How to Get a US/UK Cross-Border Estate Plan Done (We’re The Brits In America S1:E30)

Working with cross-border attorneys who have expertise in both US and UK law is crucial for navigating the complexities of international estate planning.

Luckily, we’ve got one here. Paula Jones is a cross-border estate planning attorney. She’s the principal and founder of Jones Estate Group, a law firm based in Philadelphia that serves clients across the US and internationally.

In this episode, Richard and Paula discuss the importance of working with cross-border attorneys who have expertise in both US and UK law, as well as the need for a network of advisors to navigate the complexities of international estate planning.

If you are, as Paula refers to them, a multinational (you’ve got a business relationship with the US plus a non-US component), you’ll need to know the pitfalls of US federal and state estate taxes, inheritance taxes, and the differences in probate processes across states.

Paula explains that probate fees and legal fees vary depending on the jurisdiction, and the process can be delayed if the probate office is backed up. Filled with the answers to the questions you need to know, this episode is a must for any multinational.

We’re the Brits in America is affiliated with Plan First Wealth LLC, an SEC-registered investment advisor. The views and opinions expressed in this program are those of the speakers and do not necessarily reflect the views or positions of Plan First Wealth.

Information presented is for educational purposes only and does not intend to make an offer or solicitation for the sale or purchase of any specific securities, investments, or investment strategies. Investments involve risk and unless otherwise stated, are not guaranteed. Be sure to first consult with a qualified financial adviser and/or tax professional before implementing any strategy discussed herein. Plan First Wealth does not provide any tax and/or legal advice and strongly recommends that listeners seek their own advice in these areas.

About Richard

Richard Taylor is a British expat, dual citizen (UK & US). Originally from Bolton, he now lives in Greenwich, CT, where Plan First Wealth has its head office.

As the firm’s leader, Richard launched Taylor & Taylor, now Plan First Wealth, and continues to fuel the firm’s growth. Richard is a Chartered Financial Planner (UK – CII) in addition to holding the IMC (CFA UK) and Series 65 (US – FINRA).

Connect with Richard on LinkedIn

About Paula

Paula Jones is the Principal and Founder of Jones Estate Group, International and Domestic Estate Law.

Jones Estate Group, Inc. serves clients in all aspects of international and domestic estate planning and estate and trust administration, business succession planning, family corporations and private charitable foundations. International estate matters include foreign account and asset compliance, residency determinations, expatriation planning and pre-immigration planning, foreign ownership of U.S. real estate, foreign non-grantor trusts and probate of U.S. assets owned by non-U.S. persons.

Connect with Paula on LinkedIn

Transcript:

Richard Taylor:
[00:00:38 – 00:03:03]
Welcome to the we’re the Brits in America Podcast, a Plan First Wealth podcast for Brits in America by Brits in America, dedicated to helping British expats thrive in America. I’m your host, Richard Taylor and Plan First wealth is the business I founded and run today and we work with successful British expatriates living across the US to make the most of their opportunity and avoid the expat landmines. However, while Plan First Wealth, LLC is an SEC registered investment advisor, the views and opinions expressed in this program are those of the speakers and do not necessarily reflect the views or positions of plan first wealth. Information presented is for educational purposes only. Now, if you aren’t already receiving our weekly emails, please go to our website www.plannedfirstwealth.com and sign up to WealthHub. Its free and you will then be notified every time we drop a new episode and so much more. Alrighty, let’s get back to this week’s show.

Welcome to our ask an expert show where I invite a fellow professional in the US UK cross border space to come in and talk to me about the issues we think Brits in America needs to be aware of if they are going to thrive here. My guest today is Paula Jones. Paula is the principal and founder of Jones Estate Group, a law firm based in Philadelphia serving clients across the US and internationally in matters of international and domestic estate law. Paula is an American, although she is now also a Brit, and she helps international people, which for our purposes, that means Brits in America, to set up estate plans that protect them and their families in the US without inadvertently triggering adverse consequences outside the US. This conversation is hot on the heels of my conversation with Aidan grant where we got really specific on some of the details, nuanced and pitfalls of US UK cross border estate planning. So this conversation is the icing on that cake. How as a Brit in America with some or all of the cross-border estate planning issues and challenges that we face, as highlighted in this podcast and my podcast with Aidan, how do you go about putting a us estate plan in place that is fit for purpose, that doesn’t trigger any adverse consequences, and that doesn’t bankrupt you in fees? Well, Paula is going to tell us just how right now. So without further ado, let’s get into this. Hi Paula, welcome to we’re the Brits in America.

Paula Jones:
[00:03:03 – 00:03:06]
Thank you. I’m very happy to be here. Thanks so much for the invite.

Richard Taylor:
[00:03:07 – 00:03:38]
I am really excited to have this conversation. As I said, I’ve just had a great conversation with Aidan and I feel that this is such a critical. It is both a critical topic and it is a widely misunderstood, if it’s even known about by people. So the fact that I could get you on here to kind of tie this up for us, like, go from, like, cover the challenges people face to the. All right, great. What do I do? How do I solve this? So I’m really. I’m really excited to have this conversation.

Paula Jones:
[00:03:38 – 00:04:48]
Yeah. It is important to realize that it’s a unique area. Even among us attorneys, there are very few of us who actually do cross border work, also known as international estate law. It means all the same thing that we’re working with what I call multinationals, people who have a relationship with the US, plus a non us component to any aspect of their life, whether it’s their citizenship, residency, they’re married to someone who has a non us component, their children have a non us component. Some of the newer trends I’m seeing is we have fully us people who wind up with non us grandchildren, much to their surprise. So the world is getting smaller and smaller and smaller, and in doing so, there are many, many cross border issues that crop up more and more each day. So it’s a fascinating area. It’s interesting, it’s complicated, but our job as advisors is to make sure that it is nice and clear and well organized and not overwhelming to the client.

Richard Taylor:
[00:04:48 – 00:06:17]
There’s not many in your space. There’s a lot of estate planning attorneys. There’s not many internationally focused. I have been at this in America for nearly ten years. I have known of UK based UK US estate planning attorneys who can do some of the stuff in the US, but they can’t do anywhere near sufficient that a us based person needs. And I have, outside of the very, very, very big firms, which is just outside of the realm of possibility for the people we work with. I have not. Until I came across you and I started following you on LinkedIn, I started engaging in your stuff and realizing, oh, there’s someone here who. This is what I’ve been looking for. It took me in this space nine. Well, I don’t know when we connect on LinkedIn, but multiple years, so that’s a problem because is it the same? And I’m sure it is, and I know it is because I see it all the time in the tax world. It’s a similar story. Right. In my opinion, expats, anyone with international issues, needs a cross border tax advisor, but there are very few of them, and there are many, many more domestic focused tax advisors who are more than happy to take on international clients or people with international wrinkles without the knowledge, whether it’s in, whether they just don’t know what they don’t know, or whether they’re intentionally taking people on when they’re not equipped to advise them, I don’t know. But that’s a real problem. And I imagine it’s exactly the same in estate law where you’ve got expats going around engaging a local attorney and coming out with something they shouldn’t have.

