News

Minneapolis, MN (June 23, 2020) – Lurie Wealth Advisors, LLC, a financial advisory firm in Minnesota, was recently named to Accounting Today’s annual list of the top 150 CPA Firms by assets under management (AUM), a ranking of leading CPA firms that provide financial planning and wealth management services.

For the past fourteen years, Accounting Today has been compiling the list of leading CPA-affiliated wealth management firms by AUM in the United States. The publication received submissions from over 200 CPA firms for the 2020 list.

To read the cover story and view the Accounting Today Top Firms by AUM 2020 list, visit the digital version of the magazine here.

“We are honored to be recognized by Accounting Today as it affirms our integrated approach with Lurie, LLP. Our growth is a testament to the commitment we make to our clients. We take the time to understand their needs, place their interests first, and provide innovative solutions,” said Michele Martin, President of Lurie Wealth Advisors, LLC.

Lurie Wealth Advisors, along with Lurie LLP, have created a COVID-19 resource hub on our two websites that provides clients with news, alerts and timely communication on the key issues for our clients, and their business or individual situations.

Lurie Wealth Advisors is also organizing financial planning and wealth management specific resources on our website to help clients understand and navigate their investment, retirement and tax planning options. Our advisors are investing in our client communication abilities and bringing on new team members in anticipation of giving each client situation the personal attention and responsive service they deserve.

About Lurie Wealth Advisors, LLC
Lurie Wealth Advisors, LLC provides integrated wealth management and financial solutions including investment advisory, consulting, financial planning and other wealth management services to business owners, executives and their families. Lurie Wealth Advisors, LLC’s parent company is Lurie, LLP. To learn more visit: www.luriewealthadvisors.com.

About Lurie, LLP
Founded in 1940, Lurie, LLP is a prominent CPA & Advisory firm providing accounting, audit, tax planning, transaction advisory, retirement planning services and wealth management to privately held and family businesses, as well as individuals. With more than 160 employees, offices in Minnesota and Southwest Florida, and membership in Moore Stephens North America, Lurie has the ability to serve clients across the United States and hundreds of countries worldwide. To learn more visit: www.LurieLLP.com or follow on LinkedIn: @Lurie LLP.

To our valued clients and our Minnesota community –

On March 28, the ‘Stay at Home’ Executive Order issued by Governor Tim Walz took effect.
It directed all Minnesotans to work together by limiting movements outside of the home in the fight
against COVID-19.

Lurie Operations Will Continue

Lurie, LLP remains fully operational. Our team is successfully operating under a full-fledged “work from
home” policy that leverages our technology to serve clients remotely while our office is closed to visitors.
You can continue to drop off materials either in our vestibule (Monday through Friday, 8:00 AM – 5:00
PM) or through the mail slot in the door to the right of our main entrance. We are also receiving mail on a
daily basis.

Health & Safety is Our Top Priority

The health and safety of our staff, along with our clients and community, remain our top priority. Lurie is
dedicated to doing things right, and fueled by the desire to help our community. Together, we will
overcome this unprecedented health and economic challenge.

Our Team’s Role & Commitment

Lurie falls under the definition of a Critical Sector in the Executive Order. Together, we play a vital role in
the operation and viability of the economic relief programs being put in place at the state and federal
levels. We are working with businesses and individuals to connect them with programs that keep more
workers employed in our state and more businesses viable in the long-term. For ongoing updates and
resources, please go to the Lurie, LLP COVID‐19 Information & Resources Page.

If you have questions, we encourage you to please contact us. We will be here for you, your business,
your employees and your family – without interruption. Thank you.

– Team Lurie

The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act created a new program to encourage investment in economically distressed areas through generous tax incentives. The Qualified Opportunity Zone (QOZ) program relies on investments in Qualified Opportunity Funds (QOFs) — funds that can provide wealthy taxpayers with some new avenues for estate planning.

3 big tax benefits

Investors in QOFs stand to reap three significant tax breaks:

1. They can defer capital gains on the disposition of appreciated property by reinvesting the gains in a QOF within 180 days of disposition. The tax is deferred until the QOF investment is sold or Dec. 31, 2026, whichever is earlier.
2. Depending on how long they hold their QOF investment, they can eliminate 10% to 15% of the tax.
3. After 10 years, post-acquisition appreciation on the investment is tax-exempt.

