Most high-earning attorneys have a will, maybe. What they usually don't have is a real plan for how their assets move, to whom, and at what tax cost. The difference between those two things can be significant.
The average estate with no planning loses a meaningful chunk to federal and state taxes, probate costs, and delays before anything reaches heirs. For attorneys who've spent decades building, that's not a technicality. It's real money that could have been directed intentionally.
The other issue is control. Without updated documents and proper titling, the state decides who gets what, and your family spends months navigating a process that should have taken days. We've seen it play out with high earners who had substantial assets but no functional plan to move them.
Legacy planning isn't morbid. It's one of the most concrete things you can do to show what your values actually are, not in words, but in structure.
We're not estate attorneys, and we don't draft documents. What we do is identify the gaps in your current structure, coordinate with your estate attorney to close them, and make sure your beneficiary designations, trust titling, and account structure are actually aligned with what your documents say. A will that contradicts a beneficiary designation is worse than no will at all.
Four areas where coordinated estate planning protects what you've built.
We review your existing will, trust documents, and powers of attorney alongside your financial picture. When gaps appear, we coordinate directly with your estate attorney to get them resolved rather than leaving them as an item on a to-do list.
Beneficiary designations on retirement accounts, life insurance, and annuities override whatever your will says. We audit every account to make sure the named beneficiaries are current, intentional, and consistent with your overall estate plan.
For larger estates, the structure of how assets are held matters as much as how much is held. We model your estate tax exposure and work with your estate attorney to identify strategies like irrevocable trusts, family gifting, or charitable vehicles that reduce what goes to the IRS.
Beyond documents, we help you think through what legacy actually means for your family. That includes conversations about transferring values alongside assets, structuring inheritance timing, and planning for family members with different financial situations.
A partner came in for a broader financial review. She had a will from when her kids were young, a couple of retirement accounts, a brokerage account, and a life insurance policy. She assumed her estate plan was in order because she had signed documents at some point.
When we audited the full picture, three of her four retirement accounts still listed her ex-husband as primary beneficiary. Her will directed assets to a trust that had never been funded. And she had no healthcare proxy or durable power of attorney in her state.
None of those issues required a crisis to fix. They just required someone to look.
Book a discovery call and we'll walk through your current structure together. Most people leave the first conversation with a clearer picture of what's working and what isn't.