Paula Jones:
[00:06:17 – 00:10:26]
Yeah, it’s very common. So the expression that I use all the time, because I do a lot of speaking to other estate attorneys on aspects of international one to raise awareness of them. But I do get much of my clients come from other us estate attorneys who an international issue walks into their office and they at least know enough to say, this is not me, I don’t know enough about this. So the expression we all use is we don’t know what we don’t know. You don’t even know what questions to ask because you literally have no frame of reference about an international estate client. So fortunately, some of them are wise enough to know what they don’t know, and they hand it off to someone who does in the same way that I do that as well in other areas of state law that I, that, you know, I don’t focus on. I hand that off to someone else. There are not, you know, many of us, but it’s certainly helpful when, when those attorneys know enough to hand it off. The other thing too, and this is kind of my, my general, I don’t know, excuse maybe for, for that us centric view, there is a bit of a difference between the US and the UK and that in the US, first of all, we are a massive, massive country. And for someone to leave the country, unless they are going to Canada or Mexico, obviously they have to get on a plane to go somewhere. And so, you know, the amount of international travel that is done in the United States is not as much as it is in other parts of the world, simply because if I get in the car here and I drive for 2 hours, I’m in the same state that I started in, and there’s 50 of them. You know, if I’m in the UK and I go somewhere 2 hours, I’m, I’m in a completely different country. You know, there is a difference there. So, yeah, you know, and so that does come across where we do have other advisors who have this America centric view. And as soon as anything international kind of comes their way, they, they get all nervous about it or something. So. And I don’t find that so much in Europe or Asia. You know, it’s. People are used to working with people that have a connection to another country. It, it, you know, so that’s an excuse. Maybe it’s a poor one, but there it is. That’s, that’s, you know, that’s. It’s. It’s important for us to realize that you need the us attorney. It’s important that if you’re working, working with, whether it’s a us attorney and you’re probably also working with a. With a UK attorney, that you’re working with the right kind, and that’s going to be a cross border attorney, you know, so, for instance, I will have clients who come in here and maybe they own real estate in another country. And, and normally, it’s a fairly universal concept that if you own real estate in another country, you’re probably going to need a separate will in that particular country, even if it is just for the real estate itself. And a lot of people will say, oh, well, you know, the person, the, the attorney who helped us buy the house there, we’ll just use them to do the will. And I say, no, you need the cross border attorney because they need to know that that will has to match up with the US estate plan and they have to coordinate together. And one of the specific reasons why is most wills start out by saying, this is my last will and testament. I revoke all prior wills and codicils prior to this one. Well, in doing that, if you have done a UK will and you did it last year, because you still keep your real estate there, and then you do one in the US, you have just revoked your UK will and you did not mean to do that. So unless you have cross border attorneys to spot those issues for you, because we don’t know what we don’t know, that may be done well.

Richard Taylor:
[00:10:26 – 00:10:38]
So that’s obviously something I’m familiar with, you know, in theory. But as someone on the ground, do you see that a lot? Do you see a lot? Do you encounter clients a lot where they’ve inadvertently canceled a will they didn’t mean to?

Paula Jones:
[00:10:40 – 00:12:13]
You know, maybe I work with slightly more sophisticated people. I don’t see it a lot. I see well meaning people say things like that to me in a meeting where I will say, oh, no, you know, now they’ve come to me as a cross border client. They may be referred by another cross border attorney or something. So there is a little bit of an understanding, or certainly from another estate attorney. So there is an understanding of, you need to be careful here. You need to tread lightly. Some people have had that experience as well. Most people that they have the income tax under control, and they have learned the hard way just how far of a reach the US does have, well past our borders into anything that you’re doing globally. And so they might have some understanding that the same concepts may apply to, you know, in the estate area, however it absolutely happens, you know, or afterward even, you know, we put everything together in the US and kind of, you know, five years later, we’re regrouping again because of some changes needed. And we always do a review of, okay, what, what do you have in place? Give me the asset update. How are things titled? You know, what. What other legalities do you have in place? And maybe they went off and I did something. We sold a house, we bought a house, we did this. Most clients, whether they’re cross border or not, sort of run off and do things, and then they call their attorney and say, oh, I did this. Is that a problem? So there’s a lot of that. Sure. I mean, we get that all the time.

Richard Taylor:
[00:12:14 – 00:12:34]
Yeah. It’s really interesting to hear you categorize what you said a minute ago, that most people have the income stuff under control yet, but they’ve learned the hard way about the long arm. And that’s exactly my experience. And we’re often, we’re very sadly and frustratingly, we’re very often the kind of the people who point that out.

Paula Jones:
[00:12:34 – 00:12:34]
Right.

Richard Taylor:
[00:12:34 – 00:12:48]
People will come to us saying, oh, yeah, I need some help with this, I need some help with that. And in learning about their situation, we’re the ones who uncover, ah, you shouldn’t have that, or this is gonna be a problem. And they learn the hard way. Yeah.

Paula Jones:
[00:12:49 – 00:14:53]
I think what’s also really important, and as you said, you know, outside of kind of massive firms, you know, it can be difficult to focus on an international advisor. To that end, I think I’ve had a lot of conversations over the last 15 years with people trying to get into compliance with their income tax. You know, they did not realize, as is so easy to understand, that they did need to file a us tax return, or they did need to report, you know, bank accounts that are, that are in another country. And why would they do that? There, there’s nothing intuitive about those rules. And so some people miss those rules. And in doing so, I think not having the knowledge or not having a good team of advisors leaves people vulnerable to an advisor in the US who scares them all the more and says, oh, this is a terrible, terrible problem you’ve done, and it’s going to cost a ton of money to get it all fixed. I’ve done a lot of the cleaning up of foreign account compliance filings, for instance, you know, having to update the income taxes and get a packet to the IR’s, you know, the streamlined entries, those kinds of things. I’ve done a lot of that work and that does not have to be a scary proposition and it does not necessarily have to be this like incredibly expensive prospect to get those things back into compliance. So I think not having this good team of advisors, meaning the accountant who does cross border and the attorney who does cross border and, you know, kind of a network, just feeling like you’re part of a network, even of other people who are part of a cross border and they have cross border advisors and just being able to bounce ideas off and say, well, wait a minute, I received this quote from this firm and they said this or whatever, and at least gauging that, you know, are they kind of being taken advantage of by the vulnerability of being, you know, in a complicated position?

