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Estate Planning Solicitors

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Services in: Estate Planning Solicitors

    • Inheritance Tax Planning
    • International Estate Planning
    • Planning for Care Home Fees
    • Trusts

Estate planning is essential to make sure your wealth is protected for you and your family. By structuring your assets in a tax-efficient way, you can make sure everyone is provided for in the future. 

Estate planning is not just about reducing tax. It’s about giving you peace of mind for the future, knowing you will have enough after retirement and your loved ones will have the financial support they need.

Contact us today to see how our estate planning solicitors can help you and your family. 

What does an estate planning solicitor do? 

Our solicitors can help with estate planning services like:

  • Wills – advising on, drafting and executing
  • Inheritance tax planning – ensuring your loved ones receive the full benefit of your estate
  • Trusts – setting up and administering trusts to manage money, property or investments for specific people or purposes
  • International estate planning – making sure your estate is not subject to tax in multiple jurisdictions
  • Wealth management – advising on investments and wealth-holding structures
  • Succession planning – planning for the future so your business continues to thrive
  • Planning for care home fees – ensuring your assets aren’t depleted in later life.

Why choose Irwin Mitchell to help with your estate planning? 

Our partner-led team offers the full range of legal and tax expertise you need to help you plan effectively for the future. We are experienced in dealing with complex estates, often with international elements. 

Estate planning is one of our core specialities at the very heart of our work in tax, trusts, and estates. We’ve given extensive estate planning advice over many years, drawn up thousands of Wills and trusts, and helped hundreds of clients structure their assets effectively to make the most of their capital and income. 

We offer a comprehensive service, drawing on the expertise of our multidisciplinary team. This means everything is done in-house and allows us to deliver a uniquely streamlined service for our clients. 

We have a national presence, with offices across the UK. Wherever you are, our advisers are on hand to help. 

Work with financial planners to plan for tax efficient estates
Detailed knowledge of inheritance tax and how to protect your assets
Offices across the country
Resolved some of the UK's most high-profile disputes

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Paula Myers Profile
Paula Myers National Head of Will, Trust and Estate Disputes Meet the team

Estate Planning Solicitors - More Information

Estate planning can be useful to anyone. You can use our estate planning services to: 

  • Minimise inheritance tax on your estate 
  • Prepare for future costs, such as care home fees 
  • Plan for what would happen if you lost mental capacity 
  • Set up dedicated trusts for things like school or university fees 
  • Make sure your loved ones are provided for after your death 
  • Put in place succession plans if you are a business owner. 

Whether you’re worried about protecting your wealth, preparing for the future, or just making sure you leave your affairs in good order for your loved ones, we can help. 

Yes, we can advise on how to structure your Will to make sure any tax will be as low as possible. 

There are different ways you can reduce your inheritance tax bill, including: 

  • Leaving money to charity
  • Setting up trusts
  • Giving away parts of your estate while you are still alive.

Preparing for inheritance tax is essential so that the value of your estate is not drastically reduced for your loved ones. With effective estate planning you can make sure your wealth is protected for the next generation. Our lawyers and tax advisers can advise on the best way to do this. 

Lifetime inheritance tax exemptions are also a valuable planning tool to consider, if you have spare income or capital that you can give away before your death.  

Our financial planners may be able to help you rearrange your assets so that you can make a gift of something in your lifetime and save your estate being taxed. 

Trusts are a valuable part of estate planning. They allow you to make gifts of assets or property in a controlled way that: 

  • Protects it from unnecessary tax
  • Makes sure the beneficiaries (who receive capital or income from it) use the funds appropriately
  • Means various people can benefit from it at different times (this may be helpful, for example, if you have young children from a current relationship and older ones from a previous marriage).

You can make a trust in your lifetime or write one in your Will to take effect upon your death. Lifetime trusts can help save inheritance tax, if you make a gift at least seven years before your death.

To make sure you still have control of what happens to the gift while you’re alive, you can appoint yourself as a trustee. If you don’t want the responsibility yourself, we're also frequently appointed as a trustee for lifetime trusts, as well as Will trusts. 

Find out more about setting up a trust.

Tax regulations are constantly changing, and the laws surrounding international wealth have become particularly strict in recent years. 

