How to Separate Business and Marital Assets

August 29, 2022

High-profile cases like the Bezos or the Gates should cause many people to consider how to separate their business and marital assets that are tied together. You need to have plans in place from the beginning. No one thinks their partnership will end. However, it’s necessary to have a plan in place, just in case.

The Dallas Business Journal’s recent article entitled “Does your business need a prenup?” explains that there are three typical outcomes when married couples working as business partners decide to end their relationship:

One individual buys out the other partner’s shares and continues running the business;
The partners sell the business and divide the proceeds; or
The couple continues working as partners after the divorce.

Safeguards can be put in place on the first day of the relationship to protect your personal and business assets in the event of a divorce. A way to do this is through a prenuptial agreement, which states what will happen if a split happens. A pre-nup should:

Establish the value of the business as of the date of marriage or the date the agreement is signed;
Detail a course of action with the appreciation or depreciation of the business from the date of the marriage;
Say how business value will be measured; and
Specify the allocation of business interests to be awarded to each spouse in the event of a divorce.

In addition to a prenuptial agreement, any privately held company should have a shareholder agreement (or “operating agreement” for non-corporations). The shareholder agreement is one of the most important documents owners of a closely held business will ever sign.

It controls the transfer of ownership when certain events occur, like divorce and states the following:

Which party will buy out the other’s shares of the company if a buyout occurs; or
If either party has the right to sell, how the ownership interest will be valued and the terms and conditions concerning the acquisition.

Because there are some tax implications involved in a buyout, it’s best to bring in experienced estate planning attorney for this process. In addition, life events like divorce or changes in a business partnership are an appropriate time to update your will, estate plans and any necessary insurance policies. Remember, it is important to consider how to separate business and marital assets before there is conflict. If you would like to learn more about pre-nups and other business and marital agreements, please visit our previous posts.

Reference: Dallas Business Journal (Aug. 1, 2022) “Does your business need a prenup?”

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Business Interests are better Protected by Trusts

July 26, 2022

Once your business grows, so does the pressure to make good financial decisions in the short and long term. When you think about the future, estate and succession planning emerge as two major concerns. You’re not just considering balance sheets, profits and losses, but your family and what will happen to them and your business when you’re not around. This thinking leads to what seems like a great idea: transferring stock or LLC membership units to one or more of your adult children. There are benefits, especially the ability to avoid a 40% estate tax and other benefits. However, there are also lots of ways this can go sideways, fast. Your business interests are better protected by trusts established to benefit your family.

Executing due diligence and creating an exit plan to minimize taxes and successfully transfer the business takes planning and, even harder, removing emotions from the plan to make a good decision.

An outright transfer of stock or ownership units can expose you and your business to risk. Even if your children are Ivy-league MBA grads, with track records of great decision making and caring for you and your spouse, this transaction offers zero protection and all risk for you. What could go wrong?

An in-law (one you may not have even met yet) could try to place a claim on the business and move it away from the family.
Creditors could seize assets from the children, entirely likely if their future holds legal or financial problems—or if they have such problems now and haven’t shared them with you.
Assets could go into your children’s estates, which reintroduces exposure to estate taxes.

No family is immune from any of these situations, and if you ask your estate planning attorney, you’ll hear as many horror stories as you can tolerate.

Trusts are a solution. Thoughtfully crafted for your unique situation, a trust can help avoid exposure to some estate and other taxes, allocating effective ownership to your children, in a protected manner. Your ultimate goal: keeping ownership in the family and minimizing tax exposure.

A Beneficiary Defective Inheritance Trust (BDIT) may be appropriate for you. If you’ve already executed an outright transfer of the stock, it’s not too late to fix things. The BDIT is a grantor trust serving to enable protection of stock and eliminate any “residue” in your childrens’ estates.

If you haven’t yet transferred stock to children, don’t do it. The risk is very high. If you’ve already completed the transfer, speak with an experienced estate planning attorney about how to reverse the transfer and create a plan to protect the business and your family.