Richard Taylor:
[00:14:54 – 00:15:43]
That’s it. The network, you’ve hit on that, that’s, I believe that’s the key. People, people come to America to be successful. It’s a land of opportunity. People go to Europe for different reasons. Brits come to America to be successful for their career opportunity. And what we see is they’ve been here for 1020 years and they’ve been successful. They’ve built up wealth, they’ve got complicated affairs. Even sometimes when they don’t have stuff in the UK, most of them do, but not all, but they’ve still got complicated affairs. And at that level, it’s a network. No one person has all the answers. And you need an accountant, you need a financial advisor, you need an advisor, you may need some other help as well. But you want all those people to be cross border.

Paula Jones:
[00:15:43 – 00:19:17]
Yep, yep. And to that end, so I’m sure people understand that and would say, yes, I would love all that kind of support. But then the fear is, what are the fees going to be for all of that? Right? Terrifying. Okay, so this is one of the huge misunderstandings. Fortunately, it’s a misunderstanding from a lot of clients, is, you know, they call, I just received something the other day. Someone said, I’m us and, but I own a house in France and like, can you do all of that for me? Like, I understand you do cross border and this person is expecting me to be able to practice us and french law all together and be a one stop shop. Unfortunately, that’s not the case. Right. So we are admitted to practice law in the United States, in particular states. And so I do not try to practice the law of other countries. One, I’m not allowed to, but two, I’m not going to do something that I have no knowledge in, in the same way that advisors in other countries, if they are not admitted to practice law somewhere in the United States, they should not be advising on us law. I do see that sometimes very sophisticated clients have said, oh, well, we had all of our advisors in Switzerland tell us that we could do this, that, and the other in the United States. And I said, well, next time you’re going to need a us tax advisor for those things, you know, unfortunately, and you hate to deliver that message anyway. So in setting up the representation, I mean, this is how it’s done. You, the US is usually leads a little bit in the estate in putting together an estate plan. And what I mean by that is, because the US reaches far beyond its borders, the us estate plan may govern things that go beyond its borders. Right. And so you’re not necessarily going to get the same approach when coming from the UK. So on the UK end of things, things are generally, anything that is happening within the borders is handled within the estate plan and it doesn’t go beyond. So that’s what I mean by the US is a little bit of a leader in the estate plan, even though you need both. So what happens is you’re going to have your us estate attorney and they’re going to put together the plan because people are either resident here or citizen here, but that’s going to be your leader. You may also need a separate estate plan in the UK. You may not, and it depends on the type of assets that. That you may hold there and your relationship back. Do you spend a lot of time there? Do you are your beneficiaries there? Is your family there? If are you here for only a few years, and then as soon as your, you know, job opportunity or whatever kind of lapses, your general plan is to go back. All of these things are, you know, unique to each particular client. So we may need a separate advisor in the UK. And if we do, I can’t tell you how many times that we’ll put together the US plan and the UK advisor will take a look at it and say, yes, that actually will work in the UK as well. So, for instance, it is possible for someone to have a US will and for the UK attorney to say, we could actually use that us will in the UK if needed at that person’s death. And so, no, I don’t think they need a separate UK will at this time. Now, I will tell you this, I’m not a UK attorney, but working with them enough, I can say if you still have real property in the UK, you’re going to need a separate UK will.

Richard Taylor:
[00:19:17 – 00:19:23]
Okay, so this is for things. This might be accounts or pensions, not physical real estate.

Paula Jones:
[00:19:23 – 00:19:24]
Exactly.

Richard Taylor:
[00:19:24 – 00:19:24]
Okay.

Paula Jones:
[00:19:24 – 00:20:15]
Exactly. And then, you know, under other scenarios. And the great thing about working with cross border attorneys is that we all know each other and we can usually shoot a quick email to say, here’s the general profile of this client. Do they need something in the UK? If so, what would they need? And I’m going to get a quick email back from all my folks in the UK to say, well, they should do this, that or the other, or, no, you’re good for now, come back in a few years if their circumstances change, whatever, you know, and that’s how that works. So this fear of saying, oh, you’re telling me I need two attorneys instead of one, my fees are going to be doubled. That is not actually true. I don’t think I’ve ever worked with someone who has exactly double the fees in each jurisdiction. That’s a big fear.

Richard Taylor:
[00:20:16 – 00:20:40]
And I was actually going to be my next question. So I’m in Connecticut and let’s say I engage you to do an estate plan for me. Do I have to go and find a UK attorney and connect you or. It sounds like that’s something you’ve got the network you can plug into that very easily. It’s not on me. You will determine if you need to have a conversation and then if you need to engage them. Will you handle that?

Paula Jones:
[00:20:40 – 00:21:35]
Absolutely. Absolutely. Yes. So there are various organizations. There’s step, which is society of trust and Estates practitioners, there’s the International Bar association, there’s a private client committee, there’s a conference every year on that. I mean, we are all part of networks and I, like you had said in the beginning, it’s a fairly small group of people that we tend to know each other. So when someone says, yeah, I’m us people and I’m in the US now, but I still have my pensions in the UK. We’re hanging onto our London flat for a while, you know, do I need something in the UK? In that scenario, I can say, yep, you do, and I’ll give you a couple of names of people who I know are not going to charge them the earth, who are not going to sort of try to take advantage and say that they have a more complicated situation than they do. You know, we all tend to work together because we know if my clients are going to be happy with me, I know they’re going to be happy with this other person as well.

Richard Taylor:
[00:21:36 – 00:21:58]
Yeah, great. And what about from a state perspective? Because one of the stumbling blocks I’ve encountered repeatedly in my time here is, I thought you needed to. I thought we needed. At one point, I thought we needed to find a. A cross border estate planning attorney in each individual state, because each state have its own rules and probate and stuff.

