Estate Planning & Administration can be simple or very complex, but it is most often a stressful process of decision-making. Whether our lawyers and legal staff are dealing with a same-sex couple, a second or third marriage, a young couple wrestling with the naming of guardians for minor children, or a major estate tax plan for clients with multiple trusts and numerous parcels of real estate and other assets, patience and understanding guides the process. When a loved one dies, the administration of the trust and/or the probate estate is handled in a thoughtful and diligent manner.

Our recent cases have involved the probating of an estate of a physician, including the sale of real estate and liquidation of a medical practice; completion of a multimillion dollar court approved estate planning petition for an elderly woman who moved from Florida, was living in Rhode Island, but who was then located to a Massachusetts nursing home and whose heirs were all in Canada and Portugal (the plan included a grantor retained annuity trust, and various other irrevocable trusts for gifting which took into consideration the tax laws of the United States, Portugal, and Canada); completing a multi-jurisdictional and Florida estate tax plan for clients splitting their time between Florida, Delaware and Virginia; completing multi-jurisdictional estate tax plans for Rhode Island clients where the husband was a Canadian citizen with assets in Canada, and the couple owned real estate in Florida; establishing a trust for a second home in Rhode Island for a French citizen domiciled in Belgium; completing an estate tax plan for a client in a second marriage with children from a first marriage; completing an estate plan for clients owning a major international jewelry company based in Providence, Rhode Island; using an irrevocable trust for a WWII Veteran to protect a $2 million beach home in Misquamicut, Rhode Island and qualify for Veteran’s benefits; completing an estate plan for a young couple with children, each of whom were partners in large Boston law firms; and renegotiating and resolving a premarital agreement, legal separation and revised estate plan for an elderly women being legally challenged as the caretaker by the adult children of her second spouse.