Bottom line: business interests are better protected when they are held not by individuals, but by trusts for the benefit of individuals. Your estate planning attorney can draft trusts to achieve goals, minimize estate taxes and, in some situations, even minimize state income taxes. If you would like to learn more about business succession planning, please visit our previous posts.

Reference: The Street (June 27, 2022) “Should I Transfer Company Stock to My Kids?”

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Advantages to Establishing a Business Trust

July 18, 2022

Business owner’s heads are frequently filled with a steady stream of questions concerning day-to-day activities. Long-range planning questions about how to expand the business, set business priorities, identify vulnerabilities, etc., are lost in the flood of events requiring immediate action. However, business owners need to keep both details and the big picture in mind, according to a recent article “5 Ways Business Owners Can Use Trusts to Benefit Their Company” from Entrepreneur. There are advantages to establishing a business trust.

Three key questions for any business owner are: how can I minimize taxes, protect assets and what kind of legacy do I want to leave with my business? All three questions can be answered with two words: estate planning. Within estate planning, trusts are a well-known tool to tackle and solve these three issues.

A trust is a legal entity created when one party (grantor) gives another party (trustee) the right to hold title to property or assets for the benefit of a third party (beneficiaries). Trusts are used to provide protection for assets for individuals and businesses. For business owners, trusts protect beneficiaries and thwart potential creditors (including previous spouses) from gaining direct access to assets held within the trust.

All future growth of assets transferred to an irrevocable trust occurs outside of the estate. It will apply to your lifetime exemption, but all future growth occurs estate tax free. Let’s say a business owner transfers a business worth $3 million into an irrevocable trust and years later, the company is sold for $17 million. The increased value is not subject to estate taxes, saving family members a significant amount of money.

It should be noted these types of trusts needs to be created with an experienced estate planning attorney to achieve the desired goals.

Assets in a trust maintain privacy. For companies and individuals who live in the public eye, placing assets in trust means only the grantor and trustee need to know about the assets. A person who lives in a small city and owns a few restaurants may not want their personal financial matters to become known when they die. Wills become public documents when the estate is probated; trusts remain private.

Litigation arising from sales of small businesses are among the most common legal actions filed against business owners. By removing assets from ownership, the business owner receives another layer of protection. You can’t be sued for assets you don’t own.

Trusts are used in succession planning and should be created to align with business legacy objectives, whether the plan is to sell the company to outsiders, key employees or keep it in the family. Succession plans must be properly documented. This is done with the estate planning attorney, CPA and financial advisor working in tandem. A succession plan should also address the goals for the business owner’s life after the business is sold or transferred. Do they want to remain on the board of directors, do they require income from the business to maintain their costs of living?

Minimizing taxes. Preparing for a liquidity event is an excellent reason to consider creating a trust. Depending upon its structure and the laws of the estate, a business owned by a trust may minimize or avoid state income taxes on a substantial portion of the estate income tax.

A succession plan, like an estate plan, needs to be created long before it is needed. Ideally, a succession plan is created not long after a business is established and revised as time goes on. When the company attains certain milestones, the plan should be updated. These are a few of the advantages to establishing a business trust. If you would like to learn more about how trusts can help your business, please visit our previous posts.

Reference: Entrepreneur (June 17, 2022) “5 Ways Business Owners Can Use Trusts to Benefit Their Company”

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Succession Planning can Protect Family Legacy

April 25, 2022

Failing to have a succession plan is often the reason family businesses do not survive across the generations. Succession planning can protect the family legacy, according to the article “Planning for Success: How to Create a Suggestion Plan” from Westchester & Fairfield County Business Journals.

Start by establishing a vision for the future of the business and the family. What are the goals for the founder’s retirement? Will the business need to be sold to fund their retirement? One of the big questions concerns cash flow—do the founders need the business to operate to provide ongoing financial support?

Next, lay the groundwork regarding next generation management and the personal and professional goals of the various family members.

Several options for a successful exit plan include:

Family succession—Transferring the business to family members
Internal succession—Selling or transferring the business to one or more key employees or co-workers or selling the company to employees using an Employee Stock Ownership Plan (ESOP)
External succession—Selling the business to an outside third party, engaging in an Initial Public Offering (IPO), a strategic merger or investment by an outside party.

