Estate & Tax Planning
Cummins & White, LLP provides a full range of estate and business succession planning services to major institutions, closely-held companies, and individual clients. Our services include a “global review” of each client’s overall estate, income, and gift tax issues with a view toward practical and relevant solutions. We focus on wealth transfer planning for the perpetuation of personal wealth and to benefit the client’s heirs.
Overall estate planning usually begins with the creation of a revocable family trust, wills, and durable powers of attorney for health care and financial management. We address methods of value compression for estate tax purposes and integrate these methods with insurance and other sale and gifting techniques.
Depending upon the client’s need, we often establish other business entities and/or prepare insurance, charitable and other irrevocable trusts. Such irrevocable trusts can include Intentionally Defective Grantor Trusts and/or Grantor Retirement Annuity Trusts to freeze value and push appreciation to the next generation. Sometimes Qualified Personal Retirement Trusts are used to pass legacy homes to the next generation with a minimum gift tax. Many of these trusts can also protect these assets from creditors.
Yet some of the most efficient, low tax and cost-efficient estate planning comes with growth planning for the business. Our lawyers are adept at integrating estate planning techniques with business acquisitions and mergers. Such planning often includes having new operations, acquisitions, or entities owned by the succeeding generation, or moderately-priced sales and gifts to the next generation. We also offer assistance with setting up family foundations or directing assets contributed to donor advised funds.
Cummins & White provides retirement benefits planning and other related services to ensure a comfortable lifestyle for those contemplating or planning for retirement. Often in estate planning, family issues arise, and our lawyers are quick to handle domestic matters that relate to estate planning, including preparation of prenuptial, postnuptial, separate property and community property agreements.
The firm handles after-death estate and trust administration. We represent executors, trustees, beneficiaries and other interested parties. When friends or relatives have failed to plan appropriately, we will also handle probate matters, conservatorships or guardianships. Although we attempt to dispel any unnecessary family disputes, if one does occur, we assist fiduciaries and beneficiaries with the mediation of any issues and, if necessary, will represent them with the litigation of probate, estate and trust matters.
