Asset Protection for Professionals
Asset Protection
Asset Protection Strategy services for professionals and others, including:
- Development of strategies to shelter the income and assets of professionals from potential creditors and professional malpractice liability, while retaining management and control for the client of his or her professional practice. There is no reason to leave your personal assets and wealth exposed to potential creditors and litigation risks.
- Why consider asset protection? Many clients know how to play offense, they know how to make money and their wealth increases over time. But many clients are not as good at defense, having not devoted enough time or energy to protecting the money they have accumulated or will continue to accumulate. Sensible strategies are available to build a bullet-proof wall between the potential creditors and the client's assets so that the creditor cannot get at the client’s income or the client’s assets, while at the same time the client retains management and control of both the income and the assets. A by-product of using the right strategies is that income taxes can be significantly reduced by maximizing available deductions and depending upon the client's family situation, spreading income to family members with lower tax rates.
- Professional Associations or Professional Corporations are useful to shield one professional from the professional malpractice of his or her colleagues, but are ineffective to protect the working professional from litigation creditors asserting malpractice claims arising out of his or her own professional practice. In addition, many professionals unwisely place significant assets, such as real estate or equipment, in the P.A. or P.C. where it is fully exposed to the claims of creditors.
- You don’t know what you don’t know, and that can bankrupt you. Creating wealth is a commonly taught subject in this country, but how to keep it out of the clutches of creditors and lawsuits is hardly ever taught. Most estate planners, most financial planners and sadly, most lawyers, do not know how to do it. Litigation is exploding in this country against wealthy professionals who have long been the target of choice of plaintiffs' attorneys. However, the law can be every bit as much a shield as a sword, when properly applied to a comprehensive asset protection strategy.
- Bullet proof strategies to protect your assets. A good asset protection strategy will prevent a judgment creditor from attaching any significant part of your assets, will shield as much as 99% of your family’s income from a judgment creditor, will prevent a judgment creditor from being able to interfere with your own management and control of your assets, and will maximize your own after-tax income by maximizing your entitlement to tax deductions. North Carolina’s laws are favorable for asset protection strategies, so you need not relocate to Florida to maximize your protection from civil creditors (unlike O.J. Simpson and Paul Bilzerian and other notorious persons who have taken flight to Florida for protection against creditors).
- You can put insurmountable obstacles between your assets and potential creditors. It is perfectly legal to erect reasonable barricades which protect your assets from potential creditors. When faced with properly constructed barriers, many plaintiffs' lawyers will give up trying to get money out of your assets and will pursue other litigation targets.
- Personal consultations with clients to discuss the client's assets, potential creditors and litigation exposure, to develop and asset protection strategies to meet the client's goals.
- Reasonable and competitive legal fees, commensurate with quality and personal service.