Approved IAR CE Courses

This session focuses on ensuring estate plans remain effective over time by addressing real-world challenges such as family dynamics, beneficiary readiness, and administrative complexity. Advisors will learn how to incorporate strong governance, thoughtful trustee selection, and flexible planning tools to create plans that adapt and function in practice—not just on paper.

This session explores how accepting an inheritance or gift can create unintended tax, legal, and financial consequences, and when strategic use of qualified disclaimers may be more advantageous. It equips advisors with practical strategies for coordinating disclaimers and trust design to preserve flexibility, protect beneficiaries, and align outcomes with long-term planning goals.

With today's $15 million estate tax exemption, relatively few clients face traditional estate tax concerns. Yet financial advisors are increasingly expected to guide estate planning conversations that go far beyond tax minimization. In this session, expert Marty Shenkman will explore the evolving 'menu' of estate planning priorities: protecting wealth from lawsuits and divorce through asset protection structures; strengthening revocable trusts to address aging and health challenges; leveraging non-grantor trusts for income tax benefits; reviewing and repurposing existing or outdated trusts; and designing flexible plans that provide both asset protection and client access. Advisors will leave with practical insights and tools to elevate their estate planning conversations and deliver more value to clients.

In this continuing education session, learners will review 2 Nerd’s Eye View blog articles: Don’t “Avoid Probate”: Reframing Estate Planning Success Around Managing (Not Escaping) The Probate Process and Gifting Strategies That Allow Business-Owner Clients To Save (Millions Of) Dollars In Estate And Income Taxes.

In the first article, David Haughton reframes probate as a normal and often necessary component of estate administration rather than a failure of estate planning. He emphasizes that advisors can use estate planning to focus on coordinating estate administration and managing client expectations, rather than probate avoidance.

In the second article, Anna Pfaehler explains how business-owner clients can use strategic gifting of business interests to reduce estate and transfer tax exposure, particularly by shifting future appreciation outside their taxable estate. She highlights key techniques such as timing gifts before liquidity events, leveraging valuation discounts, and structuring ownership to preserve control while maximizing tax efficiency.

This course teaches investment adviser representatives, CCOs, and advisory firm principals how to identify and manage the legal and compliance risks that arise when non-attorney investment adviser representatives discuss estate planning, coordinate with estate planning professionals, review beneficiary and titling issues, or recommend digital estate planning platforms. The course emphasizes fiduciary duty, conflicts of interest, disclosure, supervision, client communications, due diligence, cybersecurity/privacy, recordkeeping, and unauthorized practice of law boundaries.

Estate planning is deeply personal work, often requiring professionals to guide clients through conversations involving death, incapacity, grief, family dynamics, and significant life transitions. Yet most professional training focuses on technical competency rather than the human skills needed to navigate these moments effectively.
In this seminar, estate planning attorney, business owner, and trained end-of-life doula Rachel Schromen explores how grief- and trauma-informed client counseling can strengthen the advisor-client relationship, improve communication and decision-making, and create a more meaningful client experience. Drawing from her experience integrating these principles into a successful estate planning practice, Rachel provides practical strategies professionals can use to approach difficult conversations with greater confidence, compassion, and effectiveness - without stepping outside the boundaries of their professional role.

This self-study course provides clear, practical explanations of how ETFs and mutual funds work and how to use them responsibly in advisory practice. Across six sections and eighteen lessons, youll examine fund structures and trading mechanics (intraday pricing, NAV execution, spreads, premiums/discounts, liquidity), total cost of ownership (expense ratios, trading frictions, cash drag, platform fees), and tax considerations (capital-gains distributions, in-kind processes in concept, dividend types, asset location). Youll compare passive, factor-tilted, and active approaches and learn when each has a practical role.The course connects concepts to day-to-day implementation: building core-satellite portfolios, setting rebalancing routines, placing holdings across account types, selecting appropriate share classes, managing conflicts (e.g., 12b-1 and revenue sharing), and documenting decisions in a client-ready, defensible manner. Checklists, brief case examples, and model language help you translate analysis into suitability notes, trade rationales, and monitoring plans aligned with NASAA IAR CE expectations for Products and Practices. Educational content only; not individualized investment advice.

Ethical Advertising explores how the SEC's Marketing Rule shapes every aspect of how investment advisers promote their services — from social media posts and client testimonials to performance claims and AI-generated content. Through real-world case studies, the course reveals how easy it can be to cross a compliance line, whether through cherry-picked returns, an undisclosed testimonial arrangement, or a careless repost on social media.