Estate Planning

Estate planning, in its broadest sense, is about accumulating, managing and transferring one’s property. Probate addresses the often complex legal issues which arise when, at the time of death, one’s property is not held in trust or otherwise disposed of by operation of law. Both estate planning and probate are also about relationships with others:

  • Family members
  • Employees
  • Business associates
  • Charities
  • Creditors

In numerous ways, attorneys at Udall Shumway PLC routinely help our clients make important decisions and take critical actions which affect their property and their important relationships. Here are some of the services our estate planning lawyers provide:

  1. Estate Plans. We have considerable experience preparing both simple and complex estate plans and the related documents: Wills, durable powers of attorney, health care powers and revocable and irrevocable trusts. We work closely with accountants, financial planners, benefits consultants, life insurance agents, trust officers and other professionals to help our clients achieve their goals.
  2. Estate-Related Matters. We assist our clients with a wide variety of estate-related matters such as business succession planning, business acquisition agreements, entity selection, buy-sell agreements, deferred compensation and family business structures. We often draw on our substantial expertise in real estate, corporate law and employee benefits in addressing these estate-related matters.
  3. Tax Planning. We assist our clients in addressing the significant federal and state tax issues that often arise when planning an estate, administering a trust or probate or dealing with distributed property.
  4. Probate. Trust Administration and Other Post-Mortem Work. We help our clients with probate and trust administration, post-mortem tax and succession planning and retirement and employee benefit distribution planning.
  5. Guardianships and Conservatorships. We counsel our clients on the benefits and burdens of guardianship and conservatorship, we help process guardianship and conservatorship proceedings through the Arizona courts and we assist with guardianship and conservatorship administration.

Not everyone needs a complicated estate plan but everyone can benefit from estate planning.

Services

For over 50 years, attorneys at Udall Shumway PLC have advised Arizona residents on wills, trusts and powers, estate and gift planning, probate and trust administration, guardianship and conservatorship and business succession planning.

Attorneys practicing in this area include:

Tim D. Butterfield
Curtis M. Chipman
Roger C. Decker
Barry C. Dickerson
Stephen L. West