Miller Wealth Management

08/06/2026

Don’t Assume Your Will Has The Last Word | Pillar 5 — Legacy Planning

Credit card debt doesn't automatically pass to your children when you die. It's paid from the estate — and if the estate can't cover it, it generally goes unpaid. The exceptions: co-signers, joint account holders, and spouses in community property states like Arizona.

If you are unsure of the rules, before automatically paying any credit card debt for a decedent, speak with the credit card company, your estate attorney and/or your financial advisor.

08/03/2026

July Series: Don’t Assume Your Will Has The Last Word | Pillar 5 — Legacy Planning

Adding your adult child to the deed or to an investment account seems like a simple way to make things easier later. Often, it's the most expensive one — triggering a taxable gift, exposing the asset to their creditors, and quietly cutting other heirs out of the will.

In regard to taxes, assets your child inherits normally get a "step-up" in value for tax purposes, based on what they're worth on the day you pass away. Assets you add your child to while you're alive don't get that reset. Your child could face a much bigger tax bill when they eventually sell.

If your real goal is simply avoiding probate, ask your estate attorney about a transfer-on-death deed, a beneficiary designation, or a revocable living trust instead. Each one skips probate without any of these downsides.

07/31/2026

July Series: Don’t Assume Your Will Has The Last Word | Pillar 5 — Legacy Planning

Here's something that surprises most people: your will does not have the final say on who inherits your 401(k), IRA, or life insurance policy. Those pass directly to whoever is named on the beneficiary form — regardless of what your will says. An outdated form (an ex-spouse, a blank field) will win every time.

It's a small detail with outsized consequences, and it's exactly why Legacy Planning is one of our Seven Pillars — not a document you sign once, but a system you maintain. Tactic #77 in our 99 Tactics has us talking about primary and contingent beneficiary designations regularly, reducing the likelihood that something falls through the cracks for your family or the next generation.

The Family CFO Protocol means Visualizing what you actually want, Strategizing the architecture to protect it, and Realizing it — with the paperwork actually matching your intent.

When did you last check your beneficiary forms? If it's been a while, that's a five-minute task worth doing this week.

07/29/2026

July Series: Say What You Mean, While You Still Can | Pillar 5 — Legacy Planning

A serious diagnosis has a way of clarifying what actually matters. When the timeline gets short, bank balances start to feel secondary to a simpler question: does everyone I love know what I want?

We've seen it firsthand — the details families regret afterward are rarely about money. They're about not knowing which hymn Dad wanted, or who was supposed to get the piano. None of that requires an attorney. It requires a conversation, written down, before it's too late to have it.

The kindest gift you can leave your family isn't more money. It's clarity.

Want a tool to start? We offer a free Financial Letter of Instruction template — download it at

https://www.millerwm.com/downloadable-resources.

07/23/2026

July Series: Financial Caregiving | Pillar 7 — Family Stewardship

Most of a family's financial life now lives on a phone — banking apps, two-factor codes, password managers, photos of statements, logins to accounts no one else knows exist. When someone passes away, that phone doesn't just go quiet. It seals shut, and everything behind it goes with it.

There's a simple safeguard for this that most families have never heard of: a Legacy Contact. Both Apple and Google offer a built-in way to name someone trusted who can request access to your data after you're gone — no guessing passwords, no waiting on a court order, no locked-out grief. It takes about ten minutes to set up, and it's one of the easiest things you can do this week to protect the people who'll be left sorting through it all.

Here's how:

On an iPhone — Add a Legacy Contact

1. Open Settings, then tap your name at the top.
2. Select Sign-In & Security.
3. Tap Legacy Contact, then select Add Legacy Contact.
4. Authenticate with Face ID, Touch ID, or your passcode.
5. Choose a contact — you may be able to pick someone from your Family Sharing group.
6. Share the required Access Key with them via iMessage or by printing a copy.

The Legacy Contact will need that unique Access Key and a copy of the death certificate to access the account's data.

On an Android Device — Plan a Digital Legacy
1. Go to your Google Account on a phone or web browser.
2. Tap the Data & Privacy tab.
3. Scroll to the More Options or Tools section and tap Make a plan for your digital legacy.

07/21/2026

July Series: Financial Caregiving | Pillar 7 — Family Stewardship

The call comes at 6:30 a.m. Dad has had a heart attack in his kitchen overnight. By the time his daughter reaches the hospital, the fear for his life is already giving way to a second, quieter problem — she has no legal authority to access his accounts, talk to his doctors, or pay a single bill.

This isn't a failure of love. It's a structural gap: the space between deciding to help and having the legal authority to act. And it ends in one of two ways — either the paperwork exists before the crisis, or a family spends the crisis trying to create it.

Every family should have three things in place well before that call ever comes: a Durable Financial Power of Attorney recent enough for banks and brokerages to honor without delay, a separate Healthcare Power of Attorney and HIPAA Authorization so a devoted adult child isn't locked out of conversations with physicians, and a current, findable inventory of accounts, advisors, and important documents.

If your family hasn't had these conversations yet, the best time isn't during a hospitalization. It's now.

07/17/2026

July Series: Talking Social Security | Pillar 1 — Investment Strategy
The 2026 Social Security Trustees Report confirmed what demographics have been signaling for years: in 1960, 5.1 workers supported every retiree. Today it's 2.7. By 2045, it's projected to fall to 2.2.

If you're still working, here's the number that matters more than the depletion date: even if Congress took zero action and the retirement fund's reserves ran out in 2032, ongoing payroll tax revenue is still projected to cover roughly 78% of scheduled benefits — closer to 83% for the combined funds. That's a real reduction worth planning around, but it's a long way from nothing.

As your Family CFO, we don't build retirement income plans that assume Social Security vanishes — and we don't build them assuming it's untouchable either. Under Pillar 1 of the One Process, Investment Strategy, we run Tactic #13, Model Retirement Income Scenarios, stress-tested against a range of Social Security outcomes so your plan holds up regardless of how the politics shake out.

Visualize. Strategize. Realize.

To read our full article, visit https://www.millerwm.com/social-security-2026-trustee-report

Want to see how your retirement options hold up? Let's talk.

Every year, the government publishes a checkup on Social Security's finances. It's called the Trustees Report, and this year's version — released for 2026 — is worth a closer look. The good news: the headline depletion date barely moved. The less comfortable news: the program's long-term shortfa...

07/15/2026

July Series: Talking Social Security | Pillar 1 — Investment Strategy

The 2026 Social Security Trustees Report is out, and the headline number didn't move — the combined retirement and disability trust fund is still projected to last until 2034. But look one layer deeper, and the 75-year funding gap grew by 16% in a single year, driven almost entirely by slower workforce growth, not politics.

If you're retired or approaching retirement, here's what actually matters: this report is not a reason to rush your claiming decision. History suggests Congress will act to protect benefits for those already retired or nearing retirement long before any reserves are exhausted. Your claiming strategy should be built around your income needs, health, and tax picture — not a headline.

This is exactly the kind of work we do as your Family CFO, under Pillar 1 of the One Process — Investment Strategy. Tactic #14, Optimize Social Security Claiming Strategy. It exists so decisions like this are modeled, not guessed at.

To read our full article, visit https://www.millerwm.com/social-security-2026-trustee-report

If this year's report has you second-guessing your claiming strategy, let's model it out together.

Every year, the government publishes a checkup on Social Security's finances. It's called the Trustees Report, and this year's version — released for 2026 — is worth a closer look. The good news: the headline depletion date barely moved. The less comfortable news: the program's long-term shortfa...