By incorporating QOFs in your estate planning, you can reduce both capital gains and transfer tax liabilities.

Estate planning implications

Proposed regulations make clear that a QOF investor’s death isn’t an “inclusion event” that would trigger tax on the deferred gains. In addition, most of the activities involved in administering an estate or trust (for example, transferring the interest to the estate or distributing the interest) won’t trigger the gain. But the sale of the QOF interest by the estate, the trust or a beneficiary would. Gifts of QOF interests also are generally considered inclusion events that make the deferred gains immediately taxable.

You could avoid this, though, by gifting your interest to a grantor trust. Both revocable living trusts and irrevocable grantor trusts qualify. However, transfers to the latter are completed gifts and therefore produce greater potential tax savings in situations where the income and gains of the trust are taxed to the grantor, in turn reducing the grantor’s estate by the amount of income taxes paid. (Note, though, that the termination of grantor trust status for reasons other than the grantor’s death is treated as an inclusion event.)

For example, you could transfer a highly appreciated asset to an irrevocable trust with no gift tax under the federal gift and estate tax exemption ($11.40 million for 2019 and $11.58 million for 2020). The trust could sell the asset and defer the gains into a QOF investment.

Another option for transferring QOF interests is the grantor retained annuity trust (GRAT), which allows you to make a gift to a trust and receive an annuity interest roughly equal to the fair market value of the gift. Any appreciation beyond the amount required to pay the annuity also passes to the beneficiaries without gift tax.

Contact Lurie Wealth Advisors for additional information or if you have questions on the Qualified Opportunity Zone program and related estate planning matters.

With its winter recess looming before it, Congress has engaged in a flurry of activity. Most notably, it reached agreement on a massive government wide spending package titled the Further Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2020. The legislation extends certain income tax provisions that had expired, as well as some that were due to expire at the end of 2019. To the surprise of some, the agreement also includes the Setting Every Community Up for Retirement Enhancement (SECURE) Act, which is the first significant retirement-related legislation since the Pension Protection Act of 2006.

Changes to retirement plans

The SECURE Act is packed with more than two dozen provisions primarily intended to encourage saving for retirement. Most of the provisions take effect January 1, 2020. They include measures affecting both individuals and businesses.

For example, under current law, individuals are prohibited from contributing to traditional IRAs after they reach age 70½, regardless of whether they’re still working. The SECURE Act eliminates that restriction so that anyone can contribute as long as they’re working, matching the existing rules for 401(k) plans and Roth IRAs.

The SECURE Act raises the age at which taxpayers generally must begin to take their required minimum distributions (RMDs) from 70½ to 72. The new rule applies only to those individuals who haven’t reached the age of 70½ by the end of 2019.

The law also includes a new exemption from the 10% tax penalty on early withdrawals from retirement accounts. Taxpayers can withdraw an aggregate of $5,000 from a plan without penalty within one year of the birth of a child or an adoption becoming final.

Less favorably for individual taxpayers, the SECURE Act eliminates the “stretch” RMD provisions that have permitted beneficiaries of inherited retirement accounts to spread the distributions over their life expectancies. This allowed younger beneficiaries to take smaller distributions while growing the accounts and deferring taxes.

Now, most non-spouse beneficiaries must take their distributions over a 10-year period beginning on the deceased’s death. That could increase the tax burden by pushing the distributions into years when the beneficiary is working and in higher tax brackets. The change, therefore, could require some modifications to estate plans, particularly if the plans include trustee-managed inherited IRAs with guardrails to prevent young beneficiaries from quickly draining the accounts.

On the business side, the SECURE Act expands access to open multiple employer plans (MEPs). MEPs give smaller, unrelated businesses the opportunity to team up to provide defined contribution plans at a lower cost, due to economies of scale, with looser fiduciary duties. It also provides tax credits to employers for starting retirement plans and automatically enrolling employees.

In addition, the new law paves the way for employers to include annuities in their retirement plans by eliminating their potential liability when it comes to selecting the appropriate annuity plans. And the SECURE Act requires employers to allow participation in their retirement plans by part-time employees who’ve worked at least 1,000 hours in one year (about 20 hours per week) or three consecutive years of at least 500 hours.

Action required

Changes to the laws for retirement savings may require a rethinking of both retirement and estate planning. Contact Lurie Wealth Advisors to help you navigate through the new law changes related to retirement savings.