meetings opened new dialogue that may improve those agencies' relationships with lawyers and the Hoosier families that they represent.

Jeff Hawkins Hits the 2011 Speaking Circuit

Jeff Hawkins hit the road again for the 2011 professional speaking circuit on estate planning and administration at the French Lick Springs Resort in June 2011. Lawyers packed a conference hall at the Indiana State Bar Association's 10th Annual Solo & Small Firm Conference to hear Jeff lecture on new estate planning techniques and the Tax Relief, Unemployment Insurance Reauthorization, and Job Creation Act of 2010. Jeff kept the crowd rolling with laughter as he fielded numerous questions on widely ranging wealth management issues in his usual light-hearted style.

Hawkins Teaches Indiana's Transfer on Death Property Act

Jeff Hawkins logged some miles in 2010 as he traveled around Indiana to teach Hoosier lawyers about Indiana's Transfer on Death Property Act.

The Indiana State Bar Association's Probate, Trust, & Real Property Section appointed Subcommittee Chairman James Martin, of Merrillville, and members Suzanne Katt, of Indianapolis, and Jeff Hawkins, of Sullivan, to write the comprehensive Transfer on Death Property Act (the "Act") in l2008 for the 2009 legislative session. The Act was enacted in 2009 and revised in 2010. An additional revision is expected in 2011.

The Indianapolis Bar Association asked Jeff to teach its members about the Act in January 2010. He explained part of the Act in his elder law presentations for the Indiana Continuing Legal Education Forum's Advanced Elder Law conference in French Lick in July, and its annual Elder Law Institute in Indianapolis in October. Stock Yards Bank & Trust Company invited Jeff to present the topic at its 2010 Estate & Tax Seminar in Clarksville in October. The Estate Planning Council of Central Illiana invited Jeff to give his latest presentation of the Act  in Terre Haute on December 2, 2010.