FEATURES & NEWS

A client—a third-generation owner of a family business in New York—once asked me, “Russel, can we make this dynasty trust revocable? I want to keep

Three siblings inherit their parents’ brownstone in Brooklyn. One still lives in the city and wants to move into the house. Another, living in California,

I recently met with the children of a former client, a successful architect from Brooklyn. Years ago, we had drafted a revocable living trust for

An executor for a Brooklyn estate calls me. She’s preparing the inventory of assets for Surrogate’s Court, but the deed to the family brownstone is

A few years ago, the children of a successful Manhattan real estate investor came to my office. Their father had passed away suddenly, and they

An unmarried couple buys a condo together in Manhattan. Both their names are on the deed. For the next decade, one partner pays the mortgage

I have seen it happen more than once. A family from Nassau County builds a successful business over decades, creating generational wealth. They assume simple

A family from Manhattan recently came to my office. Their father, a retired architect with a significant art collection and a West Village co-op, had

A construction worker falls from scaffolding in Queens. After a long fight, the case settles for a seven-figure sum. The family is relieved; their financial

A client’s father passed away in his Brooklyn apartment last fall. The family was grieving, but they also had immediate financial obligations—the co-op maintenance fees,

A client recently came to our Manhattan office after his mother passed away. She was a lifelong resident of Queens, lived simply, and left behind

Last month, the executor of a complex Manhattan estate called me. We had spent weeks working through the details of a trust administration, but his

A client sat in my Manhattan office last week, worried. He had read about a “7-year rule” for gifts and feared that helping his daughter

A client once came to my office with a simple goal. He and his wife had spent 30 years in their Brooklyn brownstone, and they

A new client recently sat in my Manhattan office, notebook open, ready to discuss his estate plan. “Russel,” he said, “I’ve been reading online, and

A son sits at his late mother’s kitchen table in Brooklyn, a stack of papers in front of him. In the stack is the deed

When a Manhattan executive is struck by a negligent driver on the Long Island Expressway, the immediate aftermath is rarely calm. Sirens, adrenaline, and sheer

I recently spoke with a woman whose uncle lived a solitary life in his Brooklyn brownstone. After years without contact, her repeated calls went unanswered,

A new client once brought me a will he’d downloaded from a website for $99. He was proud of the savings. The problem was that

When a family walks into a Manhattan bank branch with their father’s death certificate and a heavy, leather-bound trust document, they expect a smooth transition

A client once brought me his father’s will, a straightforward document leaving a valuable Brooklyn brownstone to him and his brother. On its face, it

A family from Manhattan sits in my office. Their mother recently passed, and her will names their brother—who has lived in Florida for twenty years—as

The phone rings at 3 a.m. A loved one is gone. In the blur of grief that follows, a practical and heavy responsibility often lands

A client recently came to our Manhattan office with a simple request. “I just need a will,” he said. He owned a small business, a