Estate Planning & Business Succession

Our Team in Newcastle specialise in the areas of estate planning, asset protection and business succession planning.

Our Estate Planning and Business Succession Team was created in response to the recognition of the fact that estate planning is one of the biggest growth areas in the legal and accounting professions at the moment. The reasons are well known and documented – with growing community wealth, baby boomers reaching retirement, small businesses now worth a lot of money (compared to five to ten years ago), blended families (becoming more common) and same-sex couples (becoming more recognised), it all means there is added complexity to the estate planning process from every perspective.

The key thing to understand in relation to estate planning is that it is an inter-disciplinary area of practice. You cannot just pick out trust and estates law and say “that’s it – I know enough to help you”. Estate planning also includes taxation matters, state revenue and stamp duty issues, superannuation laws and administration, trust law, wills and estates law, elder law, asset protection and bankruptcy laws and family law. It must be understood that all of these areas have a place within estate planning.

During their years of practice Warwick Gilbertson and Lisa Roberts have regularly dealt with all forms of structures used by people to create, develop and preserve their assets and wealth. They have also spent too much time in the NSW Supreme Court watching families destroy themselves as they fought over the assets in a deceased estate all which could have been prevented by a proper estate plan.

Estate planning is more than just making a plan to distribute certain assets to certain people. Our passion for estate planning has seen the creation of many varied estate plans from those for the young family through to retirees who have sold their business or retired from their employment. We create the estate plan that ‘protects your assets now and for generations to come’. We also take into account evolving legal and economic strategies as well as the continually changing tax and superannuation laws to make the most of your estate plan and update it to reflect these changes. Estate planning is a continuous process.

If you are looking for a firm with experience in estate planning, with practitioners who understand testamentary trusts, and the interaction of structuring for asset protection, superannuation, family trusts and insurance with estate planning, business succession planning and all other aspects of effective inter-generation transfer of wealth, call Warwick Gilbertson or Lisa Roberts on 02 4904 8000 or send an email.