If you hold assets in more than one country, you’ll need to consider: 

  • Whether you’re classed as resident or domiciled for tax purposes
  • Changing tax laws for structures such as offshore trusts
  • Automatic exchange of information under financial agreements such as Common Reporting Standard, Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act, and others
  • Increase in HMRC enquiries and investigations
  • Changes to regulatory and privacy requirements in offshore financial centres.

There can also be different cultural elements for wealth held in foreign jurisdictions – for example, forced heirship and Sharia law. This may affect the ownership status of your assets and how you can pass them on to the next generation. 

We frequently work with international clients and have the expertise to deal with the unique issues that arise. 

Find out more about international estate planning.

Person relaxing by the sea with no legal problems

Irwin Mitchell are a very professional, trustworthy and straightforward company to deal with. I would recommend them to anyone."

Frank Clayton, client

Elderly Care Crisis: A Tipping Point

How you can prepare

Our new research predicts that the UK retirement living sector will run out of beds and face a multi-billion pound funding gap in the next 10 years.

This upcoming crisis means that planning ahead is more important then ever - find out more about how our Later Life Planning experts can help you prepare

Frequently Asked Questions

What is estate planning?

Estate planning is essential to make sure your wealth is structured as efficiently as possible. 

We can help you: 

  • Avoid paying unnecessary amounts of tax on your collective assets, or leaving your loved ones with a large tax bill after your death 
  • Protect assets from divorce or financial difficulties 
  • Make sure you have enough money once you stop working 
  • Choose the right person to administer your estate 
  • Appoint trustees to manage a trust you’ve set up for your children or other dependants – we can also act as trustees. 

Our solicitors and tax specialists will work with you to make sure your estate is structured in the best way to provide for your loved ones and give you peace of mind for the future. 

Do I need to appoint Irwin Mitchell as my executor?

No, you can appoint whoever you want as your executor. This should be someone you trust, who you know can cope with the responsibilities of administering your estate.  

Many people do prefer to appoint a professional executor, of course. You’ll have peace of mind knowing your estate will be dealt with by someone with the right expertise to administer it efficiently and deal with any issues that arise. 

Irwin Mitchell often acts as executor for clients, and there are several benefits as part of our Wills Assured service when you do this. 

However, it’s not essential. You can make use of our estate planning services without appointing us as your executor. 

Find out more about the duties of an executor. 

What is the Residence Nil Rate Band?

In 2017 a new inheritance tax relief was introduced, called the Residence Nil Rate Band (RNRB). It means that some estates over the inheritance tax threshold of £325,000 may qualify for an additional tax exemption.

It is essential to plan effectively to make sure you can take advantage of RNRB. The law is complicated in this area: if you don’t seek expert advice, your estate could end up not qualifying or getting less tax relief than it should.

Our tax specialists have the in-depth knowledge you need to make sure your estate benefits from RNRB if it’s eligible. We’ll help you make sure your assets are structured properly and your Will is up to date to reflect current legislation.

Read more about inheritance tax planning.

What issues could I face as a high-net-worth individual?

While being a high-net-worth individual can bring greater financial security, it also means there is often more to think about to plan effectively.

Some issues that our high-net-worth clients often face include: 

  • Assets held in many different structures (i.e. trusts, businesses, rental property, investment companies) 
  • Asset protection – from creditors or life events such as divorce 
  • Protection of privacy – especially important for clients with a high profile in the media 
  • Succession planning for businesses and family governance. 

Our solicitors and tax experts can provide the bespoke advice you need to protect your wealth for the future. We frequently work with high net worth and ultra-high net worth clients and pride ourselves not only on our expertise but also our discretion.

Estate Planning Solicitors - Related Information

Will Writing – we can help ensure that your wishes for your estate are carried out
Inheritance Tax Planning Package – Fixed-fee legal guidance to help make sure you loved ones get the most out of their inheritance
Trusts – learn more about this important aspect of estate planning
Tax – how our solicitors can help take advantage of tax allowances to protect your estate

About Irwin Mitchell

Founded in Sheffield in 1912, Irwin Mitchell has always been a bit different. Our advisers really get to know the people and business that we help.

We have offices around the UK so wherever you are, our experts can help.

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