“Have you heard about portability?” “What does it have to do with my estate plan?”

These are two questions we often hear from clients. “Portability” allows a widow or widower, in most cases, to add any unused estate tax “exemption” to his or her own estate tax exemption. The American Taxpayer Relief Tax Act of 2012 made this concept of portability between spouses permanent… well, at least as permanent as anything can be in the tax law. Fortunately, it doesn’t come with a built-in expiration date, like so many tax benefits do.