Nina Whitehurst
Planning for peace of mind and wealth preservation.
Cumberland Legacy Law* provides the highest quality estate planning for clients in Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Oregon and Tennessee. Whether you need a sophisticated strategy for minimizing or avoiding estate taxes and providing maximum possible asset protection, or just a simple will or trust to ensure your assets are distributed in accordance with your wishes, or anything in between, we are here to help you and your loved ones.
We present seminars on a variety of estate planning and elder law topics; call us if you want to be on our seminar mailing list, or subscribe to our newsletter by jotting a quick note to us.
Nina Whitehurst, the owner of Cumberland Legacy Law, is a member of Wealth Counsel, Elder Counsel and Lawyers With Purpose, all national estate planning attorney organizations. She is continually upgrading and updating her knowledge of estate planning law through seminars and being an active member of several estate planning attorney email list serves. Her husband, Brian Whitehurst, is the firm's marketing coordinator. Nina Lamothe is the firm's documentation paralegal.
*Cumberland Legacy Law is not a public legal aid society.
- Estate Planning
- Guardianship & Conservatorship Estate Administration, Health Care Directives, Trusts, Wills
- Elder Law
- Probate
- Probate Administration
- Real Estate Law
- Commercial Real Estate, Condominiums, Easements, Mortgages, Residential Real Estate
- Free Consultation
- Alaska
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- Arizona
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- California
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- Colorado
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- Oregon
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- Tennessee
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- English: Spoken, Written
- Attorney
- Cumberland Legacy Law
- Current
- Arizona State University
- J.D. (1986) | Law
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- Arizona State University
- B.S. (1983) | Accounting
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- Honors: Summa Cum Laude
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- AV Preeminent 5.0 out of 5 Peer Review Rated
- Martindale-Hubbell
- Wealth Counsel
- Member
- Current
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- State Bar of Tennessee # 037146
- Member
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- State Bar of Alaska # 1802010
- Member
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- State Bar of Oregon # 172386
- Member
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- State Bar of Colorado # 26720
- Member
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- State Bar of California # 159873
- Member
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- State Bar of Arizona # 011030
- Member
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- Wills, Trusts and Nursing Home Asset Protection, Various
- Website
- Nina Whitehurst, Attorney at Law, Professional Website
- Q. I was in a bad relationship and had to leave my home. I own the house in Dallas Texas and live in Somerset PA.
- A: You did not say whether or not you and your "ex" were married. If you were, of course, a divorce would go a long way toward resolving this (but not all the way). The house might get awarded to you, in which case you can sell it, or the house might get awarded to him, in which case you will need to be certain that he is required to get you released from liability on the mortgage. (Your divorce attorney should make sure this is part of the order.) If you were not married, but you are both on the deed, then you can hire an attorney to help you file a lawsuit to force a sale and remit your share of the proceeds to you.
- Q. Life insurance on daughter who suddenly passed away. What "estate" paperwork does ins co need me to file?
- A: Usually a life insurance policy has a designated death beneficiary, and all the beneficiary has to do is provide the life insurance company with a death certificate and the beneficiary's own contact information and identification. If the primary beneficiary was not living when the insured passed, then the proceeds to to the secondary beneficiary. If there was no secondary beneficiary, then the life insurance proceeds become an asset of the primary beneficiary's estate. If a probate was already opened for the primary beneficiary, then the probate might need to be reopened in order to claim the life insurance for the beneficiaries of the decedent's will or else the decedent's intestate heirs. If there was no prior probate, then a probate can be opened now to transfer the life insurance proceeds and any other assets in the decedent's estate. A probate attorney can help you with this.
- Q. I have a revocable trust naming my daughter as successor trustee. She is sole beneficiary. I recently discovered that
- A: It is not true that the sole beneficiary cannot be the sole trustee. However, it is true that if you set it up that way, it is virtually impossible to afford the beneficiary any asset protection. If asset protection for her is your goal, then you should name an independent trustee and also take care to draft the distribution standard carefully and correctly to match your asset protection goal.
