Having confidence in your documents is essential for a successful estate planning practice. If you make errors consistently, struggle to explain “how we do things here” to new associates or spend lots of time and energy redoing paperwork at the eleventh hour, it’s time to change. Whether you acknowledge it or not, problems processing paperwork are likely spilling over into other parts of your business and negatively affecting your practice. 

Do any of these six examples resonate and sound familiar? 

High net-worth clients set up Grantor Retained Trusts (GRT) to ensure gifts go to specific beneficiaries and to avoid annoying taxes. GRTs are irrevocable, though, so your clients need to understand the consequences of placing assets in them. 

C corporations are often the best planning option for business entities. However, fears of the dreaded “double-taxation” may lead some to reject C corps without a closer look. But double taxation can be reduced, and in some cases avoided, making it an option worth considering. Attorneys seeking to maximize tax savings for their clients should investigate whether C corps are a good option for their estate planning. Simply put, double taxation means that the C corp is taxed on its income at the corporate level, and then its shareholders are taxed on the same income when it is distributed to them in the form of dividends.  Understandably, this is a situation most want to avoid or minimize.