Paula Jones:
[00:21:58 – 00:24:09]
Yeah, it does. So let me speak to that a little bit. And this is something where the US is always called out on all my. Earlier today, I had a call with my step group, and we have eight different countries on the call, and we’re all chatting and we tend to compare notes about, this is what happens in my country, what happens in yours, etcetera. So the US is known for being somewhat complicated because not only are we a different country, but we have 50 separate states within. And each of the laws in those states is, of course, slightly different. So what does that look like in the estate context? First, let me talk about federal, because I think this can get rid of a lot of complexity. First of all, so we do have a federal estate tax here. The exemption amount for that federal estate tax is 13.61 million in 2024. So in other words, if I die with less than $13.61 million, I don’t have to worry about us federal estate tax. That’s. A lot of people just went, oh, Phew. I don’t have to worry about that. Okay, that’s a very high number. That number is going to change in 2026. It is going to go down. It’s going to go down to 6 million. Still, a lot of people just went, Phew. I don’t need to worry about that. Okay, so when we talk about wealthy, that’s what we’re talking about, we’re kind of saying, you know, very high net worth. People are going to need to address us federal estate tax planning as part of their estate plan. Okay, now let’s talk about everybody else. There is also a state level of estate or inheritance tax in some states, but not in many others. So let me just throw out some examples. New York has a state level of estate tax. The tax rate is roughly 16%. It’s a graduated rate. It’s roughly, you know, kind of around 16 ish percent. But there’s also a exemption amount there, which is about 6 million. Okay, so New York, which tends to be a fairly high tax state.

Richard Taylor:
[00:24:09 – 00:24:19]
Just so I’m clear here, Paula, if you’re say you’re worth 100 million, so you over both all exemptions, are we talking 40% federal, 16% New York state?

Paula Jones:
[00:24:19 – 00:25:25]
Yes. Yes. They’re huge. They can be huge. That’s why people need to do planning. First of all, that federal estate tax right now is a flat rate of 40%. It’s a huge tax. It is historically larger than the highest income tax bracket, and historically it tends to be that way. The philosophy being you’ve just passed away and therefore, anyone who’s receiving an inheritance from you, it’s found money. So it’s a whole lot easier to take a 40% chunk off of that because you never had that money to begin with. Right. That’s different than income tax, where you’re like, I’m working to earn this money, and what, you’re taking that chunk out, you know that it’s more painful on income tax than it is on a state. That’s the philosophy. I’m not saying I agree or disagree, but that’s the philosophy. So then, yeah, you have to factor in the state level as well. So state of Delaware, for instance, got rid of their inheritance tax many years ago. So there is none. Florida, no inheritance tax. New Hampshire, no inheritance tax.

Richard Taylor:
[00:25:25 – 00:25:41]
Am I right? Just being specific on the language, estate tax, right. Is it tax on the estate? When we’re talking about inheritance taxes, are we talking about a tax on the people who receive the money as opposed to a tax on the estate? Or is it state by state? Each has its own way of doing it.

Paula Jones:
[00:25:41 – 00:27:35]
It is state by state, and each does have their own. So, for instance, New York really is an estate tax, meaning the estate itself has to pay it and then the beneficiaries receive. And that really is a practicality, because at the end of the day, when you’re administering anyone’s estate, you’re going to make, you have to make sure those taxes are paid first anyway. And so it’s not as if you’re going to give the money and then the beneficiary has to file anything and pay a tax. That’s not how it practically works. You’re settling an estate. All, any estate and inheritance taxes have to come off the top and then. Got it, you know, and then beneficiaries can get, if there is something left for them to receive they will receive it. But to answer your question, yes, the estate is paid from the estate. An inheritance tax. Technically, the legal definition is that the beneficiary has to pay that tax. So New York is an estate tax. I’ll compare that with Pennsylvania, which is an inheritance tax. So Pennsylvania says, if you’re a spouse, the inheritance tax, anything passing to spouse is 0%, you’re a child of the decedent. Anything passing to child is 4.5%. It’s a flat tax. There’s no exemptions. So here’s how that actually works. Let’s say I’m a decedent. I left everything to my three kids. It’s an inheritance tax. Right. It’s still, when the estate is being settled, the inheritance tax attributable to each of those beneficiaries is going to get paid first before those beneficiaries actually receive anything. Let’s throw in a curveball on that one and say I left things to my three children and also $100,000 to my sister. My sibling tax rate in Pennsylvania is 12%. So my sister.

Richard Taylor:
[00:27:35 – 00:27:36]
No exemption. There’s no.

Paula Jones:
[00:27:36 – 00:27:38]
No exemption. No dollar one.

Richard Taylor:
[00:27:38 – 00:27:40]
Right. Wow.

Paula Jones:
[00:27:40 – 00:28:14]
So that $100,000 going to my sister, she is actually going to receive, at the end of the day, 100,000 minus $12,000, that’s what she’s actually going to receive. And the estate itself, when being settled, before she ever receives her inheritance, they’re going to pay that $12,000. Yeah. From a practical standpoint, it all gets paid first. From a legal standpoint, she, she. An inheritance tax, the beneficiary is going to receive the balance after their personal tax rate is paid. Yeah. That’s the difference between estate and inheritance.

Richard Taylor:
[00:28:14 – 00:28:19]
I think you were naming some of the states where there is estate or inheritance tax.

Paula Jones:
[00:28:19 – 00:28:30]
So you’re going to hear, you know, Florida is popular for more reasons than just the sun. And one of that is they do not have a state level of income tax. They do not have any death taxes in that state.

Richard Taylor:
[00:28:30 – 00:28:31]
Okay.

Paula Jones:
[00:28:32 – 00:29:41]
So it is a very popular state for people who say, if I’m going to pick a state in the, in the US in which to be resident at the time of my death, which is the cheapest one. So for at least for a state and inheritance, New Hampshire, Texas, Florida, Delaware, there’s a bunch of others that they just don’t have anything at death. You know, not so uncommon to have nothing. Estate and inheritance. You know, I gave you some examples. New Jersey used to have inheritance in a state, and they got rid of both of them a couple of years ago, there are exemptions, even if there is an estate or inheritance. For instance, in Pennsylvania, I said, well, but the exception is, yes, there’s an inheritance tax, but if it’s going to the spouse, it’s 0%. So it doesn’t matter anyway. A lot of the states have that. If it’s going to a spouse, that’s, that’s an exempted beneficiary. Charities are exempted beneficiaries. They’re, they’re not going to get taxed on that. Some of them continue on and say, okay, if you’re leaving things to kids, that’s an exempted beneficiary. But any, anyone receiving things beyond that amount, now we’re going to, you know, incur either in estate or inheritance. So, good to know.

Richard Taylor:
[00:29:41 – 00:29:46]
One of the differences with states, right. Is this issue of probate.

