Estate Planning (Wills and Trusts)

Organizing an individual’s assets to avoid future family fights and to prevent the majority of the estate from going to the government is essential to passing down a family’s hard earned wealth. Smart estate planning can be complex, living wills, inter-vivos trusts, pour over wills and other legal documents can assure your assets will be passed down and dispersed precisely at your discretion. With so many components to consider like, paying for your children’s education, buying a second home, and how and when to retire, having a legally sound and effective estate planning counsel is essential in modern times.

Within the real of estate planning and wills, we are able to assist in the construction all necessary medical directive documents. In the unforeseen circumstance you become incapacitated or seriously injured, a medical directive can be used to set up healthcare proxies to make decisions on your behalf regarding care. Additionally, we can assist with Special-Needs Trusts, in the event that an individual has a special needs child or dependent that they would like to make sure is cared for long after their passing. Special needs trusts are an effective way to provide a supplement to the disabled child’s income and quality of life, without subtracting from their government benefits. It is vital Special-Needs Trusts are constructed in a way that they are durable and reliable under any challenge. Trusts are no longer an instrument of the super wealthy, they are a prudent strategy to effectively protect assets from creditors and lawsuits seeking compensation from the decedent or the decedent’s estate

One of the most prevalent needs for estate planning is to avoid the Estate Tax. The federal estate tax is applicable on the transfer of the taxable estate of every decedent. This can be a huge tax burden regardless of the size of the estate, the crucial factor which expert counsel can provide is to maximize deductions and effectively limit your tax burden thereby passing on the greatest portion of wealth and assets to close family and friends. Additionally, the complicated framework of the overlap of federal estate tax and state inheritance and estate tax can have major implications if not effectively planned for. Additionally, the estate tax has numerous nuanced implications regarding non-residents and noncitizen spouses, to which only a well-versed expert counsel in estate planning precisely guide.

Death of a loved one will always be difficult, however without proper estate planning, the emotional pain of their passing will be compounded by financial chaos. When relationships between beneficiary and fiduciary become strained, litigation may be the best avenue to preserve the intent of the trust or succession of wealth. Additionally, advocating for the testator’s intent to be followed may be an important function of litigation in this regard. Often misconduct among fiduciaries and beneficiaries seek to impose their own preference for distribution under a will or trust and litigation may be the best avenue to adhere to the testator’s intent. We approach each estate planning strategy with a vast comprehensive knowledge of all legal instruments aimed at maximizing our client’s goals and creating the most efficient transfer of wealth possible.