Special Planning Services

1. Estate Planning Maintenance Plan

This program is our annual maintenance program which was created to give clients the protection and peace of mind that their estate plan will continue to achieve their goals and remain just as effective as the day the plan was created.

Why is Annual Maintenance So Important?

The purpose of this program is to reduce the overall cost of estate planning, especially costs associated with disability and death, by having a process for formal review and updating.  Estate Planning to often is viewed as a “one and done” proposition. In reality, estate planning is a lifelong process. The core of that process is annual meetings to review the state of law and the state of your situation (new children, grandchildren, new assets, etc).

Even a carefully drafted estate plan can be made vulnerable by changes in the law or in the clients’ lives, but often other attorneys do nothing about it. The annual maintenance plan is our proposal for communicating with clients on at least an annual basis in order to solve this problem.

Benefits of being an Annual Maintenance member:

* Annual Amendments. Amendments to comply with new Federal or State laws; or for minor changes to your documents due to changes in family situations are included in the annual fee.

* Annual Meeting. As a member of the plan you receive an annual meeting with an attorney to review the status of funding, your situation, and the legal environment.

* Access to Your Medical Directives. Access to 24/7/365 access to Living Wills, Health Care Power of Attorney and other instructions through a partnership with Docubank. Docubank stores your documents and sends you an Emergency Card, allowing for easy document retrieval. It also provides the names and phone numbers of your loved ones and physician so hospital staff can reach them quickly.

* Protection Planning for Adult Children (Ages 18-25). For plan members, we will prepare powers of attorney and health care directives for their children ages 18-25. In, North Carolina a child becomes a legal adult at age 18 and therefore needs to have legal documents to appoint decision makers. We provide this service for our clients with college age children at no additional cost through the maintenance plan.

* Reduced Rate for Hourly Fees. 10% off our hourly or fixed fees for any additional matters that we may handle, such as funding, administration, etc.

* Reduced Fee for Planning for Parents. As maintenance plan members, we will provide our estate planning services for your parents at a reduced 10% rate.

* Subscription to Client Alerts. As plan members we will make sure you are added to our client alerts mailings and email so you receive updates on changes in the law and other important information.

* Unlimited Attendance to Educational Programs. We put on educational seminars on a variety of topics.

* Use of Resources for Non-Estate Planning Matters. We maintain a network of professionals (attorney and non-attorney such as accountants, financial professionals, insurance professionals, painters, plumbers, etc.) for reference upon request. We will make every effort to match your need with an appropriate provider.

2. Business Compliance Maintenance Program

We can provide business compliance solutions for private companies -- insuring the necessary legal formalities are met, including providing annual minutes, registered agent services, and compliance and advisory services to our clients.

For a single annual fee for each legal entity, we provide companies with the following basic services:

1. Prepare standard annual meeting minutes for shareholders and directors (or for an LLC; members and managers) of the company.
2. Serve as the registered agent for the company.
3. Participate in the annual meeting to review compliance issues, record keeping and address needs and questions.
4. Prepare the annual report for filing with the Secretary of State.

Additional services are provided at a reasonable cost to our clients.