Covering assets with solid wills during coronavirus period? Making decisions based on emotion. Buying a house is a major life milestone. It’s a place where you’ll make memories, create a space that’s truly yours, and put down roots. It’s easy to get too attached and make emotional decisions, so remember that you’re also making one of the largest investments of your life, says Ralph DiBugnara, president of Home Qualified in New York City. “With this being a strong seller’s market, a lot of first-time buyers are bidding over what they are comfortable with because it is taking them longer than usual to find homes,” DiBugnara says. How this affects you: Emotional decisions could lead to overpaying for a home and stretching your budget beyond your means. What to do instead: “Have a budget and stick to it,” DiBugnara says. “Don’t become emotionally attached to a home that is not yours.”
Today’s buyers are very educated about comparable sales in your home’s area. You want your home to look like it is a great deal. In order to compete with other sellers, you should have your Realtor provide you with sales prices for similar homes that have already been sold in your area. Find out what your home is worth and then set your selling price 15% to 20% lower. By doing so, you will get multiple bids and more than likely end up with a bidding price that is well over what your home is worth.
Most estate planning lawyers have had some increase in the numbers of clients wanting to create or update wills and they have worked out ways of meeting with clients in settings where social distancing can be observed, outside on patios or driveways, with masks, sanitizer, disinfecting wipes and separate pens. Most provinces have allowed remote signing of wills and powers of attorney in some form or other, but the consensus from a lot of professionals seems to be that remote signing procedures should be a last resort when it is completely impossible to meet in a live setting. When remote processes are used, they must be identified as to timing, since it is quite likely that once the emergency measures are lifted, at least some of the new techniques introduced during the emergency will be rolled back. Find more details on protect myself during coronavirus.
However, the advice remains that wherever possible, Wills and Codicils should continue to be executed in the conventional way, ie with two independent witnesses present in person with the will-maker. It is acceptable for this to be done with the parties a short distance from each other, whether outside or in adjacent rooms, or through a window or open door of a house or vehicle. Wills and Codicils can be validly executed within existing law as long as all parties have a ‘clear line of sight’ of each other throughout the signing process.
Have an Emergency Fund: If you lost your job tomorrow would you have enough money to live off while you look for a new one? If not then you’re not alone. This study found that although Americans are doing a better job at saving, around 24 percent of them (57 million people) don’t have an emergency fund. Now I don’t want to be a negative Nancy or a Debbie downer, but emergencies happen all the time. They may not happen to you, but it’s always good to be prepared. You can’t predict an emergency, but you can prepare for one. The best way to do so is to set up an emergency fund of 3-6 months living expenses. That means if you lost your job tomorrow, you’d be able to live off your emergency fund for 3-6 months while you look for a new one. Net worth can seem like a tricky topic, but it’s quite simple. Your net worth is how much money you are worth. If you were to sell everything you own, then pay off everything you owe, how much money would be left?
Real estate finance transactions have witnessed breaches, and potential breaches, of loan to value ratios (LTV) and/or interest cover ratios. Some lenders have been amenable to agreeing to LTV covenant holidays up to a period of one year (and the waiver of their rights to obtain property valuations at the borrowers’ cost for the corresponding holiday period). This has in particular been the case in the retail sector and in relation to loans that were performing pre-COVID 19. Other lenders have agreed to equity cures of financial covenant breaches, with some lenders acting in a spirit of co-operation and going as far as waiving any prepayment penalties resulting from an equity cure. We have also seen an increase in the use of cash trap and cash sweep provisions under existing facility agreements to preserve cash in the structure and ensure the servicing of debt. Read extra info at https://techbullion.com/wills-and-covid-19-safeguarding-your-assets-during-a-global-pandemic/.