Trusts, Estates & Private Client

Our Services

Nationally ranked by Best Lawyers for trusts and estates in its U.S. Best Law Firms list, our firm offers a wide range of trusts, estates and private client services, including:

• Estate and tax planning
• Administration of trusts and estates
• Business succession planning
• Planning and trusts for individuals with special needs
• Prenuptial, postnuptial and cohabitation agreements
• Fiduciary litigation, family disputes and will contests
• Guardianships
• Family office
• Planned charitable giving
• Private foundations
• Retirement planning

Estate and Tax Planning

Our lawyers handle all aspects of estate and tax planning, including providing counsel on the development and implementation of sophisticated estate planning techniques designed to achieve our clients’ personal objectives and transfer wealth in the most tax-efficient manner.

We assist clients with nontax aspects of estate and personal planning, such as asset protection, centralized management of assets, transitioning ownership of a family business, premarital agreements, and effective use of trusts for children and grandchildren. Serving as family advisers, we offer pragmatic guidance on complex issues, helping our clients provide for future generations.

Administration of Trusts and Estates

From probating wills and protecting valuable assets to ensuring proper documentation, recordkeeping and accounting to beneficiaries, we assist corporate and individual executors, administrators and trustees in optimizing the value of their trusts and estates. Taking a collaborative approach, we work closely with each client and with our tax, real estate, corporate and litigation lawyers to provide comprehensive, customized guidance across multiple disciplines.

Business Succession Planning

We understand that each business succession situation is unique, and as such, we tailor each solution to fulfill our clients’ objectives. In addition, we help clients facilitate tax-advantaged succession of their business while focused on maximizing the value of the business, transferring the maximum amount of wealth in the most tax-efficient manner, and addressing all asset protection and family succession issues and goals.

Planning and Trusts for Individuals with Special Needs

We assist clients who have loved ones with special needs, such as mental or physical disabilities, by creating and implementing supplemental needs trusts and special needs trusts.  These trusts provide clients who are currently caring for a loved one who has special needs with a way to continue financial security into the future.

Prenuptial, Postnuptial and Cohabitation Agreements

Our lawyers are highly knowledgeable in negotiating, drafting and handling all issues regarding premarital, postnuptial and cohabitation agreements. We prepare these agreements as tools not only to protect our clients’ assets, but also to address issues such as debt responsibilities, support obligations, real and personal property ownership, property division upon divorce or death, rights to income and expense-sharing arrangements, and the manner in which disputes will be resolved.

Family Office

From building single-family and multi-family office organizational structures to providing related regulatory guidance, we offer a sophisticated understanding of customized investment platforms, international investment and tax structures, implementation of novel partnership and joint venture structures, protection from potential liability, and creation of strategic approaches to raising capital. We advise family offices on a broad range of investment activities, from private equity and hedge fund investments to co-investments and direct investments. Family offices frequently call on us concerning investments in traditional asset classes such as private equity, real estate and venture capital, and concerning alternative asset strategies, including emerging markets investments, private credit, digital assets and blockchain, art and other collectibles, and cleantech and renewable energy investments.

Representative Matters

• Secured an appellate victory on behalf of the Pennsylvania Department of Revenue in the Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania related to the denial of a $26 million tax refund claim brought by the estate of a Pittsburgh billionaire and Mellon family heir.
• Represented a charitable organization in a long-running litigation involving the destruction of a will and the recovery of assets improperly distributed from an estate.
• Advised two national trust companies in connection with Corporate Transparency Act reporting obligations of various trusts in which the clients serve as trustee.
• Represented a local university to provide advice regarding the structure of charitable gifts from donors.
• Represented a significant religious organization in asset protection planning and nonprofit corporate restructuring.
• Represented a client in a record-setting auction sale of a rare pre-revolutionary pie-crust table — attributed to the Garvan carver — which dates back to the early 1760s; auctioned by Christie’s, the antique table sold for more than $6.7 million.
• Closed one of the largest client estates, saving more than $14 million in federal estate tax; the IRS gave the estate tax clearance without any adjustment to the federal estate tax return.
• Represented a residual beneficiary of an estate in the protection of estate assets and removal of an executor in Orphans’ Court in Philadelphia in a case involving a legal issue of first impression.
• Represented the owner of a closely held business and various private equity interests in connection with the creation of an intentionally defective grantor trust to sell appreciated company stock income tax-free to the long-term trusts to freeze the value of the stock and remove all future appreciation from the owner’s estate.
• Represented a client in the creation and funding of an irrevocable life insurance trust holding very large life insurance policies, the funding of which was leveraged through the creation and administration of numerous GRATs.
• Represented a client in the successful resolution and conclusion of IRS audits involving exposure to significant gift tax liability relating to valuation methodology in connection with certain family limited partnership transactions.