Yesterday, in Canada, was Remembrance Day, a day when we remember those who fought for our country. In honour of that, I wanted to write about the soldiers of World War I – in particular, about their wills. Thousands of soldiers answered the call to fight in WWI. Many...
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cesia@wall-arm.ca
Keeping things hidden
Let’s say you are buying a house, but you are an extremely private person. Can you hide the price you paid for the house so that no one can find out? The short answer is, yes. If you truly do not want to show your purchase price, you can pay your Land Transfer Tax in...
Military wills
With Remembrance Day around the corner, I thought I would talk today about wills for men and women serving in the military. For the most part, doing a will is no different for those in the armed forces. The Canadian Armed Forces administrative staff do a very good job...
Helping out your children
Most parents work hard to protect and help their children as they grow, and continue to do so when their children become adults. One aspect of helping is often assisting their children in buying a home, often through co-signing a mortgage. Acting as a co-signer or...
Remembering a tractor
65 years ago, Cecil Harris was out in his field when he jumped off his tractor to check on something. The tractor unfortunately kept going, and he became trapped underneath it. Recognizing that he might die, he scratched instructions into the side of the tractor: “In...
Breaking up isn’t hard to do
I have a client who recently got a nasty surprise: while they were still together, but after things had gotten bad, his now ex-wife changed their house from joint tenants (meaning they both owned the whole house, with rights of inheritance on death of one party) to...
An update on the right to live
I have written before about a case winding its way through the Canadian courts about a patient’s right to live. Hassan Rasouli went into Sunnybrook Hospital for surgery, contracted an infection, and ended up on life support. His wife, who was also his attorney under a...
How a lawyer can help when you’re buying a condo
Buying a condo is as exciting as buying a house, but there are a lot more rules that go along with it. While having a lawyer is not an option in Ontario when purchasing a property, there are even more reasons to bring your lawyer on early if you are buying a condo:...
Missing and presumed dead
I recently read this article from the CBC about a man in Ohio who has been trying to prove for several years that he is not, in fact, dead. In 1986, Donald Miller went missing. For eight years, his family heard nothing from him. At the end of eight years, in...
What exactly does a real estate lawyer do?
The practice of real estate law is sometimes a bit of a mystery to the public. When people hear the word “lawyer,” they immediately think of Law & Order and courtroom work. What happens on the transactional end isn’t as exciting to the outsider, but there are a...