Know Enough to Protect your Assets?
By: Michael Scott Ioane
These are dangerous times. What you own or worked so hard to obtain may be taken from you by people in the government or private individuals. Administrative errors by the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) may cause you to pay taxes you do not owe. Trivial lawsuits made by opportunistic persons may be ruled against your favor. This is the environment in which we currently live.
Do you know enough to be able to defend yourself and your assets? What you thought to be secure means to amass your savings and properties are not as safe as you imagined. Banks can simply turn your money over to the IRS per that agency’s request. As much as 40% of your own life insurance may not be enjoyed by your heirs. It goes to the government in the form of estate taxes.
To protect yourself you may: increase your financial privacy and increase your level of asset protection. Some people want to “exit the system” by increasing their privacy. In this method, you keep your name off of any deed, title or document pertaining to assets and properties. The general idea is that items cannot be taken from you if you are not documented as the items’ owner.
Asset protection, on the other hand, consists of different methods and techniques designed to make your assets unavailable to those who seek to acquire them. It involves the use of business entities you form to isolate and insulate your assets from attacks.
Privacy and protection may be at odds with one another. Increasing your privacy often decreases your asset protection and vice versa. What is important is that a balance between the two be struck based on your individual needs and situation.
Before you even begin to think about providing yourself some privacy and protection, you must know a few things about asset protection:
- It is not a way to deceive the government about what you owe in taxes
- There are many ways to achieve a high level of privacy but they entail important life changes
- Privacy and asset protection must be balanced based on your requirements
- There is no such thing as a perfect and foolproof asset protection plan
There is a lot to know about asset protection and it would require some effort to achieve it. It is not advisable to do this on your own without expert guidance. There are laws you may run afoul of that render your actions fraudulent, exposing you and your assets to peril. On the other hand, there are remedies you probably are not aware of that increase your defenses. These are techniques known to asset protection experts. You would need a handbook such as the “Asset Protection Manual” By: Michael S. Ioane to help you understand these concepts and guide you on your path to securing what is yours.
Michael Scott Ioane