Terms Used In Delaware Code > Title 12 > Chapter 29 - Apportionment of Estate Taxes [Effective Jan. 1, 2014, But See &Sect; 2914 of This Title for Future Applicability]

• Amendment: A proposal to alter the text of a pending bill or other measure by striking out some of it, by inserting new language, or both. Before an amendment becomes part of the measure, thelegislature must agree to it.
• Assets: (1) The property comprising the estate of a deceased person, or (2) the property in a trust account.
• Attachment: A procedure by which a person's property is seized to pay judgments levied by the court.
• Beneficiary: A person who is entitled to receive the benefits or proceeds of a will, trust, insurance policy, retirement plan, annuity, or other contract. ^{Source: OCC}
• Charity: An agency, institution, or organization in existence and operating for the benefit of an indefinite number of persons and conducted for educational, religious, scientific, medical, or other beneficent purposes.
• Claim: means a right to payment, whether or not the right is reduced to judgment, liquidated, unliquidated, fixed, contingent, matured, unmatured, disputed, undisputed, legal, equitable, secured or unsecured. See Delaware Code Title 12 Sec. 3570
• Common law: The legal system that originated in England and is now in use in the United States. It is based on judicial decisions rather than legislative action.
• Court: means the Court of Chancery. See Delaware Code Title 12 Sec. 39A-101
• Creditor: means , with respect to a transferor, a person who has a claim. See Delaware Code Title 12 Sec. 3570
• Damages: Money paid by defendants to successful plaintiffs in civil cases to compensate the plaintiffs for their injuries.
• Debt: means liability on a claim. See Delaware Code Title 12 Sec. 3570
• Decedent: A deceased person.
• Disposition: means a transfer, conveyance or assignment of property (including a change in the legal ownership of property occurring upon the substitution of 1 trustee for another or the addition of 1 or more new trustees), or the exercise of a power so as to cause a transfer of property, to a trustee or trustees, but shall not include the release or relinquishment of an interest in property that theretofore was the subject of a qualified disposition and shall not include a sale or exchange for full and adequate consideration. See Delaware Code Title 12 Sec. 3570
• Donee: The recipient of a gift.
• Equitable: Pertaining to civil suits in "equity" rather than in "law." In English legal history, the courts of "law" could order the payment of damages and could afford no other remedy. See damages. A separate court of "equity" could order someone to do something or to cease to do something. See, e.g., injunction. In American jurisprudence, the federal courts have both legal and equitable power, but the distinction is still an important one. For example, a trial by jury is normally available in "law" cases but not in "equity" cases. ^{Source: U.S. Courts}
• Executor: A male person named in a will to carry out the decedent
• Fair market value: The price at which an asset would change hands in a transaction between a willing, informed buyer and a willing, informed seller.
• Fiduciary: A trustee, executor, or administrator.
• former spouse: means only persons to whom the transferor was married at, or before, the time the qualified disposition is made. See Delaware Code Title 12 Sec. 3570
• Fraud: Intentional deception resulting in injury to another.
• Garnishment: Generally, garnishment is a court proceeding in which a creditor asks a court to order a third party who owes money to the debtor or otherwise holds assets belonging to the debtor to turn over to the creditor any of the debtor
• Gift: A voluntary transfer or conveyance of property without consideration, or for less than full and adequate consideration based on fair market value.
• Gross estate: The total fair market value of all property and property interests, real and personal, tangible and intangible, of which a decedent had beneficial ownership at the time of death before subtractions for deductions, debts, administrative expenses, and casualty losses suffered during estate administration.
• Indemnification: In general, a collateral contract or assurance under which one person agrees to secure another person against either anticipated financial losses or potential adverse legal consequences. ^{Source: FDIC}
• Inter vivos: Transfer of property from one living person to another living person.
• Jurisdiction: (1) The legal authority of a court to hear and decide a case. Concurrent jurisdiction exists when two courts have simultaneous responsibility for the same case. (2) The geographic area over which the court has authority to decide cases.
• Legatee: A beneficiary of a decedent
• Life estate: A property interest limited in duration to the life of the individual holding the interest (life tenant).
• Partnership: A voluntary contract between two or more persons to pool some or all of their assets into a business, with the agreement that there will be a proportional sharing of profits and losses.
• Party: means the respondent, petitioner, guardian, conservator, or any other person allowed by the Court to participate in a guardianship or protective proceeding. See Delaware Code Title 12 Sec. 39A-101
• Person: has the meaning ascribed to it in § 302(15) of Title 1. See Delaware Code Title 12 Sec. 3570
• Personal property: All property that is not real property.
• Power of attorney: A written instrument which authorizes one person to act as another's agent or attorney. The power of attorney may be for a definite, specific act, or it may be general in nature. The terms of the written power of attorney may specify when it will expire. If not, the power of attorney usually expires when the person granting it dies. ^{Source: OCC}
• Property: includes real property, personal property, and interests in real or personal property. See Delaware Code Title 12 Sec. 3570
• Qualified disposition: means a disposition by or from a transferor (or multiple transferors in the case of property in which each such transferor owns an undivided interest) to 1 or more trustees, at least 1 of which is a qualified trustee, with or without consideration, by means of a trust instrument. See Delaware Code Title 12 Sec. 3570
• Record: means information that is inscribed on a tangible medium or that is stored in an electronic or other medium and is retrievable in perceivable form. See Delaware Code Title 12 Sec. 39A-101
• Remainder: An interest in property that takes effect in the future at a specified time or after the occurrence of some event, such as the death of a life tenant.
• Revocable trust: A trust agreement that can be canceled, rescinded, revoked, or repealed by the grantor (person who establishes the trust).
• State: means a state of the United States, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, the United States Virgin Islands, a federally recognized Indian tribe, or any territory or insular possession subject to the jurisdiction of the United States. See Delaware Code Title 12 Sec. 39A-101
• Statute: A law passed by a legislature.
• Testator: A male person who leaves a will at death.
• Testimony: Evidence presented orally by witnesses during trials or before grand juries.
• Transferor: means a person who, as an owner of property, as a holder of a power of appointment which authorizes the holder to appoint in favor of the holder, the holder's creditors, the holder's estate or the creditors of the holder's estate, or as a trustee, directly or indirectly makes a disposition or causes a disposition to be made. See Delaware Code Title 12 Sec. 3570
• Trustee: A person or institution holding and administering property in trust.
• Trustor: The person who makes or creates a trust. Also known as the grantor or settlor.