Private Client & Family Office

Our Private Client & Family Office practice is unique for its range of tax acumen combined with exceptional estate, generation skipping transfer (GST) and gift tax advice. The Private Wealth team also works closely with other attorneys at Pillsbury, who offer guidance in transactional business matters, as well as litigation and dispute resolution, in a host of private client-focused specialties, including artwork and collectibles, wine and wineries, foundations and philanthropy, direct investment, campaign finance, residency, real estate and international tax advice.

As trusted advisors, we have developed generation-spanning relationships with our clients. We forge strong lines of communication with other trusted advisors in accounting, banking, investment and insurance, as well as our clients’ other partners, such as offshore and onshore administrative service providers, private investment funds and trust companies. In addition, with Pillsbury’s proprietary back office services, our clients’ matters undergo continuous review by professionals sensitive to discovering tax, accounting and insurance risks and opportunities on a real-time basis.

Private Client & Family Office Advisory

Our professionals draw on an extraordinary breadth and depth of knowledge and practical experience in private client matters to offer a strategic view of where the law is going, not only where it is today. Our Private Client & Family Office group advises clients worldwide on sensitive business and personal affairs, including:

• Mitigating income, estate, gift and GST tax liabilities
• Multiple passport and tax residency planning for U.S. citizens and non-resident aliens, including expatriation planning, change in state tax residency planning and financial privacy and security advice
• Generational ownership of real estate, including like-kind exchanges of real property and umbrella partnership real estate investment trust (UPREIT) transactions
• Multijurisdictional taxation and tax treaty planning
• Establishment and structuring of family offices, funds and partnerships
• Wealth preservation and asset protective strategies
• Creation of pre-immigration and other foreign trusts
• Family governance advice and planning
• Controlled foreign corporation (CFC) and passive foreign investment company (PFIC) planning
• U.S. income, estate and gift taxation, both U.S. federal and state, of non-U.S. residents, individuals, partnerships and corporations, including regulatory and compliance advice
• Foreign trust planning and structuring for non-U.S. residents
• Structuring of management for family offices
• Family back office operations, administrative services, bookkeeping support, insurance management, and art and collectables management
• Succession planning for family and closely held businesses
• Reputational risk assessments and support
• Advice for financial privacy and security
• Establishing terrorist and emergency procedures for family and business
• Private placement life insurance (PPLI) planning and assessment by licensed life insurance professionals
• Elder and health law related matters

Tax Structuring — Our private wealth tax lawyers are sought out as tax authorities and seasoned advisors, and are quoted frequently in The New York Times, Bloomberg and The Wall Street Journal on matters including the effect of U.S. tax reform on art collectors, carried interest rules, and foreign tax benefits under the new tax act affecting C corporations and flow-through entities. Our lawyers have co-authored numerous well-regarded tax treatises and monographs in the areas of S corporations, artwork, and estate and gift planning.

Estate Planning and Administration — With care and nuance, our Private Client & Family Office advisors assist individuals, families, family-owned businesses and charitable foundations in the planning and administration of complex trusts and estates, and in U.S. and international estate, trust and tax planning.

Estate, Probate and Family Dispute Litigation — Pillsbury’s Private Client & Family Office team comprises experienced litigators who manage complex litigation involving multigenerational families with significant assets. Pillsbury’s sophisticated and sensitive approach to dispute resolution can achieve positive results for our clients, while minimizing expensive litigation. Where litigation is unavoidable, our highly skilled litigators excel at achieving our clients' desired outcome. We proactively advise our clients and structure their interests in ways that mitigate conflict to resolve disputes efficiently, delicately and favorably. When disputes arise, we advocate for our clients with sophisticated and careful determination, recognizing that the optimal outcome often includes a negotiated resolution as promptly as possible, without sacrificing financial benefits.

Philanthropy — Our teams have crafted the formation of numerous public charities and private foundations benefiting health care, the natural environment, and needy and underprivileged children and have advised their ongoing governance and administration. We have also advised on charitable giving and philanthropic activities involving for-profit enterprises. We are skilled in advising and preparing charitable gift agreements, both on behalf of sophisticated donors and for hospitals, museums and civic organizations.

 Aircraft, Yachts and Automobiles — Clientele who own private aircraft, yachts, classic cars and hypercars know that our user-friendly service and superior performance are luxuries that they can afford, and necessities that they cannot afford to forgo. Our team has negotiated the purchase of all classes of private aircraft from all major manufacturers on behalf of some of the wealthiest individuals and most successful corporations in the world. In addition, we have guided countless buyers and sellers of aircraft through the secondary trading market.

Art — Pillsbury’s Private Client & Family Office group has represented world-renowned museums, collectors and art galleries with respect to their collections. One of our members has authored a Tax Management portfolio, published by the Bureau of National Affairs, concerning authors’ and artists’ tax copyright issues, as well as numerous articles and speeches regarding optimal planning for art collections.

Founders Planning and Business Affairs — The team regularly advises business owners in pre-IPO and prefunding tax and related planning and transactions. These include exit strategy planning; pre-sale of a business planning; UPREIT transactions; sales to intentionally defective grantor (IDGT); and planning preparation for an IPO.

A Global Platform of Services

Our Private Client & Family Office group coordinates with other lawyers in the firm to deliver seamless, high-end services in the following areas:

• Real Estate
• Business, Private and Trust Litigation
• Insurance Recovery and Risk Management
• Emerging Companies and Venture Capital
• Private Equity/Hedge Funds
• Technology Transactions
• State Income and Residency Tax Considerations
• White Collar Defense
• Real Estate Litigation
• Executive Compensation
• Regulatory