Once a succession exit path is selected, the family needs to identify successors and identify active and non-active roles and responsibilities for family members. Decisions need to be made about how to manage the company going forward.

Tax planning should be a part of the succession plan, which needs to be aligned with the founding member’s estate plan. How the business is structured and how it is to be transferred could either save the family from an onerous tax burden or generate a tax liability so large, as to shut the company down.

Many owners are busy with the day-to-day operations of the business and neglect to do any succession planning. Alternatively, a hastily created plan skipping goal setting or ignoring professional advice occurs. The results are bad either way: losing control over a business, having to sell the business for less than its true value or being subject to excessive taxes.

Every privately held, family-owned business should have a plan in place to establish what will happen if the owners die or become incapacitated.

An estate planning attorney who has experience working with business owners will be able to guide the creation of a succession plan and ensure that it works to complement the owner’s estate plan. With the right guidance, the business owner can work with their team of professional advisors to ensure that succession planning can protect the family legacy over generations. If you would like to learn more about succession planning, please visit our previous posts.

Reference: Westchester & Fairfield County Business Journals (March 31, 2022) “Planning for Success: How to Create a Suggestion Plan”

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Ways to Avoid a Succession Fight

January 13, 2022

Far too often businesses fail because there was not a plan in place to succeed the owner or CEO. There are ways to avoid a succession fight. A comprehensive succession plan is a set of legal guidelines to ensure an orderly transfer of financial control and executive responsibilities to a new generation of leaders. Index Fund Advisors’ recent article entitled “How to Avoid a Messy Succession Battle” suggests that you take a multi-prong approach to succession planning.

A business owner must identify the individual who has the skills to run a business. A succession plan can sometimes divide the leadership roles, with one person running the business and another in a senior role overseeing long-term development and planning.

Business owners also must consider their personal estate plans when devising a succession plan. Business owners need to be proactive about estate planning and succession planning. Ask an experienced estate planning attorney about both processes as ongoing strategies. That means you don’t create an estate plan or a succession plan and file it away until you want to retire. Circumstances can change, so you’ll probably periodically need to review it and make sure everything is up-to-date.

When multiple owners are involved, a succession plan should create rules and procedures for other owners who might want to hire friends and relatives for key positions. The company’s founders must consider what happens if an owner gets a divorce, suffers a disability, or declares personal bankruptcy. These types of situations can change the rules within a buy-sell agreement—the master document that details the rules between who gets what and how a company is organized in the future.

A succession plan can also state the rules for issues involving transferring of equity and/or shares of a company to family members. In addition to putting into writing exactly who can be a transferee and the amount of equity they’re allowed, business owners should use the succession planning process to address issues related to voting rights. A succession plan should also specify the financial terms at the time of an owner’s death or sudden exit.

While avoiding such a decision-making process might appeal to younger executives, delaying these decisions and processes creates more uncertainty in a company’s ongoing success.

Whatever the size of a business, any business owner needs to create a succession plan sooner rather than later. If you don’t, you may not be able to avoid a succession fight for the next generation of owners and employees. If you would like to learn more about business succession planning, please visit our previous posts.

Reference: Index Fund Advisors (Nov. 22, 2021) “How to Avoid a Messy Succession Battle”

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Small Business Owners need Estate Planning

October 28, 2021

Small business owners need estate planning. Not having an estate plan can place business owners and entrepreneurs in jeopardy because they may face difficulties in keeping the business running, if they have to withdraw from the business at any point in time.

Legal Reader’s recent article entitled “What Small Business Owners Should Know about Doing Estate Planning” explains that estate planning is necessary to ensure business continuity. Think about who can take control when you’re no longer around to have the business continue according to your wishes contained in your estate plan. An experienced attorney can help create a comprehensive estate plan, so things do not become chaotic for their family in the event of premature death or any permanent disability. Consider these steps when it comes to good estate planning for business owners.

Create an estate plan if you haven’t got one. A will is designed to detail your wishes about how you want the business to run and the manner of sharing your property at your death. A power of attorney allows an entrusted individual to undertake your business transactions and manage your finances, if you are incapacitated by injury or illness. A healthcare directive permits a trusted agent to make medical decisions on your behalf when you can’t do so yourself.