Paula Jones:
[00:29:46 – 00:29:46]
Yep.

Richard Taylor:
[00:29:47 – 00:30:03]
This is one of the main issues we have with Brits in America, is they’ll walk past an estate planning attorney’s office on the high street, and the estate planning just lobs a living trust at them, which can cause some problems. Right. But why? What’s this whole thing with probate and living trusts here?

Paula Jones:
[00:30:03 – 00:32:20]
Yeah. Okay. This is something, too, that we have to educate even fully domestic estate clients about is probate has a terrible reputation, and sometimes that is absolutely warranted. But again, it is different from state to state. And so some of these things can be looked up, and I’ll direct people exactly where they should look it up. It is the county in which you reside, in the state in which you reside. And you can google whatever that county is. You know, if I’m sitting in Philadelphia right now, it’s Philadelphia County Register of Will’s office. Sometimes it is called the surrogates court, sometimes it’s called orphans Court. Sometimes it’s called probate office. Any of those things, look that up and they will have a page. They will tell you what the probate fees are. And some of them have some, you know, kind of basic legal guides about, like what is required when, when someone passes away. It’s not necessarily super intuitive on their website, I will give you that. But you can at least have some idea of what probate fees may be at play at death. And you can also pick up the phone and call and ask them and they will tell you, okay. However, some places, I’ll give you an example, probate in the state of Delaware. My first year of practice was in Delaware, is very high. So if you have a million dollars in probate property at death. You have a $17,500 probate fee. That’s just the probate fee. Okay. That’s a lot of money, considering that if you moved across the border into Pennsylvania, your probate fee would be about $1,200. Okay. Pennsylvania, not a big deal with probate. Delaware, expensive. The process, however, not a big deal in Florida. The probate fees are not necessarily large, but there is the process that is done there. You almost have to have an attorney, and so your legal fees are going to be where youre, you’re, the probate process in Florida is going to get you. All right.

Richard Taylor:
[00:32:20 – 00:32:39]
So I wasn’t even coming at this from a, from a cost perspective. I wasn’t even aware of this, really. I thought the differences in probate fees were immaterial in the grand scheme of things. I was coming at it from a process perspective that it, taking months, years and difficulties. This is just an additional wrinkle I hadn’t even, I wasn’t even aware of.

Paula Jones:
[00:32:39 – 00:35:24]
Yeah. There, there’s a couple of issues with probate. There’s a couple of things that we want to look at depending on where someone is resident at the time of their death. One is, what is the actual probate fee? Meaning the fee that the probate office charges in order for you to use them, you know, and to use their services. Two is what legal fees might be incurred. Quite high in Florida, quite high in California. But then the third is, what is the actual process, what needs to be done? Do I really need an attorney to do that? Can I just file some paperwork on my own? Is it fairly straightforward? I will say New Jersey, Pennsylvania, fairly straightforward. The other issue is going to be how backed up is the office that your probate is going to be a part of. Now, we just got through Covid, where there was an, you know, incredible backs, backups on everything all over the world, and there wasn’t a whole lot we could do about it. However, you know, if you’re in a small town with not a lot of people, your probate office is probably pretty timely, and they can turn things around in a month, and you’re free to go and settle the rest of the estate and you have access with the assets, etcetera. No problem. And I experienced that even during COVID If you’re in a small town, you’re probably okay. If you’re in a big city, if you’re in New York City, you could be waiting a year, a year and a half, two years, just for them to get through the paperwork to issue the letters to give the personal representative the legal authority to proceed, and that’s a problem. So, yes, that is something we absolutely take a look at when working with someone. So you had asked about. And so what’s with irrevocable living trust in the US? In a purely domestic situation? One of the ways to avoid probate is to take assets and make sure that they are put into a revocable living trust. It takes it out of your individual name, but you still have complete control over those assets. Sitting in that trust, everything is still reported under your own Social Security number. Your income tax return looks exactly the same, and you pay exactly amount of taxes. There is no tax, no avoidance of a state or inheritance tax. By putting things in a revocable trust. One of the biggest misconceptions is they think, well, I put all my assets in here and I vote I avoid all tax. You do not. You avoid a probate fee and a probate process. You do not avoid taxes.

Richard Taylor:
[00:35:25 – 00:35:42]
People who think that maybe they’re spending too much time on TikTok, I don’t know. There’s a lot of bad advice on TikTok right now. There’s a lot of very confident young men. It’s always young men standing in front of flip charts writing, LLC and trusts, and then black lines of arrows and making promises that are not true.

Paula Jones:
[00:35:42 – 00:39:10]
Yeah, yeah. It’s so wrong. And, you know, so Susie Orman, right, this incredibly, very successful, you know, written a million books. She actually has a statement in one of her books. It’s one of her earlier books, Granite. And she says the probate fees go to the attorneys. That is incorrect. That is incorrect. Probate fees go to your local probate office, your court. Legal fees go to attorneys, you know, and sort of never, never the two shall meet. So, yeah, there. There’s, again, take legal advice from an attorney, not anyone else. So that probate process, very common for fully domestic people to have revocable living trust. They have a poor over will, and they have a revocable living trust so that they can go ahead and fund that trust with their assets. So that if all their assets are sitting in a revocable living trust at the time of their death, they don’t have to go through probate, they still have to file the taxes and, you know, go through all that. But the legal access to the assets is immediate upon their death. Their trustee, their successor, trustee of the revocable trust, has immediate legal control over the assets in there. So, yes, there can be some very good benefits to that however, when dealing with UK people, we do not use revocable trusts. Okay. There are other way. And. And that is something that, you know, Aidan, maybe on his last call could detail is that some years ago, there are income tax triggers that happen on the UK side when you put assets in and out of a revocable trust. So we try to avoid it. Fortunately, we can still avoid probate in other ways. In the US, other than a revocable living trust, you can title assets in different ways. For instance, if I have an asset with a beneficiary designation on it, that’s a non probate asset. I already have a legal document attached to that asset, like my retirement plan, my life insurance policy, annuities. Some investment accounts are offering beneficiary designation forms where you can fill that out so that upon that person’s death, even if that account is in their sole name, we already have a beneficiary designated, so it automatically passes to that beneficiary and does not pass through the will of that person. Probate property means property that passes through the will. So it is entirely possible, especially if you’ve got a married couple and of the death of the first spouse, you may not have probate at all. If everything is in joint names, it just automatically passes to the spouse. Everything else is by beneficiary designation. It all goes to the spouse. You don’t have any probate property there anyway. Every situation is different. Any of us, whether it’s the financial advisor or the attorney or the accountant. Right. The client gets handed the dreaded questionnaire where they have to write out everything, all the titling, the approximate value, you know, all of those things, because it’s really, really, really important. And the last part of any estate plan, you can put together the will and powers of attorney, and you can sign all that. You are far from done. Because the last step is, do we need to retitle things such that it is passing exactly how you want it to pass? And we make sure that all those things are updated.

