The Net, Net Gift

Practitioners are well-aware that lifetime gifts are more tax-efficient than transfers at death. But during the past seven years there's been a possibility that the estate tax might be permanently repealed, so it's been out of vogue for practitioners to advise clients to make taxable gifts that exceed the lifetime gift exemption and require tax payments. Now that permanent repeal of the estate tax seems ever more unlikely, taxable gifts are making a comeback.