Estate planning must be integrated with personal, financial, business and tax planning for the client's family. The firm has the highest expertise in sophisticated estate planning, including the gift, estate and income tax aspects of complex family ownership structures, estates, trusts and probate. In addition, our extensive business experience enables us to view the process in the broadest possible context, resulting in an estate plan which is not merely technically correct, but matches the personal and financial needs of each client. Today's economic climate and current tax structures make the process of preserving and transmitting wealth a difficult one. By providing our clients with the highest level of expertise, we assist them in bringing a large part of that challenging process under their control.

Freeland Cooper & Foreman approaches estate planning in the same way we approach any other legal situation: estate planning must be integrated with personal, financial, business and tax planning for the client's family. The firm's extensive business experience with the techniques and structures available to the owners of closely held enterprises and high net worth individuals enables us to view the estate planning process in the broadest possible context. This results in an estate plan which is not merely technically correct, but matches the personal and financial needs of each client.

It is our view that estate planning is not merely a way to deal with the issue of who inherits what at death. We phrase the question more broadly: What steps should we take now, and what steps should we plan for the future, which will maximize the preservation and growth of the client's existing wealth, and the orderly transfer of that wealth to the next generation? We emphasize the "orderly" transfer because we understand the importance to each client of structures which, in addition to minimizing taxes, encourage the development of responsible attitudes and behavior in the next generation. We are also sensitive to the fact that structures which "work" from a tax point of view are of little value to a client if they create complexity and confusion in the day to day management of his or her affairs.

Today's economic climate and current tax structures make the process of preserving and transmitting wealth a difficult one. By providing our clients with the highest level of technical expertise, business experience, and personal attention, we assist them in bringing a large part of that challenging process under their control.

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