Richard Taylor:
[00:39:11 – 00:39:16]
Got it? Got it. Right. So, Paula, you’re admitted to practice in, what, New York and Pennsylvania?

Paula Jones:
[00:39:16 – 00:39:17]
And New Jersey.

Richard Taylor:
[00:39:18 – 00:39:18]
And New Jersey.

Paula Jones:
[00:39:18 – 00:39:18]
Right.

Richard Taylor:
[00:39:18 – 00:39:19]
So I’m Southern Connecticut.

Paula Jones:
[00:39:20 – 00:39:20]
Yep.

Richard Taylor:
[00:39:20 – 00:39:27]
So how would that work? How would that work? How do we get around these questions of probate and who drafts it and all that stuff?

Paula Jones:
[00:39:27 – 00:41:49]
Yeah. So here’s how we work. So, again, most of what I do is federal, and so I can work with people from most states. However, it’s also important that we are admitted to certain states for a certain reason. And we are committing unauthorized practice of law if we start to try to advise on state and local law in other states. Okay, so here’s what we do. Like a lot of us, we represent, you know, the same people for, for a very long period of time. I have my clients, they started out in New York and at some point they say, well, now we’re moving to Florida. Okay, now they’re resident in Florida. I’m not a Florida attorney, but my clients are like, we’re not getting a new attorney. You’ve been with us for 20 years. You know, like, this is really important. It’s a very important relationship. What we do is, can get local council to advise on all issues of state and local law, to review everything with an eye toward that, while the, the relationship with the attorney is still, still allowed to continue. So, for instance, right now I have us UK people. They happen to be in Texas. Much of what I’m doing is federal. I have a cross border Texas attorney who is able to look at everything we’re doing, sign off on it, and it usually is as quick as it is with dealing with attorneys in other countries where you say, well, here’s what we’re doing from the us side. Can you review this from a UK perspective and let us know what we can and can’t do? Are we inadvertently bumping into something that we’re unaware of? It’s this same process when you’re dealing with another state, or certainly we have clients with, you know, they may be resident in one state, but they own real estate in another, you know, and so. Yeah, and so you reach out, you know, I have a client, they’ve got a nice house in Wyoming. A lot of people like to buy nice houses in Wyoming. Well, I’m not barred in Wyoming, but I know the person who is Jackson, Wyoming. I’m going to reach out to, you know, my firm there and say, here’s what we’re doing and they’re going to be brought in for, you know, a little bit of work and it is just a little bit of work to review everything from the Wyoming perspective.

Richard Taylor:
[00:41:50 – 00:42:26]
So back to me, because why not? I’m in Connecticut. I come to you, I say, paula, help me. And if you need, I’m assuming you do, if you need a Connecticut attorney, you’ll handle that part of it. If you need a UK, whether it’s just asking a question or if it requires more work, maybe even a will, you can handle that aspect of it. I’m dealing with you. Yes, you might need to go out there and find that. But you have this network, you know these people, you know where to go, you can get the answers. And critically, it’s not gonna. It’s not like having three separate independent engagements I have to manage and.

Paula Jones:
[00:42:26 – 00:43:31]
Correct. Correct. So what I describe is I am almost serving like a general contractor, right. Is that if you’re gonna have to renovate your kitchen, you’re gonna need the plumber and the electrician and then the cabinet people, and I. Someone has to coordinate all of those people. And that’s where, you know, that’s where the headaches are, right? Is coordinating everyone and making sure everyone shows up on time and does their job as well. So I serve in met for many clients as the general contractor, where I just kind of map it out and I organize it. You break it down and you go, okay, your UK person needs to do this, this piece, your Wyoming council needs to do this piece, and this is the US piece. And we’re gonna make sure that we do this so that the client themselves are not, again, not knowing what they don’t know. They’re not scrambling, trying to learn this, because Lord knows they never wanna do it again. When you’ve renovated your fifth kitchen in your life, you can serve as your own general contractor because you know the drill. But the first time you wanna get someone else to do it.

Richard Taylor:
[00:43:31 – 00:44:41]
You know, when I have these conversations, I can’t stop myself from thinking about my clients or the people I speak to. And as we’re having this conversation, I’m thinking about a meeting I had this week, two days ago, with a couple, not atypical of our people we speak to. This is a successful. Came to America and have been successful. They live in California. They’re worth several million. Not flirting with the current federal exemption, but, you know, several million. And they’re green card holders, so domicile might still be a point, a point of contention. So maybe there’s a UK problem that covered that in much ground with Adam. So they’re in California, worth several million. Green card holders, not citizens. And they have property in California, they have property in the UK, substantial property in the UK. They have a chalet in Chamonix, France. So we’ve got California, federal, UK and France. Yeah, that’s a lot. There’s a lot going on there.

Paula Jones:
[00:44:41 – 00:45:25]
But you know what? That’s also the norm is when I explain to people, I say, I work with people with a US plus a non us component. And it is usually not just two countries, it’s usually three or four, because especially if you’re dealing with a married couple. You might have a UK person who married a germane, you know, and they both moved to the United states. So now you’ve got three countries, you know, and, yes, people have a habit of, like, buying homes in places where they don’t live, because that’s a beautiful place to have a home. And so then they’ve got another country. Well, we do have the place in Italy, you know, and so that that is more the norm is that you’re looking at three or four jurisdictions with multinational clients.

Richard Taylor:
[00:45:25 – 00:45:36]
So they’ve got the difference allowances. It’s all got to communicate. They’ve got to be joined up. One’s not got to invalidate the other. And I think people are just so overwhelmed by that.

Paula Jones:
[00:45:36 – 00:45:36]
Yeah.

Richard Taylor:
[00:45:36 – 00:45:37]
They just switch off.

