Estate and Tax Planning
Estate and tax planning starts with a conversation. We listen to our clients’ objectives and unique family circumstances to craft customized and tax-efficient estate plans that accurately reflect their wishes. Our clients have diverse backgrounds, professions, family circumstances and asset holdings that impact their estate planning needs. We represent owners of closely-held businesses, individuals with substantial inherited wealth, blended families, same-sex couples and families with special needs beneficiaries.
After an initial meeting, phone call or video call to understand our clients’ assets and estate planning goals, we work together to design the necessary planning structures taking into account those goals and the current gift and estate tax regime. This will typically lead to the preparation and execution of a will, power of attorney, health care power of attorney/living will, and perhaps other documents.
In addition to preparing estate planning documents, we regularly meet with clients and their families to facilitate discussions regarding the generational transfer of wealth. By participating in these discussions, we help clients explain their estate plans to their families and loved ones to minimize conflict after death.
Estate and Trust Administration
We represent executors and trustees in their administrations of estate and trusts. Our clients who serve in fiduciary capacities have varying backgrounds – some executors and trustees are family members with no fiduciary experience, while others are banks and trust companies that have specialized fiduciary services departments.
Our experienced team of attorneys and paralegals offer efficient advice to facilitate the administration and termination of estates and trusts. This often includes probating wills; assisting in the transfer of retirement accounts and life insurance proceeds to designated beneficiaries; preparing and filing federal estate tax returns, state death tax returns and fiduciary income tax returns; and preparing informal agreements or formal audit papers to discharge the executor from liability. Beyond providing necessary tax preparation services, our team regularly reviews existing trust documents to identify planning opportunities under state and federal law, including trust modification and change of situs for income tax savings and for ease of administration.
Fiduciary and Tax Litigation
Our attorneys have decades of experience litigating matters before the Register of Wills and Orphans’ Court throughout Pennsylvania. We represent beneficiaries, executors, administrators, guardians, agents under powers of attorney, and both corporate and individual trustees with respect to disputes involving wills, estate and trust administration, charitable organizations, taxation of trusts and estates, and related controversies. Given our firm’s substantial estate planning and trust and estate administration practices, we are well-positioned to handle complex matters, regardless of whether we represent the parties bringing or defending the actions.
Because our attorneys have represented litigants on all sides of trust and estate controversies, we have the knowledge and experience necessary to effectively advocate for a client’s position, regardless of what side of a case they are on. We also have an established appellate practice, in which we handle trust and estate matters on appeal before the Superior Court of Pennsylvania and the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania.
We also represent taxpayers in front of taxing authorities, including the IRS and the Pennsylvania Department of Revenue, with respect to disputes involving state inheritance tax, federal estate tax, fiduciary income tax and generation-skipping transfer tax.
Attorneys in our office, being well-known and respected in their field, are often asked to serve as expert witnesses in courtrooms and administrative proceedings across Pennsylvania, and to foster alternative dispute resolution as mediators and arbitrators.
Above all else, we know from experience that trust and estate litigation often involves family members and can take on a much more personal nature than general commercial litigation does. As such, we counsel our clients on the relationship aspects of litigation and the longstanding, if not permanent, effects it can have on a family. For that reason, we recognize that the best financial result is not always the best result. So, while we are always aggressive advocates for our clients, we know that there are many ways to achieve a desired outcome.
Our litigation practice involves all aspects of trust and estate litigation, including the following:
- Breach of fiduciary duty claims
- Fiduciary accountings
- Fiduciary surcharge and removal
- Will and trust contests
- Trust modification, reformation and termination
- Will and trust interpretation
- Contested guardianship litigation
- Power of attorney disputes
- Charitable trust administrative deviation and cy pres proceedings
- Register of Wills probate disputes
Special Needs Planning
Families with special needs beneficiaries have unique considerations when developing their estate plan. We represent parents of special needs children with varying degrees of abilities to ensure that the transfer of wealth will not jeopardize a beneficiary’s eligibility for any government assistance programs, including Medicaid, Medicaid Waiver and Supplemental Security Income (SSI).
Planning for special needs beneficiaries oftentimes leads to the preparation of a special needs trust. A properly drafted special needs trust holds assets that are available to a special needs beneficiary to supplement government benefits he or she may receive, but will not take the place of those benefits.
We also represent trustees of special needs trusts to assist in the ongoing administration of the trust. Our attorneys are experienced in preparing and filing petitions for allowances when a trustee wishes to make a distribution or an investment decision that must be approved by the Court. Oftentimes, this includes the purchase or sale of trust-owned real estate or the distribution of trust principal to renovate a special needs beneficiary’s home for accessibility purposes.
Guardianships
We assist clients seeking a guardianship for their disabled minor or adult incapacitated family members in Pennsylvania. Our experienced attorneys guide our clients through the legal and emotional process of establishing a guardianship for a loved one.
There are two types of guardians: guardians of the estate and guardians of the person. The guardian of the person is generally an individual appointed by a court to provide care, maintenance and possibly custody for a minor or an incapacitated person. The guardian of the estate of generally an individual or trust institution appointed by a court to handle financial matters for a minor or incapacitated person.
Once a guardian is appointed, the guardian has ongoing responsibilities to the minor or incapacitated person and to the court. We represent guardians of varying experience levels in their administration of the guardianship estate, ranging from family members with no prior experience to professional guardians. Our services include the preparation and filing of annual guardianship reports, petitions for allowances and accountings.
We also represent alleged incapacitated persons throughout both contested and uncontested guardianship proceedings. We advocate for our clients who do not believe that a guardianship is necessary because there is a less restrictive alternative in place (such as a power of attorney) or because the individual’s ability to receive and evaluate information effectively and communicate decisions is not impaired.
Closely Held Business Planning
Individuals can hold a significant portion of their wealth in closely-held family businesses. The succession of these kinds of business interests present unique estate planning considerations and challenges. We assist individuals with closely held business interests plan for business succession and continuity, taking into account the individual’s lifetime gifting and estate planning wishes, relevant state and federal tax laws, liquidity considerations and corporate governance.
Our attorneys regularly plan for and draft the necessary documentation for strategic gifts or sales of family company interests to other family members, whether during life or upon death, including interest partnerships, LLCs, C-Corporations, S-Corporations and other business classifications. We also specialize in transferring closely held business interests into trusts and assisting the trustee navigate the complex set of tax rules that can accompany that type of transfer.
Tax-Exempt Organizations and Charitable Gift Planning
We represent charitable organizations, such as museums, foundations and educational institutions, formed under trust or with interests held in trust with respect to questions regarding charitable governance, tax-exempt status and non-profit tax reporting requirements. Our attorneys also represent trustees of charitable trust with ongoing trust administration as well as for discrete issues, including those that require representation in the Orphans’ Court (such as cy pres or administrative deviation proceedings) and before the IRS.
Our attorneys also help clients make charitable gifts in a manner consistent with their estate plan and their charitable gifting goals. We advise clients with respect to the creation and ongoing administration of private foundations and the state and federal tax effects of doing so. Our attorneys help clients create, fund and administer irrevocable charitable trusts.
