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Explained in 10 Minutes
Video Transcript
Today I want to talk about what a perfect plan looks like. I want to do it quickly and it’s something you should all watch, even if you don’t intend to do a plan now.
I’m going to give you the characteristics of a typical plan, what you always need to consider no matter who does it and I’m going to do it quickly and in a way that hopefully that you can take with you and remember for the rest of your life.
Well a perfect asset protection plan has four characteristics.
I use this little tool- I use the word ‘STOP’ because I think of stopping creditors. This isn’t everything but these are the four key characteristics for every plan no matter if you’re paying somebody $50,000 to do it for you, or you’re doing it yourself and spending $2,500. Almost every single good plan will have these characteristics.
First characteristic: It will allow you to stay in control. You always should stay in control. Sometimes you may have to share control if you’re really in trouble, meaning having a protector or an off shore lawyer on accounts with you. But in a normal situation, and you should always do plans when you’re not in trouble; normally when you’re not under the gun you will always be in a 100% control.
Second: You should trust nobody. Assume every single person you deal with is a crook; they’re going to prove you right. You’re going to come across people who are crooked, who want to steal money and you’re going to want to avoid them if you can but you can’t be perfect. Never construct a plan where you’re forced to trust somebody unless you choose to trust them. That’s one of my rules and you need to follow it or you will get hurt.
Third: Off balance sheet; that’s just a way of saying own nothing. The first rule of asset protection is what you do not own cannot be taken from you. Almost all asset protection functions by taking protected assets of your balance sheet. Remember the Rockefeller’s rule, own nothing and control everything.
And the final characteristic is that most countries you’re going to for your trusts, maybe not for you accounts but for your trusts have protective legislation. You normally don’t need protective legislation, and sometimes we start in places that don’t have protective legislation to either save money or keep it simple. But when you are in trouble you will always want to be in one of the several jurisdictions that offer protective legislation.
Well the first one is an asset protection trust. This site has over fifty articles on that right now but, trusts are a key element and they are a business entity that takes assets off of your balance sheet.
Most asset protection plans will also use an LLC; it’s not always necessary but it’s the easiest way to stay in control when you have an offshore trust run by an offshore trust company. I’ll soon show you why.
The third component will be an offshore account and the fourth component in some cases will be a domestic family loaded partnership. This is irrelevant for non-US citizens, non-US citizens will just do the first three but, for US citizens they will want in many cases, the fourth component. Now, what do they look like?
This is a typical trust. It has a settlor, that’s you. Throughout these little diagrams the little red guy, that’s you, the client. You will almost always have an offshore trust company; the location of this trust company will determine the laws that will apply to you.
That’s not part of this lecture, but you’ll have an offshore trust company. You’ll almost always have a protector, that can be you or an offshore lawyer or an offshore protector.
There are companies that specialize in this. It will have classes of beneficiaries this will always include you the client. Normally the beneficiaries will include the client and any other people that the client wants to benefit. Everything will be controlled by this trust company, not the settlor.
The problem is that this trust company has control of this trust. Sometimes I do kinetic trusts where I keep the client as a co-trustee with the offshore trustee here, but that is beyond the scope of what any of you should consider a perfect trust.
That’s unique, that’s a unique situation that requires much more specialization then you need for a rock-solid trust. It’s probably overkilling for 95% of you out there. This is the first component, this is going to get you started. This is enough for many people; you can actually use this offshore asset protection plan piece to hold things like gold. If you had a bunch of dinars, you wouldn’t need anything else because you’d have physical protection of the dinar, it’s off your balance sheet.
But this alone is normally not good enough because this trust company up here has control of the assets in the trust, therefore this person, the settlor is vulnerable to this trust company and this trust company can steal these assets. How do you avoid that?
Well simple, you put an offshore LLC in place. The offshore LLC can either be in the same jurisdiction as the trust or any place that has offshore LLCs or IBCs function as LLCs.
Every jurisdiction is different. This entity can be passed through, it’s normally a disregarded entity when it’s a single person but you can also have it treated as a corporation. You can opt to have it treated as a partnership. You have a great deal of flexibility, and indeed under this LLC, you can put hundreds of other entities. You can have corporations, which might be controlled for in corporations, you can have partnerships. You can have any offshore entity that you want all owned under this offshore LLC or under this trust.
It’s a great way to do what?
To keep you, this little red guy, in control of the assets because when you put the LLC in place, you no longer use the asset protection trust to protect these assets. Assets are held down here, owned by the APT but where are the asset’s controls?
Control happens to be with this little red guy who happens to be you. This little red guy is the manager of offshore LLC.
This is the best way to keep you completely in control of an offshore investment; including an offshore bank account because what you normally do with this offshore LLC is simple.
BOOM!
You add a offshore bank account, you go get an offshore bank account. It does not have to be in the jurisdiction of the APT or the jurisdiction of offshore LLC. As many of you know, or those of you who have been listening to me have had it drummed into your head.
Many banks or most banks are stopping accepting accounts from US citizens. Hong Kong-Shanghai bank in Singapore last week said they are simply just not going to take them. There are many banks: Barkley’s…
Just almost any bank you name is no longer wanting US citizens and it’s in large part because of the legislation that becomes effective in 2013 forcing these banks to be transparent to the IRS and basically account to the IRS for your deposits and if the bank is not transparent there is a 30% tax, that may be challenged and that may be thrown out.
But by putting this LLC in place, we really overcome a lot of those objections. You’ll find that the same banks who won’t take you when you’re trying to go there as a single human being or if you’re a trustee of your own trust going there; they won’t take you.
But when you have an offshore asset protection trust, owned in an LLC, the banks somehow seem to be able to be comfortable that, that’s enough removal that they will accept the account; at least right now, it’s working well. Now that’s all most people need. The only thing they could ever need more is…
BOOM!
A domestic family limited partnership. Notice this partnership, this little green thing right here is in the United States. This little yellow line is the line between safe, which is offshore and dangerous which is on shore; the US is less protected then anything offshore. Why?
Because no country in the world recognizes US judgments and anything over here is virtually impossible for a US creditor to without spending a huge amount of money and even then it’s doubtful that they could be successful. This is a typical situation, and note with the assets held in the domestic family limited partnership we still keep you the settlor over here in control of this, you’re just functioning as the general partner.
The general partner has 100% control over this partnership; and look the asset protection trust has 99% to 100% ownership with zero control. So what does this partnership really do? It separates ownership which is in the trust and control which is with you the general partner. This structure really holds up, it is tax neutral; it won’t increase your taxes, it won’t decrease your taxes.
You can make numerous tax selections to change your tax treatment. Basically you have all the flexibility and freedom as a normal human being investing offshore. You can do insurance type investing, you can even form and insurance company and eliminate tax on your interest and dividends and capital gains. All legally and with full disclosure of the government, all that can be done in a simple little structure and this little structure will work from 95% to 98% of the human beings who need asset protection.
I don’t care if you’re spending $50,000 or $2,500, these are the keys that you need to look for. Now, you can see the four parts of a perfect offshore asset protection plan. Remember this and just remember it doesn’t have to be complicated, it doesn’t have to be a life changing event. This is a process and a choice for you to sleep well at night and no longer be vulnerable to people who want to take you apart.
I believe that these are key elements for anybody that wants to protect themselves in the long run. Do this and you will sleep well at night, you will no longer be vulnerable, you can take control of your own life and you can stop the professional takers from being able to abuse you and not be around. You never have to take it anymore and that’s what I’m trying to give you, the tools to stop being beat up and to take control of your own destiny.
Thank you very much see you soon.