Estate Planning Lawyer in Salt Lake City

Coordinate Your Estate Plan across Tax, Business, and Property Matters

A complete estate plan addresses more than who receives your property. It can identify who manages your financial affairs during incapacity, who makes healthcare decisions for you, and who should care for your minor children. It can also coordinate wills, trusts, beneficiary designations, real estate, and business interests so those instructions work together.

At Pearson Butler, our Salt Lake City estate planning attorneys help individuals, families, property owners, and business owners create and update plans based on their circumstances. We serve clients throughout Utah and offer confidential consultations, flexible scheduling, and same-day consultation availability.

Call (800) 265-2314 or reach out to us online to discuss your needs with our Salt Lake City estate planning lawyers.

A Firm With Over 300 Years of Combined Experience

An estate plan may intersect with tax law, business ownership, probate, or real estate. Our firm provides legal services across more than a dozen practice areas, including estate planning, probate, tax law, business law, and real estate law. This multidisciplinary structure allows our attorneys to collaborate when a plan involves concerns that extend beyond drafting a will or trust.

We have more than 30 attorneys with over 300 years of combined legal experience. For a business owner, coordination may involve succession goals and the transfer of an ownership interest. For a property owner or family with tax concerns, it may require reviewing how assets are titled, transferred, or administered under the plan.

What Is an Estate Plan?

An estate plan is a set of legal documents and strategies designed to manage your assets and affairs during your lifetime and distribute them after your death. Beyond financial considerations, an estate plan can also address healthcare decisions, guardianship for minor children, and powers of attorney.

Without a comprehensive estate plan, state laws will determine how your assets are distributed, which may not reflect your wishes. Under Utah law, property that isn’t effectively disposed of by a will generally passes to the decedent’s heirs according to intestate succession. A carefully prepared plan can instead document your instructions and reduce uncertainty about who should act on your behalf.

What Is Included in an Estate Plan?

Common components include:

• Wills: A will specifies how covered assets should be distributed after your death. It can also nominate a personal representative to administer your estate and state your guardianship preferences for minor children.
• Trusts: A trust can hold and manage assets during your lifetime and after your death according to its terms. Available structures include revocable living trusts, irrevocable trusts, and special needs trusts, but the appropriate option depends on your property and planning goals.
• Financial Power of Attorney: A financial power of attorney authorizes a person you select to handle specified financial or legal matters. The document can establish the scope of that authority and when it applies.
• Advance Health Care Directive: An advance health care directive can name a healthcare decision-maker and record your healthcare wishes if you can’t communicate or make those decisions yourself.
• Beneficiary Designations: Retirement accounts and life insurance policies may pass according to their beneficiary designations rather than the instructions in a will. Reviewing those designations helps identify inconsistencies with the broader estate plan.
• Business Succession Planning: For business owners, planning may address the transfer of ownership, management responsibilities, tax considerations, and continuity goals.

Depending on your circumstances, planning may also involve incapacity planning, estate and gift tax planning, Medicaid planning, veteran planning, charitable planning, pet planning, or provisions for a beneficiary with disabilities. Our services also include trust administration and probate when a trustee or personal representative needs guidance after a death.

Benefits of Estate Planning in Salt Lake City

Working with our Salt Lake City estate planning attorneys can help you document important decisions before incapacity or death makes those decisions more difficult. The details depend on your assets, family relationships, and the types of documents used.

An estate plan may help you address:

• Decision-Making Authority: Name the people authorized to manage financial matters or make healthcare decisions if you become incapacitated.
• Asset Distribution: Explain who should receive covered property and how assets should be handled for children or other beneficiaries.
• Probate Planning: Organize assets and documents with the probate process in mind. Probate may include appointing a personal representative, addressing debts and taxes, and distributing the remaining property.
• Healthcare Preferences: Record treatment preferences and identify the person you trust to communicate with healthcare providers.
• Family Clarity: Provide instructions about guardianship, inheritance, and administration that can reduce uncertainty during a difficult period.

No document can guarantee that taxes, probate, creditor claims, or family disputes will be avoided. Our role is to explain the available planning tools and help you develop instructions that reflect your goals under applicable Utah law.

When Should You Create an Estate Plan?

Consider creating an estate plan when you acquire assets, have dependents, or reach adulthood with preferences about your medical care. Estate planning isn’t limited to people with substantial wealth. Young adults may benefit from basic financial and healthcare documents even if they don’t yet own significant property.

Consider creating or updating an estate plan if any of the following apply to you:

• You have a spouse, children, or other family members you want to provide for.
• You want to state a guardianship preference for your minor children.
• You want to plan for financial management or medical care during incapacity.
• You hold strong views regarding end-of-life care.
• You own a home, business interest, retirement account, or life insurance policy.
• You have received an inheritance or experienced another major financial change.
• You have concerns involving long-term care, Medicaid planning, or estate taxes.

Marriage, divorce, the birth or adoption of a child, retirement, serious illness, a move to Utah, or a change in family relationships can also create a reason to plan. Starting or selling a business may require additional attention to succession, ownership transfer, and the relationship between company documents and personal estate planning.

How to Review and Update Your Estate Plan

There’s no single review interval that fits every estate plan. A review is particularly important when changes to your family, assets, health, residence, or chosen decision-makers could affect existing documents.

Events that may warrant a review include:

• Marriage or Divorce: Revisit beneficiaries, fiduciary appointments, property instructions, and healthcare decision-makers.
• Birth or Adoption: Consider guardianship preferences and provisions for a child’s inheritance.
• Death or Incapacity: Replace a beneficiary, personal representative, trustee, agent, or healthcare decision-maker who can no longer fill the intended role.
• Significant Financial Changes: Review the plan after acquiring or selling real estate, receiving an inheritance, or experiencing a substantial change in investments.
• Moving Between States: Confirm that existing documents remain appropriate under the laws and procedures of your new state.
• Changes in Health: Reconsider healthcare instructions and who should make decisions if you can’t act for yourself.

Our estate planning lawyers can review existing documents, identify provisions that no longer match your goals, and prepare revisions that reflect your current instructions.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can Estate Planning Address a Family Business?

Yes. Business succession planning may address ownership transfer, management transition, continuity goals, and the treatment of a business interest after incapacity or death. Because company agreements and tax considerations can affect the available options, we can coordinate estate planning with our business and tax law capabilities when appropriate.

What Should I Gather Before a Consultation?

Bring any existing wills, trusts, powers of attorney, or healthcare directives you have. It’s also useful to prepare information about family relationships, real estate, financial accounts, insurance, business interests, beneficiary designations, and the people you may want to name as decision-makers.

How Can an Estate Plan Address Digital Assets?

An estate plan can identify digital accounts and state who should handle them, subject to applicable law and each provider’s account terms. Consider creating an organized inventory of important accounts and access instructions. Don’t place sensitive passwords directly in a will that may become part of a court record.

Discuss Your Estate Plan with Our Attorneys

If you’re ready to create, review, or update an estate plan, our attorneys can discuss your goals, family circumstances, assets, and existing documents. Because we also handle tax, business, probate, and real estate matters, we can coordinate related concerns when your plan crosses practice areas. We offer confidential consultations, flexible scheduling, and same-day consultation availability.

Contact our Salt Lake City estate planning lawyers today at (800) 265-2314.