The Flow tab of RightCapital's Estate Analysis module provides comprehensive modeling tools and an accessible visualization of assets flowing from the client to their heirs. This powerful visual tool allows clients to see with clarity through the sometimes murky waters of estate planning — continuing to elevate your services as a critical component to your client's financial success!
You can access this tab within the Estate > Analysis module of each and every client plan:
The estate flow chart flows from top to bottom, with the left side displaying the client's taxable estate, and the right side highlighting any assets held outside of the taxable estate. Within joint plans, the client who passes away first within the projections will be listed at the top:
What determines who passes away first?
Each client's planning horizon, entered within the Profile > Family section, determines their assumed age of death within the projections. If both clients have the same planning horizon, the older client will pass away first. Within the Action Items, you can manipulate each client's planning horizon to see the impact of clients passing away at different times.
Within the flow chart, certain tiles will hop as you hover your mouse over them. This indicates that you can click into those tiles to see expanded data. In this way, you can glean greater insight into the assets that make up a client's estate, the expected taxes and fees that will reduce their estate upon passing, and more.
Pro-Tip: Estate Tax
RightCapital will automatically calculate federal estate tax if the gross estate exceeds the exemption threshold for the Tax Law you are using within the plan. Under TCJA, the 2025 exemption is $13,990,000 (today's dollars). Under 2017 tax law, the exemption is $6,940,000 (today's dollars).
State-level estate taxes may also be calculated based on state-specific rules. This will be based on the resident state at the end of the Proposed Plan (including any Primary Home Relocations). RightCapital will also capture any tax that may be due to other states for real estate held there (vacation or rental properties).
Click into the 'Taxes and Fees' tiles to view any projected estate taxes. Both federal and state-level estate exemption thresholds will be projected out into the future using your Tax Inflation rate. This setting can be adjusted at the client level within the Gear Icon > Settings > Other Assumptions tab.
By default in RightCapital, the first client to pass away will leave 100% of their assets to the surviving client. However, you can adjust this within the Account Assumptions, located within the Gear Icon > Settings tab of the plan. Assets that are not left to the co-client will be moved to the 'Estate to Heirs' tile to the right of the first client's estate, rather than being passed down to the surviving client:
The Action Items beneath the flow chart allow you to fine-tune the details of a client's estate analysis. Here, you can update variables like funeral and probate expenses, play around with the impact of different planning horizons, and even propose trust strategies. The Action Items are divided into two columns: Basic Information on the left, and Trust Strategy on the right.
As a starting point, you will see the following items listed under Basic Information:
Client & Co-Client's Planning Horizon: The assumed age of death for each client. You can adjust the planning horizons to illustrate what changes will occur in the estate analysis if clients were to pass away at different times. Do note that changing the planning horizons within the Estate Analysis will not impact any other modules in RightCapital.
Funeral Expense: Funeral expenses will be automatically added to the 'Taxes and Fees' tiles within the analysis flow chart, reducing a client's estate before it is passed on. Funeral expenses should be entered in today's dollars; your General Inflation rate will be used to project this value in future dollars.
Probate Expense: Probate expenses will be automatically added to the 'Taxes and Fees' tiles within the analysis flow chart, reducing a client's estate before it is passed on. Probate expenses are entered as a percentage of the gross estate, excluding qualified accounts (see below).
Pro-Tip: Probate Expenses
RightCapital makes the assumption that qualified accounts such as 401(k)s and IRAs have beneficiaries assigned and will not go through probate. As such, qualified accounts are excluded from the probate expense calculation. Jointly owned assets (properties, business, lifestyle assets, etc.) are also excluded from probate upon first death.
In addition to the items above, you can also click the Edit button in the lower right of the Action Items to include several other items. These items include Cumulative gift, Gift tax paid, and DSUE amount:
Cumulative Gift: Generally, no estate taxes are due if the estate value is less than the lifetime gift/estate exemption. However, that exemption may be reduced throughout the client's life if they make gifts that exceed an annual gift exclusion ($19,000 in 2025). If a client has made gifts in excess of the annual exclusion, the total value can be entered in the cumulative gift field. The value entered in this field will reduce the gift/estate exemption threshold for that client.
Gift Tax Paid: This field addresses a scenario where clients make gifts in excess of the annual gift exclusion, but choose to pay the taxes in the year that the gift is made. The estate tax calculated will be reduced by the total dollar amount that you enter here.
DSUE Amount: Allows you to include any deceased spousal unused exclusion (DSUE) a client may have from a previous marriage. The value entered in this field will increase the gift/estate exemption threshold for that client.
Pro-Tip: State-Level DSUE
Only two states, Hawaii and Maryland, allow for the portability of any unused exclusion between spouses. All other states do not.
In addition to the Basic Information items described above, you can also use the Action Items to propose Trust Strategies. By adding a trust strategy, you can illustrate a scenario in which assets are moved from the client's taxable investments into a trust type of your choosing. Once added, the estate flow chart will update to reflect the impact of your trust strategy.
Use the steps below to add a trust strategy. Do note that you are not limited to a single trust, you can add multiple trust proposals to the trust strategy area to see the combined impact.
1
Click the Edit button in the lower right corner of the Action Items:
2
Within the drawer that opens on the right side of your screen, click Add New Trust in the lower left to open the menu of available trust options:
3
Choose your desired trust type, and then use the data fields to identify the parameters for that trust. The available data fields will adapt to fit your chosen trust type.
After filling out each field, click Save in the lower right:
4
After clicking Save, your trust proposal will be added to the Estate Analysis. Use the Action Items to include or exclude the trust proposals you've built here:
Looking for more on trusts?
For more detailed information on each type of trust within RightCapital, please see the article below:
When including a trust strategy, all of the figures within the estate flow chart will be updated to reflect the impact of that trust on the client's estate analysis. This will allow you to see:
How much is held outside of the taxable estate
How much more the client's heirs will receive
How much more will go to charity
How much less the clients will pay in taxes
In addition to the flow chart, the Comparison tab can be used to directly compare the current strategy (without the trust) to the proposed strategy (with the trust). A Trust tab will also appear, allowing you to track the income distributions and year-to-year balances and returns for your proposed trust. Please visit the resources below for more details on these tabs:
