My name is Stephen J. Molis, the son of one of Uncle Al’s brothers, Vito Molis. I had the pleasure of assisting Uncle Al late in life in estate planning and divesting the substantial assets that he had accumulated over his lifetime. Over a period of years, I met with Uncle Al, his personal attorney, and his accountant several times, to assist him in planning to divest his assets.
Early on, two clear goals emerged. The first was to place a portion of assets into a trust for the express purpose of providing financial assistance to family members. The second was to develop a plan to divest his remaining assets to his siblings and their family members.
While not the subject for discussion herein, we assisted him in preparing and executing a plan to gift away most of his assets to all family members over a period of years prior to his death. Through this plan, he provided individual yearly monetary gifts to every family member for five years. By doing this, he was able to avoid paying what would have been substantial estate taxes after his death.
With the assistance of Uncle Al’s attorney, a Trust document was prepared and setup and funded with $600,000 in 2003. Three family members were identified to administer the Trust
, myself, Linda Bilodeau, daughter Uncle Al’s sister, Nellie Grande