Paula Jones:
[00:45:37 – 00:46:52]
Yeah, absolutely. So. And I do understand that. And so it’s really important for us to explain things very clearly and kind of break things down. So what I like to do, kind of the first meeting with clients is we kind of get on the phone, we get all that basic information because it gives us an idea of, like, okay, who’s our team here? What do we really need to reach out about? You know, so we can. We can look at, you know, the home in France and say, okay, we’re. We’re gonna reach out quickly to french council and say, what do we need to do there? Because they’re probably going to need a separate french will that clearly says it is for this home only, you know, and it recognizes that there’s going to be a US will and perhaps another UK will that, you know, and your clients. Sure, they. They’ve got property in all three jurisdictions, so they’re going to have us, UK and France. They are. And I know that sounds painful, but it. It really doesn’t have to be. You know, the french thing is fairly straightforward. The UK, again, because the real estate is fairly straightforward, and it’s going to dovetail into the US, and the US will is going to say, and this will governs all of my, the remainder of my worldwide property.

Richard Taylor:
[00:46:53 – 00:47:25]
You know, Paula, it’s straightforward because. Because of you. Well, this has been our problem for nine years. Prior to you, it’s felt like an overwhelming problem that I couldn’t. I couldn’t fix for people. I know it’s not my job to fix it, but it’s my, you know, we’re in the business of putting things that we can’t handle ourselves. We’re in the business of finding the right professional for that person. But this estate planning thing has been like a solution we couldn’t solve for people. And because you think, I gotta find someone in California who understands, cross border, and then I’ve got to get the UK and then the France. Where do I even start for France?

Paula Jones:
[00:47:25 – 00:47:25]
Yeah.

Richard Taylor:
[00:47:26 – 00:47:36]
But once you have the knowledge and the network which you have, you can pull it together really simply without that. You’re the missing piece of the jigsaw for the people that we speak to.

Paula Jones:
[00:47:36 – 00:47:37]
Yeah.

Richard Taylor:
[00:47:37 – 00:47:38]
Yeah.

Paula Jones:
[00:47:38 – 00:51:43]
You know, I wanted to touch on. If it would be helpful to touch on residency a little bit, please. Uh, because you mentioned your California people who were here on a green card. Um hmm. They. And they sound similar to clients of mine who also, they have a home in California. They spend some time in California. They are UK people, but they’re actually domiciled in India, even though they’ve never lived there. So one might say, well, how does that happen? You know, tell me. And I. I don’t really know. Like, for the indian part of it, I don’t know. But they’ve got their advisors there, you know, and their UK advisors agree that they’re actually not domiciled in the UK. Not entirely clear to me. So that is one of the kind of base questions is, where are you, right? Where are you resident? And therefore, what does that trigger? So, in the United States, for estate tax purposes, residency is not a black or white issue. Okay. And again, I’m going to stress this is for estate tax purposes, not for income tax purposes. Okay. So for federal income tax purposes, there are fairly clear tests as to whether you’re resident or not. And a lot of it has to do with one. If you’re a citizen, boom, you’re resident. Right? Same on the estate tax. That one’s easy. Doesn’t matter where you physically are, doesn’t matter where your income or your assets are, as long as you’re a us citizen, it all gets brought in. So that’s kind of an easy rule. But the second one is, am I resident? If I’m not a citizen, am I resident in the United States? So the rule for estate tax purposes is if you are considered domiciled in the US, such that you have no definite present intention of leaving. All right? So the answer is not a black and white. It’s not, how many days have I been here or there? It is not immigration status. I have a green card, I have a visa. You know, that’s not definitive. It’s a factor, but it’s not definitive. So it is one of intention. So the law here takes a look at this list of factors. Where do you spend your time? Where do you own a property that you live in? What is the size of that property? Is your us property more like a pied terre or a vacation home, or is it more like a primary residence? Depends. Where is your circle of interests? Where’s your family? Again, not definitive. There are cases where you can, where you and your spouse can live in separate countries. And that’s okay. It doesn’t interrupt the residency issue. Where do you recite that your residence is? Do you have a driver’s license? What does your estate plan say? Does your will recite that you are resident in one place or another? Where have you made burial arrangements? Believe it or not, funeral or prepaid burial arrangements, where are you ultimately going to wind up? Because that speaks to where someone feels like, this is my home. So it’s this list of all of these various factors that are taken into consideration. And it’s a gray area. And so people can kind of lean to one way I’m leaning more toward residency or I’m leaning more toward not being a resident. So part of the planning that we do with people is to say, where are you? Where should you be? And do we need to take steps to really evidence that you are trying to declare that you are a resident in one place versus another? And what do we need to put in place to do that? You know, do we need to update your wills, your driver’s license? Where do you vote? What do you recite on your tax returns? Where are your doctors and advisors and all of those people? Take a look at your list of factors and do we need to tighten this up to really direct you to one location versus another?

Richard Taylor:
[00:51:43 – 00:52:04]
You know, thinking about this family I just mentioned, though, the thing that came up is we just don’t know. You know, we’re happy in California right now, but, you know, we’ve got property in the UK, could end up there, could end up somewhere else. As an estate planning attorney, how do you manage that? We’re an expert. Could end up anywhere. Do you manage, is it frustrating? What do you do?

Paula Jones:
[00:52:04 – 00:53:50]
No, not really. And it is the norm. It is more the norm and it has been sent into overdrive because of COVID because of remote work. We truly are more digital nomads. I have clients now. There are immigration programs throughout the world that they are offering temporary visas. They’re offering income tax residencies to certain people. So Malta. I have clients who do not live in Malta, but they are income tax resident in Malta because Malta has offered this program, and they are truly nomadic people. They move every three months, and they’re just seeing the world right now because they have the money to do it. And they both work remotely. They just change their residence every three months. Where are they? That’s a question. So there’s a couple of ways to answer that question. I mean, one is that you want to declare that you are somewhere. I’m not saying it will completely avoid any fight on that, because, hey, you have enough money, certain jurisdictions want to tax you, and they’re going to try to make a claim on you. But we evidence as much as we can. First, we do the mathematic on it all. We take all jurisdictions and say, where should you be? Okay, you know, and we kind of map that out and say, well, it would be a lot less expensive for you to say you are australian rather than us people. Also, there is a myth out there that, oh, you never want to be us because they’ll just tax you. It’s always the highest tax rate. That is not true. With a 13 million estate tax exemption and an unlimited marital deduction in some cases, and the 16 estate tax treaties we have with other jurisdictions, the US might just be your best bet, but you have to do that.

Richard Taylor:
[00:53:51 – 00:54:10]
He gets strategic about it, so it’s like, okay, so you don’t know. But let’s let. What we can do, though, is we can paint a picture that says, for now, this is what we believe are domicile and we’ll pick and then we’ll kind of like, structure things such as our affairs, our intentions, our life around what works right now.

Paula Jones:
[00:54:10 – 00:54:10]
That’s right.

