Legacy Planning
Everyone defines their legacy in different ways. We work with clients to understand, shape, and preserve their definition of legacy for future generations.
Legacy planning goes beyond traditional estate planning. It is more nuanced and complex, involving individuals working with their families, advisors, and organizations they care about to define their legacy goals and implement them both during their lifetime and after their death.
Legacy planning is not one-and-done. It is a guiding principle that brings families together around shared values. It is a very personal process. Working with our team of philanthropic advisors, estate and tax planning professionals, and other advisors, we help individuals and families define their vision and develop a framework to achieve it. We then work to ensure those plans are implemented to help steward our client’s legacy vision appropriately in the future.
Whether you are new to giving or engaged with a multigenerational foundation, we can help you explore options for giving while living, bequests, future focus for next-generation giving, and more. We will work with you to explore issues that motivate you, identify and vet organizations, and implement lifetime and estate giving vehicles. If desired, we can help you maintain your privacy or share your story.
Our Clients' Stories
Helping to Shape a Philanthropic Legacy
A couple wanted to engage their young adult children in helping to shape their philanthropic legacy, knowing the children would eventually oversee the foundation they started. We helped the family define their charitable vision and identified giving strategies targeting health and welfare and public policy issues. The family found a shared sense of purpose and the children appreciated working with our team's younger advisors.
Giving While Living
With a focus on giving while living, we helped a donor create and plan for a $100 million foundation that would spend down within five years of his death. We worked with the donor during his lifetime to identify and vet organizations that would allow him to have the greatest impact and to ensure that the future trustees knew about the issues and approaches he valued most. Flexibility was also built in to allow for new developments that would arise when the foundation had to make its grants.
Negotiating a Significant Gift of Fine Art
A foundation created by the estate of a renowned artist sought our help in negotiating a significant gift of fine art to a premier cultural institution. Working directly with the trustees and executors to translate the foundation's mission as expressed in the client's will, we identified the appropriate charity, completed due diligence on the organization, oversaw appraisals, and led negotiations regarding ownership, copyright, reproductions, and care of the art. We continue to assist with the foundation's ongoing grantmaking to other nonprofits that share the vision of the artist’s legacy. Read the full Rosalie Thorne McKenna Foundation case study.
Learn More
Getting Started
For individuals and families new to giving, it can be challenging to sort through the wide range of charitable vehicles and discern which one works best for your desired outcome.
Implementation & Operations
The level and scope of our work varies based on client needs and their desired level of engagement. We offer a full range of philanthropic, legal and investment management services and will tailor our services to your needs.
Engaging the Next Generation
We focus on next-generation planning in all aspects of our practice, fielding questions from clients about how best to engage their children or grandchildren in the practice of the family’s philanthropy
H&B's Philanthropy Blog
Now more than ever, meeting the challenges of sustainable family giving and collaboration requires great thought, care and planning. Please read this blog for inspiration, creative thinking, to address timely issues in philanthropy, offer perspective, encourage communication, celebrate success, and embolden you to take action toward sustaining your family’s charitable giving mission and values.
Legacy – what does it mean to you and your family?
Contact a member of our Philanthropic Strategies team today!