ESTATE PLANNING COUNCIL OF SEATTLE

About the Program

In this program, speakers, Ray Odom and Richard Franklin will provide ideas, examples and language to prepare trusts and other estate planning documents that are designed to improve well-being.  They will show how to build positivity, meaning and purpose into trusts, using positive psychology’s empirical research and other data to support family well-being and flourishing.  Ray will review positive, research based ways to spend that increase well-being (there’s a shocking absence of such information in trusts & estate literature) and share a “benevolence” model to consider in all wealth transfers. Richard will provide a model for trustees to use in building a well-being baseline and beyond. 

About the Speakers

Richard focuses on estate planning, trusts and estate administration, and beneficiary and fiduciary representation.  He is a member of the District of Columbia and Florida Bars, a Fellow of the American College of Trust and Estate Counsel and serves on its Tax Policy Study Committee.  Richard has spoken at numerous estate planning programs around the country, including the University of Miami’s Heckerling Institute on Estate Planning, ACTEC, the American Bar Association, state and local bars, estate planning councils, and charities such as the Carter Center, to name a few.  He has also written extensively on estate planning topics for various publications including the ACTEC Law Journal, The Washington Lawyer, Trusts & Estates, Estate Planning, and the Bloomberg/BNA Estates, Gifts & Trust Journal.

Raymond C. Odom is a Senior Vice President at Northern Trust - Chicago. He serves as Director of Wealth Transfer Services in the Wealth Management division. Ray serves as a national subject matter expert in wealth transfer planning. Ray works with The Northern Trust Foundation & Institutional Advisers and Wealth Management partners and clients to provide valuable estate planning and charitable giving ideas to clients, prospects and professional advisers.  Ray has a B.A. from Valparaiso University and a J.D. from The Ohio State - Moritz College of Law. He is an attorney licensed to practice law in Illinois and before the U.S. Tax Court. In addition, Ray is a Certified Financial Planner (CFP). Ray is a Fellow in the American College of Trust and Estate Counsel (ACTEC). He is a current member of the Chicago Estate Planning Council and is on the advisory council for the Hadley (f/k/a Hadley Institute for the Blind and Visually Impaired) Winnetka, Illinois and the Northern Illinois Food Bank in Geneva, Illinois.