Richard Taylor:
[00:54:10 – 00:54:11]
I hadn’t thought of that.

Paula Jones:
[00:54:11 – 00:54:11]
That’s right.

Richard Taylor:
[00:54:11 – 00:55:02]
Okay, cool. Yeah, right, Paul, as we wrap up here, can I just address the elephant in the room? So, obviously, the thing about this couple I’m speaking to, one of the thing I think, that puts people off or prevents them doing anything is the overwhelming complexity. California, federal, UK, France. Where do I start? I don’t know anyone. I’ll deal with it later. The other one, though, is a layperson in California is thinking, oh, my God, all these lawyers. This is going to be 30, 40, 50 grand. I don’t know what I’m putting numbers in the head here, but that also terrifies people. So I’m not asking you for specific numbers, but how would you allay the fears of someone who’s thinking, me, I’m in Connecticut. I’ve got stuff in the UK. I’ve got Connecticut issues. How can you allay the fears of someone that’s not going to bankrupt them in fees.

Paula Jones:
[00:55:03 – 00:57:01]
Well, here’s what I would suggest. Many attorneys, and I do advocate for this, is that the initial meeting with an attorney should be complimentary, where it doesn’t have to be an hour, it could be 30 minutes to just get on a Zoom with an attorney and say, like, here’s my situation and I’m talking about a cross border attorney to get on Zoom with them, get some initial facts, and get some idea of an outline of what their estate plan is going to encompass, including any other jurisdictions that may be at play so that at least they know, okay, here’s, here’s what we need to deal with. You know, oh, we really won’t need a separate, you know, UK will, for instance, or it’s all going to be the UK and we really don’t need much in the US or whatever it is. And then, I mean, I, for instance, I usually can quote a flat fee on that call after that conversation, and it doesn’t include any other advisors that may be used. But I, you know, we can get in touch with them and have them do the same, you know, for, for that client. So first of all, no one likes an open ended attorney arrangement, myself included. That’s just scary. So you get on the phone, have an initial complimentary call, sort of get the basics together. I believe that people should always interview their attorney because it isn’t going to be anything with cross border, is not going to be a one time thing where they then walk away and forget about it for 30 years. That’s just not the kind of life that cross border folks are leading. Right. Things change all the time. So they need to feel comfortable about reaching out again and sort of maintaining that relationship with their advisor, certainly with the financial advisor and the accountant as well. So they need to be comfortable. So get that interview. The client needs to interview the attorney as well and say, does this feel right to me? And then the attorney needs to sort of do an outline, quote the flat fee so that they have a good understanding. That’s, you know, works for everyone.

Richard Taylor:
[00:57:01 – 00:57:44]
So just so I’m clear on that, let’s say again, let’s say I said, you and I had an initial conversation. You come back to me and you say, right, I expect my feed for this engagement is going to be x. I do think you need a UK will, and I’d recommend this person, and I expect, or they’ve even quoted, it’s going to be x pounds. Yep. And I will need to engage a Connecticut local attorney for you. And I expect 2 hours of their time. And I think that will come to x. So I’ll have your fee plus, plus either you’ll tell me. I do think we need to engage it and maybe we’ll even have a rough fee so I can get, you know, from that I can know straight away, okay, these three parties are going to come to bear and it’s going to be ballpark, this amount of money, and then I can. Great.

Paula Jones:
[00:57:44 – 00:57:45]
Yeah.

Richard Taylor:
[00:57:45 – 00:57:45]
Great.

Paula Jones:
[00:57:45 – 00:57:53]
Yep. And a lot of, a lot of people, like, if they have that information, they go, oh, I’m so relieved. You know, it just takes away the overwhelm.

Richard Taylor:
[00:57:53 – 00:58:38]
It takes. It’s the fear. It’s the fear of, it’s half. It truly is half. It’s so overwhelming not having this network not knowing where to go and just putting it off. And then the other half is fees. The fear of fees, particularly in America. And I do get it. People are just, people hear attorneys and get terrified. They see that clock ticking and that fee rate. It’s because we’re all. But every week there’s a massive court case and it quotes the amount of fees that so and so has. And everyone thinks, right, anytime I engage a lawyer, I’m hundreds of thousands down. And there are people for whom estate plans do cost that they’ve got extra, you know, very, very wealthy people with very, very complex affairs.

Paula Jones:
[00:58:38 – 00:58:38]
Sure.

Richard Taylor:
[00:58:38 – 00:58:39]
And it’s money well spent.

Paula Jones:
[00:58:39 – 00:58:40]
Sure.

Richard Taylor:
[00:58:41 – 00:59:12]
But the people we speak to are successful expats. They are worth several million, maybe not in the realms of the federal estate tax, but successful several million. They have these issues. They have affairs and assets in multiple countries. They have state issues. And it’s been very hard to find a solution for them. So, yeah, I’m delighted that we are now in touch. I’m so grateful for you coming on and talking to us. This is critical stuff. So thank you so much.

Paula Jones:
[00:59:12 – 00:59:14]
Thank you. This was fun.

Richard Taylor:
[00:59:14 – 00:59:17]
Good. Well, where can people find you, Paula?

Paula Jones:
[00:59:17 – 00:59:33]
They can find me at. My website is www.jonesestategroup.com. they can email me at paula state group.com dot. That’s probably the best way to get in touch. Or you can call me 484-680-1143 perfect.

Richard Taylor:
[00:59:33 – 00:59:44]
And of course, people reach out to us and we can pass you on as well. So no excuses. No excuses. Paula, thank you so much for being such a great guest on we’re the Brits in America.

Paula Jones:
[00:59:44 – 00:59:45]
Thank you so much.

Richard Taylor:
[00:59:46 – 01:00:50]
All right, folks, that’s another episode of we’re the Brits in America. Under our belts. Thank you for listening. I appreciate it and I appreciate you. If you’re enjoying the show and would like to support the mission, which is to help Brits thrive in America, I’d ask you to subscribe to the podcast wherever you listen and also consider leaving a rating and a review. This stuff really does matter. Please help us get this information to the people who need it. That is your fellow Brits living in America. Just a quick reminder that this show is brought to you by planned first wealth. We are a US based US UK cross border financial planning and wealth management firm and we help successful British expatriates living across the US to make the most of their opportunity and ultimately to retire happier. So if you’re a British expat living in America and you’d like to know more about what we do for people like you, you can find us at our website website planfirstwealth.com or you can look me up on LinkedIn. Do get in touch. We’d love to hear from you. As always, thank you to the podcast guys for their help producing this episode and the entire show. See you next time.