Asset Protection Fundamentals

How much money do I need before an asset protection plan makes sense?

[Read more…] about How much money do I need before an asset protection plan makes sense?

[Read more…] about Asset protection planning has to be done early

What can you lose if you don’t have an asset protection strategy?

[Read more…] about What can you lose?

Transcript:

Shreya Ley: Colin was [crosstalk [00:00:01].

Colin Ley: Hello, viewers.

Shreya Ley: Hello and welcome to the Lawyer Human Daily.

Colin Ley: Ish.

Shreya Ley: Ish.

Colin Ley: That’s Shreya Ley. I’m Colin Ley.

Shreya Ley: I get to tell people who you are.

Colin Ley: Today we’re talking about why you need asset protection, why you might need asset protection.

Shreya Ley: Why Colin? Lay it on me.

Colin Ley: Well, let’s just jump right in it then.

Shreya Ley: Yeah.

Colin Ley: Okay. First, expanding theories of liability.

Shreya Ley: What does that mean?

Colin Ley: Good question.

Shreya Ley: That sounds so fancy.

Colin Ley: It means that courts find more and more ways to make people liable for other people’s problems. No, but I’ll give an example that I found interesting that I learned about recently when we were in Texas. The attorneys we know there, were talking about how the Texas Supreme Court has said that filing a lawsuit against somebody is protected by your first amendment freedom of speech rights. Because typically, somebody would file a, what we call, a frivolous lawsuit, and you would make a response and say, “Hey, Judge, this lawsuit is ridiculous, there’s no reason for it, they’re just harassing us, hounding us.” And if you do that, then the attorney that first filed the lawsuit can file a second claim-

Shreya Ley: Against you.

Colin Ley: … for violating their freedom of speech. And then they attach this like federal based claim, it’s called an Anti-SLAPP. I don’t know what that means, we don’t live in that world. But basically, it puts you on the hook for more damages because you thought their lawsuit was ridiculous, crazy. Shreya’s speechless. So, second one-

Shreya Ley: Well, it’s related.

Colin Ley: It is. It’s a victim oriented society these days. Shreya was nervous about saying that because she doesn’t want anybody to get upset which, I think, proves the point. But it’s basically in our country, here in the U.S., there’s a feeling that somebody has to pay, if something goes wrong with someone, somebody has to pay whether-

Shreya Ley: Yeah, what happened to just something being an accident?

Colin Ley: Yes, that’s my thing. What about the … We curse on the show? I don’t know.

Shreya Ley: No.

Colin Ley: Oh, yeah.

Shreya Ley: I don’t know. That was the rule you made.

Colin Ley: Yeah, it’s the Stuff Happens Theory, that stuff doesn’t happen anymore.

Shreya Ley: Right.

Colin Ley: Yeah.

Shreya Ley: Well, I actually have a story about this, and it was on Facebook: I saw this woman posting about how someone ran into her on the ski slope, and how she regretted not getting all of this person’s information because they should have to pay for all of her PT and whatnot for falling over and having this accident on a ski slope. But if you’ve ever been skiing or snowboarding before, I mean, one, you, kind of, just assume the risk when you’re up there because you’re participating in a somewhat dangerous sport, but also it’s just kind of life, right? Like life happens like, people make mistakes, there can be an accident.

Colin Ley: Actually I think someone sued Gwyneth Paltrow recently because he crashed into her while he was skiing. But that, kind of, gets into the next one of reasons you need asset protection, is because of all those dirty lowdown plaintiffs lawyers out there which are attorneys that find people like that, who have hurt themselves somehow, and then sue other people for it. For example, our-

Shreya Ley: A friend of ours.

Colin Ley: Yeah, he sued a climbing gym because somebody who went climbing there fell down, which is part of climbing: you climb and fall, and sometimes you don’t fall, but a lot of times you do. It’s just part of the thing. But they got to sue this company and got a nice little payday from it.

Shreya Ley: Which is weird to me, I’m like, “You chose to go climbing, and you knew that you might fall.”

Colin Ley: Yeah, yeah. So, we were hanging around with these plaintiffs lawyers last weekend. You know, they were telling all their stories about … They showed me a picture of somebody with, you know, a damaged bumper on his car, and the whole car could have been replaced for like $15,000 it was, you know, one of those little roller skate cars.

Shreya Ley: Yeah.

Colin Ley: And he got $60,000 for damaging the bumper on his car: that’s what they settled for. And that’s what?

Shreya Ley: Crazy.

Colin Ley: Whoever paid that, insurance company or something, paid it to just go away because it was more expensive to go through the litigation process. Anyway, don’t get me too riled up, Shreya.

Shreya Ley: It’s a Friday after all.

Colin Ley: Final reason, you would need asset protection is the deep pocket theory. And it goes along with everything else, but basically-

Shreya Ley: Well, it’s kind of what you already said, right? Like people will pay just to make something go away.

Colin Ley: Yep. If someone or something has the money to pay, if you come knocking, if these attorneys come knocking, they know that they can probably get a quick settlement, you know, someone will pay.

Shreya Ley: I recently had an attorney threaten us to my client. They were like, “Well, if you pursue this, instead of us being reasonable, and like figuring this out like adults, if you pursue this, then your client might have to pay attorneys fees and all this other stuff, and … “

Colin Ley: Didn’t they also threaten to sue you because you emailed them?

Shreya Ley: It was some sort of issue-

Colin Ley: Because you were critical of them?

Shreya Ley: Yeah, because I was critical of them. I think there was some alcohol involved in their email response. But they went on a rant threatening, like all of these costs associated with it and be like like, “So, you should just pay us even though you don’t necessarily owe this money, you should just pay us so that you don’t have to deal with this lawsuit.” I’m like, “Is that a real reason to like … What about justice?”

Colin Ley: Alright. So, as you see, there’s a lot of reasons that you might need asset protection. We talked about expanding theories of liability, victim oriented society, lowdown dirty plaintiffs lawyers, and then the Deep Pocket Theory of people who could pay.

Shreya Ley: We covered a lot.

Colin Ley: So, if you found this video helpful, please give it a like down there.

Shreya Ley: Share it.

Colin Ley: Share it with someone who-

Shreya Ley: Also hates plaintiffs attorneys.

Colin Ley: Yeah, share it with those people.

Shreya Ley: Don’t hate them, they are people too.

Colin Ley: So, thank you for watching. Bye.

Shreya Ley: Bye.