Estate Tax Planning
Discover how hiring an estate tax attorney is the best investment you can make in 2024.
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High net worth = high tax exposure.
Your wealth should support your family, not the IRS. But with tax laws changing every election cycle, it is far too common for Americans to pay estate taxes that could have been avoided with proactive tax and estate planning.
Estate planning to protect and grow your assets.
Minimize Estate Tax
Implement tax reduction strategies and maximize assets passed to heirs.
Safeguard your Wealth & Family
Use trusts and asset protection entities to shield assets and create financial security for your loved ones.
Achieve Business Goals
Factor current business objectives into your planning to enhance growth and profitability.
Transfer your Business to Heirs
Succession planning for a smooth ownership transition while maintaining financial stability.
Streamline Charitable Giving
Establish tax-efficient charitable trusts or foundations to create a lasting philanthropic legacy.
Our Wealth Preservation Planning Process
01
Schedule a Consultation
We review your current ownership structure and help you understand opportunities to save taxes and protect your wealth.
02
Implement your Plan
We work with you to reorganize your asset ownership structures to be as protective and tax efficient as legally possible.
Manage your Affairs with Confidence
Enjoy your life with a team in place to protect your wealth while you are alive, preserve your wealth for future generations, and avoid unnecessary taxes.
What is included in your Wealth Preservation Plan?
Your comprehensive estate plan will include a combination of the trusts and business entities described below.
We curate and customize the entities based on your specific goals and objectives.
Types of Trusts
Living Trust
A living trust is a flexible and powerful estate planning tool designed to hold and manage your assets during your lifetime and facilitate the distribution of those assets to your beneficiaries upon your passing. By creating a living trust, you can maintain control over your assets while potentially avoiding the often time-consuming and expensive probate process.
Additionally, living trusts can provide privacy, as they are not subject to public scrutiny like a will. For high net worth individuals, a living trust can be an essential component of an estate plan, offering tax planning opportunities and ensuring a smooth transition of assets to your beneficiaries.
Irrevocable Trust
A trust that cannot be modified or terminated by the grantor once it has been established, providing certain tax and asset protection benefits.
Qualified Personal Residence Trust (QPRT)
A QPRT allows the grantor to transfer a primary or secondary residence into the trust while retaining the right to live in the property for a specified term. After the term ends, the residence passes to the beneficiaries at a reduced gift tax value.
Intentionally-Defective Grantor Trust (IDGT)
An IDGT is an irrevocable trust structured to remove assets from the grantor’s estate while allowing the grantor to remain responsible for the trust’s income taxes, effectively reducing the value of the trust assets for estate and gift tax purposes.
Living Will
A SLAT is an irrevocable trust created by one spouse for the benefit of the other spouse, allowing the grantor to indirectly access the trust assets through distributions to the beneficiary spouse while still removing the assets from the grantor’s taxable estate.
HIPAA Authorization
A BDIT is an irrevocable trust set up by a third party (often a parent) with the beneficiary (often a child) as the grantor for income tax purposes. This allows the beneficiary to have control over and access to the trust assets while providing asset protection and minimizing estate and gift taxes.
Personal Property Memorandum
A GRAT allows the grantor to transfer assets to beneficiaries while retaining an annuity interest for a specified term of years. After the term ends, the remaining assets in the trust pass to the beneficiaries tax-free.
Deed to transfer primary residence to Living Trust
A CRT provides an income stream to the grantor or other non-charitable beneficiaries for a specified term or for life, with the remaining assets ultimately passing to one or more designated charities.
Trust Funding Instructions
A dynasty trust is designed to benefit multiple generations of beneficiaries, avoiding estate and generation-skipping transfer taxes at each generational level.
Life Insurance Trust
An irrevocable life insurance trust (ILIT) is created to hold life insurance policies, removing the death benefit proceeds from the grantor’s taxable estate and providing liquidity to the estate or beneficiaries.
Trust Funding Instructions
An asset protection trust is designed to protect the grantor’s assets from potential creditors or legal judgments, while still allowing the grantor to retain some level of control over the assets.
Special Needs Trust
A special needs trust is created to provide financial support for a beneficiary with disabilities, without jeopardizing the beneficiary’s eligibility for government assistance programs, such as Medicaid and Supplemental Security Income (SSI).
