What is a Will?

You have no money or property. You have no husband but you have children age 5 and 7. You walk out in the street and got killed by a drunk driver. Who has the right to sue on behalf of your children? This is why you better have a Will!

***

A will or testament is a legal declaration by which a person, the testator, names one or more persons to manage his/her estate and provides for the transfer of his/her property at death.
An estate is the net worth of a person at any point in time. It is the sum of a person's assets.
Assets is defined as the legal rights, interests and entitlements to property of any kind Minus all liabilities at that time. The issue is of special legal significance on a question of bankruptcy and death of the person.

***

Depending on the context, the term Asset is real estate or personal estate. Personal property, roughly speaking, is private property that is moveable, as opposed to real property or real estate. Real estate cannot be removed or moved to another location.

Personal property may be classified in a variety of ways. Tangible personal property refers to any type of property that can generally be moved (i.e., it is not attached to real property or land), touched or felt. These generally include items such as furniture, clothing, jewelry, art, writings, or household goods. In some cases, there can be formal title documents that show the ownership and transfer rights of that property after a person's death (for example, motor vehicles, boats, etc.) In many cases, tangible personal property will not be "titled" in an owner's name and is presumed to be whatever property he or she was in possession of at the time of his or her death.

Intangible personal property or "intangibles" refers to personal property that cannot actually be moved, touched or felt, but instead represents something of value such as service warrantee rights, stocks, bonds, and trade secrets, copyrights, patents, trademarks including the right to sue.

Accountants also distinguish personal property from real property because personal property can be depreciated faster than improvements (while land is not depreciable at all). It is an owner's right to get tax benefits for chattel, and there are businesses that specialize in appraising personal property, or chattel.

The distinction between these types of property is significant for a variety of reasons. Usually one's rights on real property are more enforceable than one's rights on personal property. The statutes of limitations or prescriptive periods are usually shorter when dealing with personal or movable property. Real property rights are usually enforceable for a much longer period of time and in most jurisdictions real estate and immovables are registered in government-sanctioned land registers such as county court houses. In some jurisdictions, rights (such as a lien or other security interest) can be registered against personal or movable property.

In the common law it is possible to place a mortgage upon real property. Such mortgage requires payment or the owner of the mortgage can seek foreclosure. Personal property can often be secured with similar kind of device, variously called a chattel mortgage, trust receipt, or security interest. In the United States, Article 9 of the Uniform Commercial Code governs the creation and enforcement of security interests in most (but not all) types of personal property. There is no similar institution to the mortgage in the civil law.

Liens on real rights follow the property along with the ownership. In the common law a lien also remains on the property and it is not extinguished by selling the property.

Many jurisdictions levy a personal property tax, an annual tax on the privilege of owning or possessing personal property within the boundaries of the jurisdiction. Automobile and boat registration fees are a subset of this tax. Most household goods are exempt as long as they are kept or used within the household; the tax usually becomes a problem when the taxing authority discovers that expensive personal property like art is being regularly stored outside of the household.

The distinction between tangible and intangible personal property is also significant in some of the jurisdictions which impose sales taxes.

In the strictest sense, a "will" has historically been limited to real property while "testament" applies only to dispositions of personal property (thus giving rise to the popular title of the document as "Last Will and Testament"), though this distinction is seldom observed today. A will may also create a testamentary trust that is effective only after the death of the testator.

Do not confuse a "Will" with a "Power of Attorney." Wills are executed after you die. Power of Attorney is executed while the testator is still alive and it dies when the testator dies.

How is Darnell’s Portfolio Doing?

This year the stock market is starting off well. The Dow is up 3.56% from January 1 to the close of January 27, 2011. For the first time since 2008, the Dow is betting my portfolio. In the same period my portfolio is up 1.45%. For the past 24 months, my portfolio is up 80.02%. My target is to achieve 100% at 36 month or 3 years.

I may not make it because the bond market is now fully valued and BBB to B rated Bonds are giving between 6% and 8% interest. Many of my bonds that were bought in 2008 and 2009 will be maturing in 2011. I will have to reinvest in bonds that have a lower rate of return. That my push my 100% return target out to 48 months or 4 years.