Plan for taxes. Tax planning is a major component of estate planning. Our tax laws keep changing frequently, so you have to stay in constant touch with your attorney to develop strategies for decreasing your tax liability, as well as creating a strategy for minimizing inheritance/estate taxes.

Buy life and disability insurance. Small business owners should think about purchasing life insurance, so their families can have a source of income after their death.

Create a succession plan. In addition to estate planning, a business owner should have a succession plan that specifies exactly how your company, and your family will prepare for a transition of ownership. The purpose of a well thought out succession plan is to keep the business operating or to take steps to sell it. This plan also includes the organizational structure of the business in case of maintaining business continuity.

Small business owners need to consider their employees as well as their family when drafting their estate planning. You should keep everyone impacted by your decisions apprised of your estate plan and your business succession plan. If you would like to learn more about estate planning for business owners, please visit our previous posts.

Reference: Legal Reader (Aug. 26, 2021) “What Small Business Owners Should Know about Doing Estate Planning”

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Businesses should have a Buy-Sell Agreement

October 4, 2021

Businesses should have a buy-sell agreement to protect the owners, their families, employees and the company. Without a buy-sell agreement or succession plan, any company is at risk, notes a recent article titled “Why does your business need a buy-sell agreement?” from the Philadelphia Business Journal.

Many business owners are reluctant to recognize the possibility of their becoming disabled or dying, so they put off creating a buy sell agreement. However, as we all know, unexpected events happen and it’s always better to be prepared.

A buy-sell agreement offers protection first by establishing what type of triggering events could happen and defining the terms and conditions for how shareholders will enter and exit their ownership of the business.

Companies often have a buy-sell agreement stuck in a file drawer from ten or twenty years ago. Chances are that big changes have taken place in the business and the old agreement is no longer relevant. The day-to-day operations of a business are pressing, and there’s never enough time to get around to it. However, when the unexpected occurs, shareholders are left to negotiate among themselves during the worst possible time.

A well-drafted buy-sell agreement for a business should address the most common events: death, disability, divorce, personal bankruptcy, voluntary termination, retirement and involuntary separation. The agreement should clearly state the percentage and type of ownership, how shares are valued and how any insurance proceeds are to be handled. Without knowledge of the value and terms of payment, there’s no way to provide protection for a triggering event.

Once the value of the company and its shareholders is defined, it may become clear that a business needs to close a valuation gap.

The intentions for the future of the business can also be clarified through this process. Some provisions to consider are:

How to notify other shareholders, in the event of a voluntary termination.
Trailer provisions to protect exiting shareholders, in the event of a subsequent liquidity event.
Discounts on value or extended payment terms for non-compliance of notification provisions.
Insurance portability provisions to allow existing shareholders to reassign beneficiary designations (once payments owed to the exiting shareholder have been made).

Businesses should have a buy-sell agreement. They are dynamic entities with frequent changes, so buy-sell agreements should be reviewed and updated in the same way that an estate plan needs to be updated—every three or four years. If you would like to read more about buy-sell agreements, and other succession planning topics, please visit our previous posts.

Reference: Philadelphia Business Journal (Sep. 1, 2021) “Why does your business need a buy-sell agreement?”

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Succession Planning for Family Farm

July 27, 2021

If you think it’s bad that 60% of farmers don’t have a will, here’s what’s even worse: 89% don’t have a farm transfer plan, as reported in the recent article “10 Farm Transition and Estate Planning Mistakes” from Farm Journal’s Pork Business. Succession planning for the family farm is just as vital as any other business. Here are the ten most commonly made mistakes farmers make. Substitute the word “family-owned business” for farm and the problems created are identical.

Procrastination. Just as production methods have to be updated, so does estate planning. People wait until the perfect time to create the perfect plan, but life doesn’t work that way. Having a plan of some kind is better than none at all. If you die with no plan, your family gets to clean up the mess.

