Estate and Succession Planning
Whether it is to minimize federal and state estate taxes on your personal assets, assure passage of your assets to heirs in accordance with your wishes, transfer business ownership and management, assure estate liquidity, or reduce probate and administrative costs, effective estate and succession planning will help you achieve your goals.
At Wolf & Company, we understand the complex laws and various tools that will help you to protect your assets and reduce the cost of leaving them to your heirs.
We start with a meeting with you to learn more about your family, your asset holdings, your business, and your estate transfer goals. Then we will discuss specific estate and succession planning issues and techniques and develop alternative recommendations to construct a plan to achieve those goals.
Our professionals employ a variety of sophisticated planning techniques, including the use of:
- Wealth transfers
- Discounted gifting vehicles
- Estate freezing techniques
- Tax advantaged giving
- Effective use of life insurance
- Business ownership structure
- Design transfer techniques
We utilize an array of planning vehicles to achieve the planning techniques above, including:
- Will and living trust
- Family limited partnership and limited liability company
- Grantor retained annuity trust (GRAT) or unitrust (GRUT)
- Irrevocable defective grantor trust
- “Crummy” trust
- Dynasty trust
- Irrevocable life insurance trust (ILIT)
- Charitable trust
- Buy-sell agreement
Our professionals continue to work with you to execute your plans, including working as a team with your legal advisor for document preparation, as well as your investment advisors, while performing business valuation services and tax return preparation services. We also monitor your plan to make sure it incorporates your current financial situation and any tax regulatory changes.
For more information on our estate and succession planning capabilities, contact Jodi T. Mersinger, Partner, Tax Services.