Posting By: Margaret Wilson
Date: November 17, 2009

Have you ever noticed that family conflict seems to surface more around the Holidays than at any other time of year? For many families, Thanksgiving is a time to gather together, share a meal and renew family ties.  Unfortunately for others, it’s an opportunity to get together and resume the family feud. 

Posting By: Joel Susco
Date: November 9, 2009

There may be many ways to skin a cat, but when it comes to the termination of a partnership interest, we are aware of two possible considerations.   In many cases, the tax consequences are the most critical considerations as the economic results of a liquidation or a sale are quite similar in nature. We thought we would share our experiences with the termination of a partnership structure.  Our considerations centered around a decision to make a complete liquidation or consider a sale/exchange transaction of that partnership interest.  In a liquidation, the partnership itself, and not a new or existing partner, make the payments to the departing partner.   Our decisions provided here share with you some of the differences between a liquidation of a partner’s interest by the partnership versus a sale of the interest to another partner or partners.

Posting by:  Geoff Brown
Date: October 28, 2009

At the recent Family Firm Institute (FFI) conference in New York, the first session I attended did not quite live up to the hype in the title, so I decided to change my tactic and instead of attending sessions that sounded like they would be the most interesting, I decided to attend those focusing on being conducted by people with authority and credentials in the field of family business advising.

One of those sessions was conducted by Kelin E. Gersick. Ph.D., an individual with very significant credentials in the family business advising field whose topic was, “King Lear at Twilight: The Late Adult Transition and the Hero’s Farewell.”  At first blush, I wasn’t sure just how enlightening it would be, but I put my trust in my new tactic and was rewarded for it.  As soon as I walked in the room I realized that I was the only CPA there.  And guess what?!  It turned out to be a very interesting discussion.