Failing to plan for substitute decision-making and health care directives. Everyone should have power of attorney and health care directive planning. A business or farm that requires your day-in-day-out supervision and decision making could die with you. Name a power of attorney, name an alternate POA and have every detail of operations spelled out. You can have a different person to act as your agent for running the farm and another to make health care decisions, or the same person can take on these responsibilities. Consult with an estate planning attorney to be sure your documents reflect your wishes and speak with family members.

Failing to communicate, early and often. There’s no room for secrecy, if you want your farm or family business to transfer successfully to the next generation. Schedule family meetings on a regular basis, establish agendas, take minutes and consider having an outsider serve as a meeting facilitator.

Treating everyone equally does not fit every situation. If some family members work and live on the farm and others work and live elsewhere, their roles in the future of the farm will be different. An estate planning attorney familiar with farm families will be able to give you suggestions on how to address this.

Not inventorying assets and liabilities. Real property includes land, buildings, fencing, livestock, equipment and bank accounts. Succession planning requires a complete inventory and valuation of all assets. Check on how property is titled to be sure land you intend to leave to children is not owned by someone else. Don’t neglect liabilities. When you pass down the farm, will your children also inherit debt? Everyone needs to know what is owned and what is owed.

Making decisions based on incorrect information. If you aren’t familiar with your state’s estate tax laws, you might be handing down a different sized estate than you think. Here’s an example: in Iowa, there is no inheritance tax due on shares left to a surviving spouse, lineal descendants or charitable, religious, or educational institutions. If you live in Iowa, do you have an estate plan that takes this into consideration? Do you know what taxes will be owed, and how they will be paid?

Lack of liquidity. Death is expensive. Cash may be needed to keep the family farm going between the date of death and the settling of the estate. It is also important to consider who will pay for the funeral, and how? Life insurance is one option.

Disorganization. Making your loved ones go through a post-mortem scavenger hunt is unkind. Business records should be well-organized. Tell the appropriate people where important records can be found. Walk them through everything, including online accounts. Consider using an old-fashioned three-ring binder system. In times of great stress, organization is appreciated.

No team of professionals to provide experience and expertise. The saying “it takes a village” applies to estate planning and farm succession. An accountant, estate planning attorney and financial advisor will more than pay for their services. Without them, your family may be left guessing about the future of the farm and the family.

Thinking your plan is done at any point in time. Like estate planning, succession planning for the family farm is never really finished. Laws change, relationships change and family farms go through changes. An estate plan is not a one-and-done event. It needs to be reviewed and refreshed every few years.

If you are interested in reading more about succession planning, please visit our previous posts.

Reference: Farm Journal’s Pork Business (June 28, 2021) “10 Farm Transition and Estate Planning Mistakes”

Time to Consider Business Succession Planning

March 30, 2021

The importance of the family business in the U.S. can’t be overstated. Neither can the problems that occur as a direct result of a failure to plan for succession. Owners of a family business need to take the time to consider business succession planning. Business succession planning is the development of a plan for determining when an owner will retire, what position in the company they will hold when they retire, who the eventual owners of the company will be and under what rules the new owners will operate, instructs a recent article, “Succession planning for family businesses” from The Times Reporter. An estate planning attorney plays a pivotal role in creating the plan, as the sale of the business will be a major factor in the family’s wealth and legacy.

Start by determining who will buy the business. Will it be a long-standing employee, partners, or family members?
Next, develop an advisory team of internal employees, your estate planning attorney, CPA, financial advisor and insurance agent.
Have a financial evaluation of the business prepared by a qualified and accredited valuation professional.
Consider taxes (income, estate and gift taxes) and income requirements to sustain the owner’s current lifestyle, if the business is being sold outright.
Review estate planning strategies to reduce income and estate tax liabilities.
Examine the financial impact of the sale on the family member, if a non-family member buys the business.
Develop the structure of the sale.
Create a timeline for your business succession plan.
Get started on all of the legal and financial documents.
Meet with the family and/or the new owner on a regular basis to ensure a smooth transition.

Selling a business to the next generation or a new owner is an emotional decision, which is at the heart of most business owner’s utter failure to create a business succession plan. The sale forces them to confront the end of their role in the business, which they likely consider their life’s work. It also requires making decisions that involve family members that may be painful to confront.

