News & Updates

More Work To Do On The Estate Tax

Technically, as they say, at the moment (early January, 2010), if you die in 2010 there is no federal estate tax. Let me repeat that: at the moment, if you die in 2010 there is no federal estate tax (there may be estate tax due to the state where you live).

The estate tax threshold has been going up for the past decade. Someone who died in 2009 with a taxable estate up to $3,500,000 will pay no federal estate tax. The current federal estate tax rules also provide that if you die in 2010, there is no estate tax, and if you die in 2011 the estate tax kicks back in again. This makes no sense but that is what the law says.

Most observers thought that Congress would change these rules before the end of 2009, but that did not happen. Most observers now think that early in 2010 Congress will take action to fix the threshold somewhere in the vicinity of $3,500,000, and will make that retroactive to the beginning of 2010. Of course, this all remains to be seen. Stay tuned for more details.

The Land Trust Alliance (“LTA”) is also working hard to get Congress to pass additional estate tax relief for landowners with land under conservation easement, so keep in touch both here and at the LTA site, www.landtrustalliance.org, for the latest developments.