Estate Planning, Trusts, and Wills in the Capital Region

Estate planning is one of the quieter forms of care a person can offer the people they love. It protects what you’ve built — a home, a business, retirement savings, family heirlooms — and it makes sure those things reach the right hands, in the right way, at the right time. Since 1971, Ianniello Anderson, P.C. has helped Capital Region families put thoughtful plans in place. From our offices in [Clifton Park](/clifton-park/), [Albany](/albany/), [Saratoga Springs](/saratoga-springs/), and [Glens Falls](/glens-falls/), we sit with clients, listen first, and build estate plans that reflect what they actually want for their families. When you’re ready, call **(518) 371-8888**.

Wills That Reflect What You Actually Want

A will is the foundation of most estate plans. It names the people who will inherit from you, the executor who will carry out your wishes, and — if your children are still minors — the guardian who will raise them. Without a valid will, New York’s intestacy laws decide all of that on your behalf, and the result rarely matches what a family would have chosen for itself.

Our attorneys draft wills that are clear, specific, and properly executed under New York law — signed in the presence of two qualifying witnesses, structured to avoid ambiguity, and coordinated with your other planning documents. We spend time on the details families often overlook: how personal property is distributed, what happens if a named beneficiary predeceases you, who serves if your first-choice executor cannot, and how blended-family considerations are handled with fairness on every side.

A will also needs to be revisited. Marriage, divorce, the birth of a child or grandchild, a move out of state, or a significant change in assets — each is a reason to pull the document back out and make sure it still reflects your intent.

Trusts — Revocable, Irrevocable, and Special-Purpose

Trusts do work that a will cannot. They can avoid probate, protect assets from creditors or long-term care costs, hold property for a beneficiary who isn’t ready to manage it, and move wealth between generations in tax-efficient ways. The right trust depends entirely on what you’re trying to accomplish.

A **revocable living trust** lets you keep full control during your lifetime while bypassing probate at death. You serve as trustee, you can change or revoke the trust at any time, and assets pass directly to your beneficiaries without court involvement. For families who own real estate in more than one state, a revocable trust can save significant time and expense by avoiding ancillary probate.

An **irrevocable trust** trades flexibility for protection. Once funded, the assets are no longer yours for tax or creditor purposes — which is exactly the point. Irrevocable trusts are commonly used for Medicaid planning (with attention to New York’s lookback period), removing life insurance proceeds from a taxable estate, and protecting assets from divorce, lawsuits, or financial mismanagement.

Within those two categories, several specialized structures handle specific planning challenges:

• Family Limited Partnerships (FLPs) — transfer business or investment assets to family members at reduced gift and estate tax cost while keeping management control.
• Qualified Personal Residence Trusts (QPRTs) — move a primary or vacation home out of the taxable estate while allowing the grantor to continue living there for a defined term.
• Irrevocable Life Insurance Trusts (ILITs) — hold life insurance policies outside the estate so the death benefit isn’t reduced by estate tax and remains available to provide liquidity.
• Special needs trusts — provide for a beneficiary with a disability without disqualifying them from means-tested government benefits.
• Testamentary trusts — created within a will to hold and manage assets for minor children or other beneficiaries after death.

Our team works through which structures fit your situation, models the tax and practical implications, and drafts the documents to do exactly what you intend.

Powers of Attorney, Health Care Proxies, and Living Wills

An estate plan that only addresses what happens after death is half a plan. The other half is incapacity planning — the documents that let trusted people act on your behalf if you cannot.

A **durable power of attorney** authorizes an agent of your choosing to handle financial and legal matters: paying bills, managing investments, signing real estate documents, dealing with insurers, filing taxes. New York’s statutory short form has specific execution requirements; documents that don’t meet them get rejected by banks and brokerages at exactly the moment a family needs them to work. We draft the form correctly and walk clients through the statutory gifts rider when that provision fits the plan.

A **health care proxy** appoints someone to make medical decisions for you if you cannot communicate them yourself. A **living will** records your wishes about life-sustaining treatment in specific end-of-life scenarios. Together, these documents spare your family the burden of guessing in a crisis — and give your chosen agent clear authority when hospitals and providers ask for it. Most clients sign these at the same meeting as the will and trust documents.

Estate Administration and Probate

When a loved one passes, the family often needs help carrying out the plan — or, if no plan was in place, working through the default process the law provides. Our estate administration team guides executors, administrators, and beneficiaries through New York’s Surrogate’s Court process from start to finish.

For estates with a will, that means filing the petition for probate, providing notice to interested parties, marshaling and valuing assets, paying valid debts and taxes, and distributing what remains to the beneficiaries. For estates without a will, the process is administration rather than probate, and assets pass according to New York’s intestacy statute. We’ve handled both for more than fifty years, including contested wills, out-of-state heirs, ancillary probate for property in other jurisdictions, and post-mortem tax planning that can preserve meaningful value for the family.

For families serving as fiduciaries, the responsibilities — and the personal liability that comes with them — are real. We take that weight off when we can and keep the process moving so the family can focus on each other.

Tax and Asset Planning

For most Capital Region families, the federal estate tax exemption is high enough that federal estate tax isn’t the main concern — the 2026 federal exemption is **$15 million per person** ($30 million per married couple) under the rules that took effect January 1, 2026. New York, however, imposes its own estate tax with a significantly lower exemption — **roughly $7 million per person**, indexed annually for inflation — and a much-discussed “cliff” feature: when a taxable estate exceeds **105% of the New York exemption**, the exemption is lost entirely and the full estate is taxed, not just the amount above the threshold. That cliff is one of the most consequential planning issues for families in our region and deserves attention well before it becomes a problem.

Our attorneys work with clients on lifetime gifting strategies, charitable planning, the trust structures described above, and coordination with the broader plan — retirement account beneficiary designations, the interplay between trusts and basis step-up at death, and business succession for owners of closely held companies. When a client’s financial picture warrants it, we coordinate directly with their CPA, financial advisor, or family office so every piece of the plan is rowing the same direction. Our [business law team](/business-law/) often works in parallel on succession matters.

Start with a conversation.

There’s no urgency to estate planning — until there is. A first conversation with our team is confidential, unhurried, and free of obligation. We’ll ask what you’re trying to protect, talk through the options that fit, and outline what putting the right plan in place would look like. From there, you decide if and when to move forward.

Use the form below to share a little about your situation, and a member of our team will follow up within one business day. If you’d rather call, the number is **(518) 371-8888**.

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