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Beginning with the trustee fiduciary duties to the beneficiaries of a trust, attorney Abbey Magnuson of Foley & Lardner’s Estate & Trusts Practice Group discusses ways to mitigate trustee liability in this 10-minute interview with Brian Lucareli. Abbey also emphasizes the role Family Offices play in the administration of trusts and how they...

Choosing a trustee is a major decision—one that may impact you and your family in many ways for generations to come. Essentially, when you establish a trust for the benefit of others, you are handing down your values through the terms of the trust and your contributed financial assets. And with an increasing number of trusts lasting for multiple ge...

It may seem that there will always be time to address estate planning. However, a unique opportunity to maximize the amount of wealth that can be tax-efficiently passed to heirs will expire at the end of 2025. Furthermore, legislation could curb lifetime exemption limits even sooner. The opportunity is even more pressing because the current market ...

No matter your role – whether you’re a family business leader, family office executive, family member – how are you preparing your family for significant wealth transfer or liquidation events? Said differently, how can you make inheriting wealth less like being hit by a comet?

Your fellow FOX members have contributed these death and estate settlement tools and samples. Please note that these samples have been provided for illustrative purposes only, and may not represent the latest versions. If you have developed sample planning tools, templates, or practices that you think will be of interest to other families, pleas...

Your fellow FOX members have contributed these trust administration tools and samples. Please note that these samples have been provided for illustrative purposes only, and may not represent the latest versions.

There are many resources and games available for teaching children about different aspects of managing money, investing, and philanthropy. Starting financial literacy education with children and teens will be more successful when you make the activity fun, connected to their life stage and related to current interests. This includes gamifying learn...

History will remember 2020 as the year society’s pervasive challenges roared. Two philanthropy experts discuss what they saw in 2020, and what they hope will last for years to come. FOX Foresight keeps you up to date on our latest thinking about matters affecting Enterprise Families. It gives you our forward look on what we're learning from our ...

Estate planning is often part of a divorce settlement, and negotiation of these terms can be as integral to the divorce settlement as allocation of parental responsibilities, support issues, or division of marital estate. For example, even a relatively simple Marital Settlement Agreement may generally contain waivers of an ex-spouse’s right to make...

Migrating trusts from state to state can be challenging. Use this decision tree as a resource when transferring trust situs from one state to another or when modifying a trust agreement following migration to a new state.

The ownership and governance structure of a private family trust company (“PFTC”) is highly customizable. This is important because all families are different, with different goals, family dynamics, asset composition, family sizes, and family affiliates. With that in mind, there are some key considerations in structuring the entity owne...

Whether the sale of your artwork is a remote contingency or it is an immediate need, planning for it will help you and your fiduciaries anticipate the possible risks and opportunities that lie ahead. This guide leads you through the steps and takes you to the opportunities that exist when artwork, and the associated intellectual property ...

For one reason or another, many families are reevaluating and modifying their fiduciary structures. To assist in these discussions, a reference summary of state laws is provided for consideration when establishing wealth transfer plans and structures, including taxation, trust laws, asset protection, and regulated and unregulated private trust comp...

Disagreements and discord can arise when it comes to your family vacation home, a unique asset that symbolizes important memories and family connections. For this reason, you should specifically address the vacation home in your estate plan to avoid hard feelings and even disputes. With thoughtful and proactive planning, a family can avoid many of ...

Continuing a trend of the past five years, exchange-traded funds (ETFs) grew in assets under management in 2020. However, the fact remains that the ETF continues to be a one-size-fits-all solution that isn’t optimal for everyone. The flexibility of a custom passive separately managed account (SMA) can beat an ETF in terms of tax efficiency in...