Our Estate Planning and Elder Law practice provides a wide range of individualized services that are tailored to the specific goals and objectives of each person. The experience of our practice group, led by Stuart Bear, Robert LaFleur, and Mylene Peterson, ranges from preparing simple wills, to planning and administering complex multi-million dollar estates. In addition, we are sensitive and highly specialized with elder law matters and the complicated issues that involve the disability and aging of a loved one. The diverse clients we serve include persons of all ages, including single persons, married couples, families with young children, blended families and domestic partners.
Estate Planning
Estate planning is a necessity of life. Our estate planning services range from basic estate planning to planning for large estates, life time wealth transfers, asset protection and specialized planning for owners of closely held businesses, executives of publicly held corporations, and other clients with highly specialized planning needs like blended families and families with persons with disabilities. We assist clients with a wide variety of planning strategies including:
- Basic Wills and Testamentary Trusts
- Estate Tax Planning
- Living Trusts
- Marital Property Trusts
- Educational Trusts
- Crummey Trusts
- Life Insurance Trusts
- Grantor Retained Trusts
- Charitable Remainder Trusts
- Planning for highly compensated clients
- Planning for business owners, clients with stock or stock options on closely held corporations and other typical executive compensation issues
- Family Limited Partnerships and Limited Liability Companies
Probate and Trust Administration
The death of a loved one can bring a flurry of paperwork. Our experience with the administration of estates and trusts can ease your burden. In addition, the possible tax issues that may arise during estate or trust administration can demand significant tax and legal expertise from the estate planning advisor. We assist clients in probating estates and administering trusts from the most simple estates and trusts to the most complex ones. Administration services include:
- Probate
- Trust administration
- Trust funding and administration
- Estate settlement
- Preparation and filing of Federal and State estate tax, income tax, gift tax and generation skipping transfer tax returns
- Beneficiary designated asset recovery
Elder Law
We regularly assist clients with the challenges of caring for elderly and/or incapacitated family members. We offer a wide variety of elder law related services including:
- Powers of Attorney
- Health Care Directives
- Guardianship and Conservatorships
- Medical Assistance planning, including long-term care planning, asset protection and government benefits eligibility.
- End of life planning
- Insurance and governmental benefits advice
- Retirement benefits planning
- Elder abuse and elder fraud investigation and litigation
- Housing reverse mortgages, life care contracts, long term care arrangements
- Supplemental Needs Trusts/Special Needs Trusts
- Disability Planning
Attorneys in our firm have lectured and written extensively in the field of Estate Planning and Elder Law not only to the general public but also for the benefit of attorneys, accountants, insurance agents, financial planners, and trust organizations.
