Insights on Private Clients, Trusts & Estates

AFS Partner and Family Office Co-Leader Kevin Matz will present at ACTEC’s 2026 Mid-Atlantic Regional Meeting in Baltimore, Maryland September 26, 2026.

AFS partner and Family Office Co-Leader Kevin Matz will present at the Trusts & Estates and Elder Law & Special Needs Section 2026 Joint Fall Meeting hosted by the New York State Bar Association on September 24, 2026.

AFS Counsel Fredrick Weber will present at the Greater North Shore Estate & Financial Planning Council’s breakfast meeting on September 16, 2026, in Skokie, Illinois.

ArentFox Schiff is pleased to announce the addition of partner Cynthia Brittain to its premier Private Clients, Trusts & Estates practice in the firm’s Los Angeles office. Cindy brings more than 25 years advising high-net-worth multinational families, individuals, and global companies with complex cross-border tax and estate planning matters.

AFS Partner Lauren Wolven will co-present in a webinar for the NAEPC’s AEP and EPLS Forum on August 31, 2026.

Family offices depend on a web of trusted advisors — lawyers, accountants, trustees, investment managers, and others — sharing sensitive information under carefully maintained protections. Artificial intelligence (AI) tools are quickly becoming part of that web.

ArentFox Schiff is pleased to announce that 125 attorneys have been recognized by The Best Lawyers in America 2027, with two attorneys highlighted as “Lawyers of the Year” and 36 attorneys listed as “Ones to Watch.”

New York City’s Pied-à-Terre (PAT) surcharge, pursuant to New York State Tax Law Article 30-C, officially took effect on July 1, 2026. The PAT is an annual property tax aimed at individuals who own a residential property in New York City that is not their primary residence. The annual surcharge applies retroactively to January 1, 2026, and sunsets on June 30, 2031, unless extended by the New York State Legislature.

Family Offices Industry Co-Leader Kevin Matz was quoted on the value of trust protectors in both revocable and irrevocable trust plans and can be useful even for responsible family members.

California family offices with clients at or near the $1 billion net worth threshold should be monitoring Proposition 40, the 2026 Billionaire Tax Act, which has qualified for the November 3 ballot and could impose a one-time tax of up to 5% on the net worth of certain California residents if approved by voters.

ArentFox Schiff Partners Kevin Matz, Brian Janowsky, and Tracy McLaughlin will present “Qualified Opportunity Zones and Estate Planning After OBBBA” during a Strafford webinar on July 30, 2026.

AFS Partner and Family Office Co-Chair Kevin Matz analyzes the IRS’s newly issued transfer tax safe harbor for contributions to Trump accounts and examines its implications for gift and generation-skipping transfer tax reporting in a recent article for TaxStringer.

Private Clients, Trusts & Estates Partner Sarah Kerr Severson was quoted in Family Wealth Report on the implications of artificial intelligence (AI) notetaking tools for confidentiality and attorney-client privilege.

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) released Notice 2026-40 on June 18, announcing that proposed regulations regarding qualified opportunity zones (QOZs) under §§ 1400Z-1 and 1400Z-2 of the Internal Revenue Code are forthcoming and providing long-anticipated transitional guidance relating to qualifying investments thereunder.

ArentFox Schiff Partner Kevin Matz will be presenting at the NYU Summer Tax Institute Advanced Trusts and Estates Conference in New York City on July 24, 2026.

ArentFox Schiff is pleased to announce that the firm’s Private Clients, Trusts & Estates Group and 12 partners have been recognized by Chambers High Net Worth 2026 guide, ranking the top attorneys and law firms for international private wealth.

ArentFox Schiff Partner Lauren Wolven will be a panelist at the STEP Chicago Conference on July 16, 2026.

Family Office Industry Co-Leader Kevin Matz was featured on the Internal Revenue Service’s (IRS) most recent guidance regarding Trump account contributions that resolves most concerns about potentially burdensome gift tax reporting requirements.

Partner Susan Bart was quoted on effective ways to use the eponymous Trump accounts. US citizens born during 2026 through 2029 qualify to open a Trump account and have it funded with a $1,000 contribution from the government. Individuals, employers and charitable organizations may made additional contributions to a Trump account, subject to annual limitations.

AFS Partner Lauren Wolven will be a panelist at the WTTW | WFMT Annual Professional Advisor Seminar, sponsored by Northern Trust, in Chicago on June 17, 2026.

ArentFox Schiff Partners Todd Angkatavanich and Kevin Matz will be presenting at the 2026 Summer Symposium & Social hosted by the San Francisco Estate Planning Council on June 12, 2026.

AFS Partner Todd Angkatavanich presented at the STEP New York program, “Structuring and Integration of the New Family Office: Redefining Advisory Relationships,” in New York on June 9, 2026.

ArentFox Schiff will be hosting the NYCPA Estate Planning Conference, long recognized as one of the premier estate planning programs in the Northeast, on May 21 in New York.

AFS Partner Todd Angkatavanich and Senior Associate Maggie Lopez will speak at a Boston Bar Association webinar on May 14.

AFS Partner Tracy L. McLaughlin will present on May 5, 2026, at the New York City Bar’s webinar “Ownership of Cooperative Apartments and Condominiums by Trusts: An Overview of Popular Trusts and Obtaining Transfer Approval from Cooperative Boards.”