The services offered by our firm are divided into two main categories: Trusts & Estates, and Tax Law.

Mr. Wood handles estate planning and estate administration to assist our clients in distributing their assets, while minimizing the payment of estate taxes.

Our services in this area include:

• Counseling clients to assure the orderly and efficient transfer of property to intended beneficiaries at death with a minimum of estate, gift, generation-skipping and income tax costs.
• Providing full legal services to personal representatives of decedents' estates including handling all proceedings in the probate court.
• Advising the personal representative and trustee, if any, on federal and state tax matters so that the estate may be handled at the lowest possible total cost.
• Establishing both voluntary and involuntary guardianships for incapacitated persons.
• Offering legal advice to beneficiaries of estates and trusts.
• Estate planning for non-domiciliaries of the United States.

In preparing an estate plan, our attorneys tailor the plan for the individual by considering all the sophisticated estate planning devices available, including:

• Wills
• Revocable and irrevocable trusts
• Life insurance trusts
• "Crummey" trusts
• 2503(c) trusts for minors
• Unified credit shelter trusts
• Gifts
• Qualified terminable interest (QTIP) trusts
• Estate freezes
• Prenuptial agreements
• Charitable remainder trusts
• Charitable lead or income trusts
• Personal residence trusts
• Qualified personal residence trusts
• Grantor retained annuity trusts
• Grantor retained unitrusts
• Qualified domestic trusts

Our firm also has an active trusts and estates litigation practice with extensive experience in will contests, trust contests and contested guardianship matters. Mr. Wood appears regularly before the probate bench and have been involved with many of the larger and more complex trusts and estates litigation matters in Florida and South Carolina.

Detailed familiarity with transfer tax laws is often critical in effectively resolving will and trust contests. Mr. Wood and associated attorneys have advanced degrees in the tax and estate planning and experience in transfer tax issues.

Tax Law

Mr. Wood works closely with associated  real estate, corporate, international and probate lawyers so that the tax aspects of our clients' transactions may be considered.

Mr. Wood and correspondents are familiar with virtually every facet of state and federal taxation, including:

• Planning for individuals, partnerships and corporations.
• Deferred compensation plans, including pension and profit sharing plans.
• Real estate ventures, including syndications and limited partnerships.
• Business planning for charitable and exempt organizations.
• International estate planning.
• Foreign investments in the United States.
• Foreign businesses structuring their United States operations.
• Representing individuals, partnerships and corporations in disputes with the United States Internal Revenue Service, the Florida Department of Revenue and the South Carolina Department of Revenue.