Trust Funding Instructions
A guide to help you transfer your assets, such as your house, money, or investments, into a trust you’ve set up. These instructions explain which assets should go into the trust and how to actually transfer them, making sure everything is in the right place. By following these instructions, you make it easier for the person in charge of the trust (the trustee) to manage your assets and distribute them to the people you want to have them (the beneficiaries) when the time comes.
Business Entities
Limited Partnership
A partnership with two types of partners: general partners, who manage the business and have unlimited personal liability, and limited partners, who have limited liability up to their investment and do not participate in management. Limited partnerships can be useful for estate planning, as they may provide asset protection and tax benefits.
Private Foundation
A type of nonprofit organization typically funded by a single individual, family, or corporation. Private foundations can be used in estate planning to preserve wealth, manage charitable giving, and provide certain tax benefits, such as deductibility of contributions and reduction of estate taxes.
Qualified Opportunity Zone Fund
Investment vehicles designed to encourage investment in designated economically distressed areas, known as Opportunity Zones. By investing in a Qualified Opportunity Zone Fund, individuals can defer and potentially reduce capital gains taxes, as well as potentially receive tax-free growth on investments held for a specified period of time, which can be beneficial for estate planning.
Limited Liability Company
In the context of estate planning, an LLC (Limited Liability Company) is a popular business entity used to hold and manage assets while providing limited liability protection to its owners. LLCs can be an effective tool for estate planning, as they offer flexible management structures, are relatively easy to set up and maintain, and can provide asset protection for the LLC’s owners.
One of the main advantages of an LLC is that it can be taxed in one of four ways: as a disregarded entity, a partnership, a C-corporation, or an S-corporation. The choice of taxation depends on the owner’s goals and objectives, as each option has its own benefits and drawbacks.
For instance, an LLC taxed as a disregarded entity means the LLC is not taxed separately from its owner and the income and expenses are reported directly on the owner’s personal tax return. This can simplify tax reporting and make it easier to manage the LLC’s assets.
Alternatively, an LLC taxed as a partnership can be beneficial for estate planning purposes, as it allows the profits and losses to be passed through to the owners and avoid double taxation. On the other hand, an LLC taxed as a C-corporation or S-corporation may be useful for tax planning, as it can provide more control over profits and retained earnings and potentially offer certain tax benefits.
Ultimately, the decision to use an LLC for estate planning and the choice of taxation depends on the individual circumstances and goals of the client, and should be made with attorney guidance.
Meet Whitney Sorrell, your Scottsdale Estate Tax Attorney.
As a former IRS revenue agent turned tax and estate planning attorney, Whitney brings a unique perspective and skill set to Wealth Preservation Planning. His 30+ year career working for and against the IRS gives him the experience and knowledge to anticipate and plan around IRS scrutiny.
Whitney graduated with a Master of Laws (LLM) in Taxation from Boston University in 2021, and is in constant pursuit of bleeding-edge tax planning strategies to bring to his clients. Schedule a consultation to discuss how he can help you reduce estate taxes and protect your family.
Whitney will work with you to design a plan to achieve your current business goals while safeguarding your wealth & business for future generations. He believes you shouldn’t need to have a board meeting to go to the grocery store and is always balancing simple control mechanisms with asset protection benefits throughout the process.
JD, MBA, LLM (Tax)
Certified Public Accountant
Former IRS Agent
30+ Years of Experience
A Wealth Preservation Success Story.
Disclaimer: Photographs contain actors to protect client confidentiality.
Be advised that every case is unique, and past results do not guarantee a favorable outcome.
How one business owner survived a recession with proactive planning.
“When my business bloomed to over 340 employees and $3 million in revenue, I hired Whitney Sorrell to reorganize my assets and protect my wealth. Six years later when the market crashed I found myself defending against lawsuits and judgements. After handing my business planning documents to my creditors, they never called again. Like Whitney says, good legal advice pays for itself!”
Protect and Preserve your Financial Legacy.
We’ll review your current ownership structure and discuss potential techniques to achieve your tax and estate planning objectives. Together, we can develop a plan to reduce your tax burden and achieve your goals.
Request a consultation, or call (480) 776-6055 today.