Trusts + Estates

Pryor Cashman’s Trusts + Estates attorneys have a long history of assisting a sophisticated clientele of individuals, businesses, and financial institutions in all aspects of legacy planning and wealth preservation. Working within our wider Private Client Group, we help identify areas of vulnerability and prepare and execute strategies to ensure wealth survives for multiple generations.

What We Do

Our Trusts + Estates attorneys help develop customized estate and wealth transfer plans, coordinating our clients’ wishes with optimal estate, gift, and income tax planning. Working with the client’s financial advisors and fiduciaries, we provide comprehensive services for probate, estate settlement, and trust administration. At every turn, we recommend ways to minimize the impact of taxes on our clients’ income, investments, and estate. Our services extend to international clients with assets or families located in the United States.

Estate Planning + Administration

For many individuals, basic preparations - such as a written will - may be in place, but comprehensive estate planning is often inadequate or nonexistent. We help clarify goals, assess risks and ensure our clients' wishes will be executed. Some of the services we provide are:

• Preparing wills, trust instruments, intrafamily agreements, prenuptial and postnuptial agreements, and related documents
• Attending to the probate of wills and the administration of estate and trust agreements
• Acting as executors and/or trustees for sizable estates and trusts, when appropriate
• Representing major corporate fiduciaries who are acting as estate executors and trustees

We also advise on related issues such as the selection of life insurance and qualified retirement plans, and the implementation of powers of attorney, medical directives, and guardianships.

The Long View for Closely Held Businesses

Many of our clients are owners and stakeholders in family-owned businesses. Recognizing and accommodating unique family dynamics and understanding the values, goals, and objectives of individual family members, we identify and develop the most tax-efficient methods of passing the ownership of closely held and other business assets from generation to generation. Further, in conjunction with our corporate attorneys, we advise on sales of businesses to third-party buyers.

Charitable Giving

Our clients often opt to use their wealth for philanthropic purposes. Not only do such contributions manifest our clients’ passions and values, but they can also lessen their tax burden and positively impact their bottom line. Our lawyers advise on the most effective strategies for making donations, creating endowments, and giving gifts to public and private charities. We help create charitable lead and remainder trusts, as well as create, develop and supervise charitable foundations and provide guidance on investments, filing requirements, and grants.

Minimizing Tax Burdens

Tax planning becomes more complex as income and the amount and variety of taxes and expenditures grow. We counsel our clients on all issues relating to state and federal estate and gift tax and fiduciary income tax and represent them before the IRS and state tax authorities if and when they face audits.

Resolving Disputes

Disputes over trusts and estates can threaten the accumulated wealth and severely impact succession plans. Our priority is to swiftly resolve conflicts in the most cost-effective and cooperative manner possible, frequently relying on mediation as an alternative to full-scale litigation. However litigation is the necessary way forward, we have deep experience resolving will contests, including those involving allegations of undue influence and fraud, as well as cases involving the appointment or removal of fiduciaries.