Various Entities for Asset Protection: What is potentially the best for you?

When structuring and planning any asset protection strategy, one of the more important factors is often how the asset protection entity or multiple entity structure is funded. While the funding of the structure itself is of paramount importance, one of the major factors is to create an asset protection structure that titles assets in a manner that takes the equity away from the person who is of primary risk, and whose assets are to be protected.

Asset Protection Update: Analysis of Your Exposure

In today’s overly litigious society, defending a lawsuit often means expending large amounts on legal fees just to defend against a claim, even if the claim is not legitimate. It takes additional money to potentially settle a claim in order to avoid even higher legal fees required to take the matter to trial and risk a potentially larger jury verdict against you.

The first thing to do is analyze your potential exposure; see what assets you have and how they could be attached by a potential creditor. Exposure could arise from a variety of sources including:

1. A professional practice liability
2. Corporate contract liability
3. Audits from insurance carriers
4. Matrimonial liability or some other personal exposure

Asset Protection Update: How Your Pension Plan Can Protect Your Assets

We recently published a blog about protecting your personal assets from exposure when a plaintiff tries to “pierce the corporate veil.” A properly structured pension plan can further protect your assets. Certain elder planning that comes in connection with asset protection, pension structure and estate planning can also provide benefit.

Pension Plan
Depending on how it is structured, the pension plan can act as a vehicle to:

• Protect your assets from creditors (insurance companies, vendors, malpractice, etc.).
• Save you income taxes.
• Permit a vehicle for future investments to increase your wealth tax-free.

A properly structured pension plan should take into account your practice, age and level of legal exposure to a lawsuit in order to properly meet your desired expectations.

Estate and Trust Planning

• Your assets can be given to persons who you choose and in the manner you choose.
• Elder planning can protect your assets from catastrophic nursing home costs.

Asset Protection Special: Is Your Corporation Likely to be “Pierced” Exposing Your Personal Assets?

In New York (and other states), courts have held that a corporation or other non-personal business entity can be “pierced” allowing a plaintiff to go after the corporation owner’s personal assets. This is referred to as “piercing the corporate veil.”

An analysis of your corporations, limited liability companies and other business entities is important to see if you are at risk for having the protections of your corporation set aside in a lawsuit, exposing your personal assets. Typically, courts have considered this remedy for a creditor/plaintiff in cases where they find the corporation to be an “alter ego” of the owner(s).