Trust Drafting for Challenging Family Dynamics
Families are unique social constructs with unique challenges. Accordingly, estate planning attorneys must anticipate and draft for these challenges if they do not want clients (and the estate plans) to be subject to probate or estate administration court battles. This program covers applicable laws, rules, and regulations for drafting trusts that address three of the most common, yet challenging, family dynamics: hostile family members, spendthrift beneficiaries, and family factions. We will also review hypotheticals to provide hands-on examples of provisions that can be helpful in keeping the peace or at least keeping clients from nasty court battles.
MAXIMILLIENNE “MAX” ELLIOTT, Managing Attorney and Founder of The Law Offices of Max Elliott, Ltd., is a licensed, Illinois estate and business planning and estate administration attorney. Her firm, with offices in Chicago and New York City, focuses on unique families and women small business owners. Firm services include estate planning for taxable and non-taxable estates, multinational families, estate administration, trust and estates litigation, and advising small businesses in various business cycle phases. Ms. Elliott routinely presents and lectures to lawyers, students, and community groups on the intersection of estate and retirement planning; small business essentials, including legal entity selection, succession planning, generational wealth transfers, and fiduciary selection and other protective measures for seniors and the LGBTQ community. She recently presented for Harvard’s Research Center – Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Quimbee – the award-winning Bar Review Program. Ms. Elliott is the first African American member of the Executive Committee for the Chicago Bar Association’s Trust Law Committee where she currently serves as the Vice-Chair, a Uniform Law Commission Drafting Committee on Healthcare Decisions Observer, a member of the Chicago Estate Planning Council, a member of the Illinois State Bar Association’s Trust and Estates Section and working group on Electronic Wills, the recipient of AV Preeminent, the highest peer rating from the 140-year-old Martindale Hubbell legal organization, National Black Lawyers Top 100, a 2017-21 Super Lawyers® Rising Star and 2022 Super Lawyer®, a Fellow of the American Bar Foundation, a volunteer faculty member for the Illinois Institute for Continuing Legal Education (IICLE), a faculty member and Content Advisory Board Member for Manhattan, New York-based Lawline that provides online CLE for attorneys nationwide. In 2021, Ms. Elliott was inducted into Marquis Who’sWho® in America.