The alternative is far worse for all concerned. If there is no plan, chances are the business will not survive. Without leadership and a clear path to the future, the owner may witness the destruction of their life’s work and a squandered legacy.

Take the time to consider business succession planning. Speak with your estate planning attorney and your accountant, who will have had experience helping business owners create and execute a succession plan. Talking about such a plan with family members can often create an emotional response. Working with professionals who benefit from a lack of emotional connection to the business will help the process be less about feelings and more about business. If you would like to learn more about estate planning for business owners, please visit our previous posts.

Reference: The Times Reporter (March 7, 2021) “Succession planning for family businesses”

Family Farm Requires Complex Planning

March 9, 2021

The family is at the center of most farms and agricultural businesses. Each family has its own history, values and goals. The family farm requires complex planning. A good place to start the planning process is to take the time to reflect on the family and the farm history, says Ohio County Journal in the recent article “Whole Farm Planning.”

There are lessons to be learned from all generations, both from their successes and disappointments. The underlying values and goals for the entire family and each individual member need to be articulated. They usually remain unspoken and are evident only in how family members treat each other and make business decisions. Articulating and discussing values and goals makes the planning process far more efficient and effective.

An analysis of the current state of the farm needs to be done to determine the financial, physical and personnel status of the business. Is the family farm being managed efficiently? Are there resources not being used? Is the farm profitable and are the employees contributing or creating losses? It is also wise to consider external influences, including environmental, technological, political, and governmental matters.

Five plans are needed. Once the family understands the business from the inside, it’s time to create five plans for the family: business, retirement, estate, transition and investment plans. Note that none of these five stands alone. They must work in harmony to maintain the long-term life of the farm, and one bad plan will impact the others.

Most planning in farms concerns production processes, but more is needed. A comprehensive business plan helps create an action plan for production and operation practices, as well as the financial, marketing, personnel, and risk-management. One method is to conduct a SWOT analysis: Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats in each of the areas mentioned in the preceding sentence. Create a realistic picture of the entire farm, where it is going and how to get there.

Retirement planning is a missing ingredient for many farm families. There needs to be a strategy in place for the owners, usually the parents, so they can retire at a reasonable point. This includes determining how much money each family member needs for retirement, and the farm’s obligation to retirees. Retirement age, housing and retirement accounts, if any, need to be considered. The goal is to have the farm run profitably by the next generation, so the parent’s retirement will not adversely impact the farm.

Transition planning looks at how the business can continue for many generations. This planning requires the family to look at its current situation, consider the future and create a plan to transfer the farm to the next generation. This includes not only transferring assets, but also transferring control. Those who are retiring in the future must hand over not just the farm, but their knowledge and experience to the next generation.

Estate planning is determining and putting down on paper how the farm assets, from land and buildings to livestock, equipment and debts owed to or by the farm, will be distributed. The complexity of an agricultural business requires the help of a skilled estate planning attorney who has experience working with farm families. The estate plan must work with the transition plan. Family members who are not involved with the farm also need to be addressed: how will they be treated fairly without putting the farm operation in jeopardy?

Investment planning for farm families usually takes the shape of land, machinery and livestock. Some off-farm investments may be wise, if the families wish to save for future education or retirement needs and achieve investment diversification. These instruments may include stocks, bonds, life insurance or retirement accounts. Farmers need to consider their personal risk tolerance, tax considerations and time horizons for their investments.

The family farm requires complex planning, but coordinating your retirement, estate, business and transition goals will give you peace of mind.

If you would like to read more about planning for farm families, please visit our previous posts.

Reference: Ohio County Journal (Feb. 11, 2021) “Whole Farm Planning”

Category: Business Succession Planning

How to Separate Business and Marital Assets

Business Interests are better Protected by Trusts

Advantages to Establishing a Business Trust

Succession Planning can Protect Family Legacy

Ways to Avoid a Succession Fight

Small Business Owners need Estate Planning

Businesses should have a Buy-Sell Agreement

Succession Planning for Family Farm

Time to Consider Business Succession Planning

Family Farm Requires Complex Planning

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