Trusted Estate Planning Services
AvoidProbate.ca is focused on helping our clients avoid the costly, onerous and lengthy process of probate which leads naturally to a comprehensive estate planning process for many of our clients. Beyond applying tactics to avoid probate, we devise strategies to maximize returns on our client’s investments, provide advice on how to mitigate or deal with capital gains taxes, or even help them to keep the beloved cottage in the family. There are many ways to grow and protect the estate you work so hard to amass – let our team of experts show you how.
Plan Your Wealth Transfer Strategy
Proper estate planning allows you to transfer your wealth according to your wishes, ensure the current and future financial security of your family and eliminate the need for unnecessary tax or probate fees.
How are we different….?
Our team of experts have decades of professional planning experience and access to the best estate planning lawyers, accountants and advisors in the country. This means we are on top of all the latest changes to tax and legal regulations.
For example:
Not every financial institution can provide the successor annuitant designation on your non-registered investments. At AvoidProbate.ca, we utilize it as a valuable estate planning tool to ensure a smooth transfer of assets while avoiding tax or probate fees.
By naming your spouse as a successor annuitant, you’ve ensured that that investment contract ownership rolls over without going through the estate and the investments being sold, meaning your spouse automatically becomes the annuitant and assumes all ownership rights. The transfer is completed on a tax-deferred basis — no tax slips to worry about.
Naming your spouse as the successor annuitant also allows for the investment contract to continue even when a child, designated as successor applicant, predeceases the parent who was the Applicant. It allows the investment contract to continue after the death of the annuitant and helps you avoid probate on your estate. However, one must be careful, as the successor does not automatically become the owner of the contract: this happens only if he is a co-investor or has been designated as contingent investor.
For more information on the use of the Successor Annuitant Designation please contact our office.