Above the $15M per-person exemption, every incremental dollar faces a 40% transfer tax. The planning objective is to move growth, not just assets, to the next generation.
Estate planning compounds like an investment: structures set up a decade early do multiples of the work of the same structures set up late. The core sequence is consistent. Use annual exclusion gifts and exemption gifts to seed trusts. Locate the highest-growth assets inside those trusts, using GRATs and installment sales where exemption is scarce. Let grantor trust status quietly shift additional value each year as you pay the trusts' income tax. Add charitable lead structures where philanthropy is part of the family's intent.
Alongside the transfer plan sits the income tax plan: trust situs decisions that affect state tax on trust income, distribution policies that manage compressed trust brackets, and asset location that puts the right holdings in the right vehicles.
We map the whole system, project exemption use across growth scenarios, and coordinate the professionals around the family so the plan is one plan rather than a stack of disconnected documents.
Transfer the upside of an appreciating asset at near-zero gift tax cost. The classic pre-liquidity estate freeze.
Read the overview →A separate taxpayer for income tax purposes. The building block behind QSBS stacking, state tax planning, and multi-generational compounding.
Read the overview →The GRAT's philanthropic sibling: charity receives the annuity for a term, and the remainder passes to heirs at a deep gift-tax discount.
Read the overview →Sell appreciated assets inside a tax-exempt trust, defer the gain across a payout stream, and take a deduction up front.
Read the overview →Own the index as individual positions and harvest losses continuously to offset gains elsewhere in your financial life.
Read the overview →A first meeting covers your situation, the strategies that plausibly apply, and what we would need to review before recommending anything.
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