Boland Law Group, PLLCPassionately Preserving Wealth™
Who we serve · Senior executives
Your compensation has outgrown ordinary planning.
Equity grants, deferred compensation, change-of-control provisions, a concentrated position in your own company’s stock: each carries its own tax treatment and its own transfer rules. We make them work as one architecture, your estate plan, tax strategy, asset protection and equity planning designed together rather than managed apart.
Six pressure points in an executive’s plan
Every one of them carries its own tax treatment and its own transfer rules. Coordinated, they create real value. Managed apart, they quietly erode it.
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Equity awards, integrated with your trusts
ISOs, NSOs, RSUs and performance shares each transfer on their own terms. The trust that receives them must be designed for them.
The timing of an exercise, the structure of the trust that receives an award and the interplay between income recognition and estate tax can create substantial value, or substantial problems, depending on how they are coordinated. We design trust structures around your specific equity profile, so income and transfer tax outcomes are planned together rather than discovered apart.
- Option exercise and recognition timing
- Trust design for each class of award
- Income and transfer tax coordination
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Concentrated stock positions
When one company’s stock is most of your net worth, volatility, liquidity and the tax cost of selling all belong in the plan.
Concentration carries risks an ordinary plan never has to price: market swings, thin liquidity and the gain waiting inside every diversifying sale. We build the answers into the architecture itself, from hedging strategies to charitable remainder trusts funded with appreciated stock to trust-based diversification, so the position is managed by design rather than by default.
- Charitable remainder trusts funded with appreciated stock
- Hedging and diversification structures
- Liquidity planning around the position
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Deferred compensation and SERPs
These assets do not pass through your trust. They pass by beneficiary designation, and the taxes at death can stack.
Nonqualified deferred compensation and supplemental executive retirement plans are governed by their beneficiary designations, not by your trust, and at death they face income tax, with estate tax as well for taxable estates. Left uncoordinated, the combined burden can erode the majority of their value. We bring every plan, every election and every designation inside the broader architecture.
- Beneficiary designation review, plan by plan
- Income and estate tax coordination
- Distribution elections aligned with the plan
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Personal liability and asset protection
The role that builds the wealth also exposes it. The plan should hold the two apart.
Shareholder litigation, regulatory action and the general exposure that accompanies a high-profile corporate role can all reach personal wealth. We design trust and entity structures that put meaningful separation between your corporate exposure and your family’s financial security, and we build them before any claim exists, which is when they work.
- Trust and entity separation structures
- Exposure review across roles and board seats
- Protection planned in advance of any claim
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Planning for the transition
Retirement, a new company or a change of control: each opens planning windows with real deadlines.
Vesting schedules, non-compete provisions, golden parachute arrangements and the shift from active income to investment income all demand adjustments to the plan, and some of them cannot wait. We work with executives during their tenure and through the transition itself, so continuity holds and nothing available is left on the table.
- Change-of-control and parachute review
- Vesting and departure timeline planning
- From earned income to investment income
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Your advisory team, coordinated
A wealth manager, a CPA, perhaps a planner your employer provides. Someone has to make it one strategy.
We integrate with the advisors you already trust, so exercise decisions, tax elections, charitable strategies and estate planning move in the same direction instead of at cross purposes. Our role is the legal architect’s: making certain that every advisor’s work product fits within one coherent structure.
- One legal architecture across every advisor
- Exercise and election decisions made together
- A single strategy, reviewed as one
The missing piece
They were the missing piece of the puzzle.
Our financial advisors and tax accountants were outstanding, but partnering with BLG was truly the missing piece of the puzzle. Their collaboration with our existing advisory team provided the clarity and integration we had been seeking. Now, all our advisors are aligned, working seamlessly together, and the comprehensive strategy BLG developed perfectly complements our financial and tax planning. BLG’s involvement brought cohesion and confidence to our overall wealth management and estate planning goals.
How a plan comes to be
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A conversation
Call the office. We listen first: the family, the holdings, the intent.
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The invitation
If we are the right counsel, our planning questionnaire follows by private invitation.
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The design
Your attorneys draft a plan built for one family: yours.
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The review
Drafts in hand, we walk the plan together, line by line, until it says exactly what you intend.
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The execution meeting
Signatures witnessed, trusts funded, and your advisors aligned around one strategy.
Asked by executives, answered plainly
Q1Will you work with our existing wealth manager and CPA?
Yes, by design. Our role is to serve as the legal architect who makes every advisor’s work product fit one coherent structure. We coordinate exercise decisions, tax elections, charitable strategies and estate planning with your full team, so the strategy reads as one.
Q2Can a trust hold my equity compensation?
Often, but never generically. Options, restricted stock units and performance shares each carry their own transfer rules and tax treatment, and company plan documents differ. The trust must be designed for the specific awards it will receive, which is precisely the work we do.
Q3What happens to deferred compensation at death?
It passes by beneficiary designation rather than through your trust, and it is subject to income tax, with estate tax as well for taxable estates. Without coordination the combined burden can erode the majority of its value, which is why every plan and every designation belongs inside your broader architecture.
Q4How does an engagement begin?
With a conversation. Call the office or schedule a consultation through our offices page. Our planning questionnaire follows by private invitation once your consultation is scheduled.
Passionately Preserving Wealth™
Over 50 years of legal excellenceThis page is provided for general information and does not constitute legal, tax or investment advice, nor does it create an attorney-client relationship. Nothing here is a recommendation regarding any specific security, award, exercise or election. Descriptions of our work are general in nature and are not a promise or guarantee of any particular result. No engagement is formed unless and until a written engagement letter is executed and any required fees are paid and cleared.