Success Story – Emergency Estate Tax Savings

Background:  Lavelle Law represented a client who owned a business and other complex assets in the estate planning process by preparing a full set of estate planning documents to mitigate estate tax.

Challenges: The client became unexpectedly and critically ill before the estate planning documents could be finalized and signed. Without the estate planning documents in place, the client’s estate would have been subject to significant estate taxes, however, the client lacked the mental capacity to sign them, due to illness.

Result: Our team worked very quickly (in a matter of just a few days) to establish temporary guardianship of the client, and – most importantly – successfully argued for the judge to authorize the guardian to execute and finalize the estate plan documents on the client’s behalf. Finalizing the estate planning documents in advance of the client’s death saved the estate and the client’s family nearly $500,000 in estate taxes.