Life can be rocky,
and full of flaw,
So come sip some Sake,
and plan with Strub Law...
Strub Law LLC will be hosting an educational event called Sake & Succession on Wednesday, June 8, 2022, at 7:30 pm. This event is a Sake Tasting & Estate Planning Seminar by Highland Park attorney and mom, Rebecca Begelman Strub. If you are interested in learning about the importance of estate planning, this is the event for you. If you are curious about tasting different varieties of Japanese rice wine, called sake, you will want to be sure to attend.
Event Location, Pino’s Gift Basket Shoppe & Wine Cellar, is a Highland Park Tradition
Strub Law is hosting Saké & Succession at Pino’s Gift Basket Shoppe & Wine Cellar, “purveyors of 'constantly superior' specialty goods for over 100 years”. Since 1920, when it started as a "greengrocery," Pino's has been a Highland Park tradition. It has evolved since into a wine shoppe, with gourmet offerings, and now a lounge, serving specialty cocktails, craft beer, wine, and small bites.
What is Sake?
Sake, also spelled saké, is an alcoholic beverage of Japanese origin made by fermenting rice that has been polished to remove the bran. Many Americans are familiar with hot sake served at Asian restaurants. This sake is often mediocre or past its prime and serving it hot distracts from the taste.
In the past 70 years, saké has dramatically evolved due to technological advances that enable polishing the rice to precise percentages and identifying and differentiating the molds and yeasts used in production. Variations in how much the rice is polished, which yeast is used, which rice is used, and the qualities of water in the region where it is brewed create a wide variety of tastes and drinking experiences.
At this event, registered participants will have the opportunity to taste several different types of saké and learn more about what saké most appeal to them.
What is Succession?
Succession is who will come after a person whether in a family, business, or in a specific role. While you are healthy, you make your own decisions about your health care – you are your “health care decision maker”. If you cannot make your own decisions, someone will make those decisions for you. This is your “successor health care decision maker.”
Likewise, you make your own financial decisions – depositing money, withdrawing money, spending money, signing a lease, buying and selling real estate, etc. If you fall and hit your head so hard that you are unable to make decisions and pay your bills, then you would want to have a “successor” who can stand in your stead to carry out personal and financial matters for you on your behalf.
Moreover, when you die, someone needs to oversee collecting your assets and distributing them – in a sense acting as you would. Some people will say, “I am still working on creating an estate, so I don’t need to do any planning.” Unfortunately, this misunderstanding keeps many people from investing in planning that can be particularly impactful for those of modest means.
During the seminar Rebecca Strub will explain how these “succession” scenarios and other situations fall under the umbrella of “estate planning.”
Learn Why You May Want to Create an Estate Plan
Who do you love? Who do you want to protect? These are the people who will benefit from your having a comprehensive, well-thought-out estate plan.
When people are in a moment of “I would do anything for” a child or spouse, parent, or friend, they often feel a fire that helps them tap into resources that they didn’t know they had to protect their loved ones.
When the challenge is “here and now” whether it is physical (carrying a child out of danger), practical (getting a tutor for a child who is struggling), etc., it’s relatively easy to feel the fire, see the challenge and act on initial solutions. When a challenge is “later” and “uncertain”, it is harder to feel the fire…it gets put on the back burner to deal with “later”. With estate planning, disability, and death, by the time the challenge is “here and now”, it is too late.
If you want to protect your family as well as keep them out of conflict and court “later” (or sooner – we just don’t know, especially in these uncertain times), creating a detailed estate plan is a “here and now” challenge.
Rebecca will discuss how her process helps people create a customized plan with ease and confidence. She includes arranging a signing ceremony, so that you sign your documents with all the proper formalities to make them effective, not leaving you with unsigned drafts and an open-ended timeline.
More Than Money – Leave a Legacy
Rebecca Strub will also share how she believes your overall “Family Wealth” - however you define “Family” - is not just your financial assets. Instead, your family wealth also includes tangible property, such as heirlooms, sentimental items, photos, etc. Family fights over these items and the meanings attached to them can and do cause lifetime feuds. Moreover, your family wealth includes intangibles - your traditions, values, creations, life lessons, family lore, inside jokes, stories, etc., that make up who you are and what’s important to you – individually and as a family.
Traditionally, estate planning focused on the transfer of your financial assets to the next generation. Strub Law LLC expands the focus to help you transfer all your family wealth. Passing along tangible property - who gets Grandpa’s compass? - need not cause your children to stop speaking to each other. Passing along the intangibles creates a strong foundation and identity upon which your loved ones can build their best lives.
As part of the estate planning plans with Strub Law, clients can record a Legacy Interview to share some “final words” with their loved ones.
Some are short, “Don’t fight. Support your siblings.”
Some are parents’ expressions of love and values, for their very young children.
Some are the history around an heirloom or sentimental item.
And so on.
Over the years, many clients of Strub Law have recorded their Legacy Interviews and found it to be very meaningful. Other clients have felt unsure about what they would say and have not recorded their Legacy Interview.
In order to help their clients figure out what to share in their Legacy Interview, Strub Law is partnering with Rabbi Bryan Kinzbrunner, a Board-Certified Chaplain (BCC), and the owner of New Beginnings Spiritual Coaching and Consulting LLC. Bryan has over 15 years of experience working closely with people from all backgrounds to explore and make meaning of their lives and understand their legacy.
Rabbi Kinzbrunner will share a few words at the seminar about his process and the importance of creating and memorializing your chosen legacy.
In Summary
Strub Law LLC will be hosting Sake & Succession on Wednesday, June 8, 2022, at 7:30 pm at Pino’s in Highland Park, NJ. This complimentary educational event is a Sake Tasting & Estate Planning Seminar by local attorney and mom, Rebecca Strub. If you are interested in learning about why you may want to create an estate plan now to protect your family (however you define that) as well as keep them out of conflict and court – and you are curious about tasting different varieties of sake, Japanese rice wine – this is the event for you. RSVP is required at https://strublaw.com/saketasting/.