Business Owners.
The business is usually the largest asset in the estate and the most fragile. A missing buy-sell, a stale operating agreement, or an incapacitated owner without a named successor turns a going concern into a fire sale in under ninety days. This is the discipline that keeps the company alive when you can't run it.
Where closely held businesses actually fail.
Death without a funded buy-sell, incapacity without a continuity POA, an operating agreement that no longer matches reality, and an "equal" inheritance that pits the operating child against the non-operating siblings. Every one is preventable. None of them are expensive to fix — compared to the cost of not fixing them.
The founder's continuity stack
- Funded buy-sell agreement — trigger, price, funding all current
- Business-continuity POA — signs, hires, and pays during incapacity
- Successor trustee with business-interest authority
- Operating agreement / bylaws aligned to the estate plan
- Life insurance sized to the buy-sell and estate liquidity need
- Key-person and disability coverage on the founder
For family-run businesses
- Operating equity to the child running the business
- Offsetting inheritance to the children who aren't
- Voting vs. non-voting share structure to protect governance
- Grantor trust or GRAT for high-value transitions
- Written family employment and compensation policy
- Family council or governance charter for multi-generation firms
Your estate plan and your operating agreement have to speak.
The single most common failure isn't a missing document — it's two documents that contradict each other. The trust names your spouse as successor owner; the operating agreement restricts transfers to non-partners. The will divides the estate equally; the buy-sell hands the business to one buyer. When they collide, the courts decide. We align them so they don't.
Frequently asked
Keep the business running — even when you can't.
The $250 strategy session is credited toward the plan we build for you. Start with the intake so we walk in prepared.