Areas of Special Interest
Asset Protection Planning

The article LAWSUIT HELL in the December 2003 issue of NEWSWEEK tells it all—“LITIGATION NATION”. This is scary stuff! But the fact of life is that wealthy individuals, business owners and professionals must plan to protect their personal and business assets. Moreover, asset protection planning is possibly the single most important issue faced by professionals and business owners today. An individual works hard for a whole lifetime and one incident can threaten those years of accomplishment. Wealthy individuals, business owners and professionals need to ask themselves these crucial questions:

"How do I protect my home and personal assets from liability if something goes amiss with my business or practice?"

"How do I limit the exposure of my personal assets to the risks created by virtue of owning a successful business?"

Asset protection may be the answer. Asset protection planning is a process which minimizes the risk of loss from business hazards and personal liability.

Asset protection strategies are an opportunity for business owners and professionals to organize and design a plan that shields wealth from personal and business liability risks.  Such strategies can include using the following:

  • Limited Liability Company
  • Family Limited Partnership
  • Offshore LLC
  • Savings Trust
  • Offshore Trusts

 

 

 

 Estate Planning

Planning for a Lifetime: Wealth Maximization
Lifetime tax planning strategies include reducing overall transfer taxes by considering valuation discounts, opportunities to leverage or strip out existing wealth and also include the interplay of income, gift, estate and generation-skipping transfer taxes. Such strategies allow clients to shift substantial wealth to other family members as smoothly and economically possible with the goal of keeping future asset appreciation outside of the taxable estate.

Planning for a Future: Building New Wealth
This type of planning involves providing counsel to individuals with new wealth such as those with stock options, restricted stock, stock appreciation rights, substantial corporate benefits, significant retirement accounts or extensive and complex real estate holdings.

Planning for the Darkest of Days: Incapacity and Death
This type of planning requires determining who will make health care decisions for individuals, and who will manage an individuals financial assets when they are unable to do so themselves, whether due to incapacity or death. A customized estate plan must be designed to carry out an individual’s wishes in a tax-efficient manner that minimizes the burden of the federal transfer tax.

Asset Exposure and Creditors: Planning to Minimize Exposure
Advanced planning by using sound estate planning devices and asset protection strategies will assist individuals in safeguarding a substantial portion of their family assets from potential creditor claims and preserve family wealth.

International: Planning Across Borders
This requires an expert in U.S. income and estate tax matters relative to an individual's status as a nonresident alien who plans to live in the United States and a resident alien who already lives in the United States. There may be opportunities for a nonresident alien to take advantage of the tax laws relative to wealth transfers and pay little or no U.S. transfer tax.

 

Copyright 2009 Randall H. Borkus  All Right Reserved  |  Disclaimer

Home | Areas of Interest| Publications | Bio/Credentials | Contact
setstats 1