Family offices

Our private wealth solicitors have been at the forefront of supporting families on their estate and asset protection requirements for many years, consistently acting as a trusted adviser. Whether guidance is needed on how to establish or operate a family office, or assistance is required to deliver critical independent legal advice, our family office team works closely with clients around the world.

Decades of family office experience

By their very nature, the relationships between a family and a specialist family office lawyer are founded on hard-earned trust and confidence in their competence and discretion. The range of advice required can vary widely from tax, wills, and probate work, to asset protection, financial management, and safeguarding the family’s privacy.

Our services encompass comprehensive financial planning across a range of areas. We can ensure that families achieve their long-term financial aims, and in particular, their philanthropic and charitable giving goals, by helping them to establish and manage charitable foundations, along with maximising the impact of their contributions.

Keeping the future of the family in mind, we regularly advise on family constitutions, creating frameworks that promote harmony and effective decision-making for generations to come, and enhancing their wealth.

Our team works alongside other professional advisers to provide strategies for recovering family assets and mitigating risks, and offers advice on complex tax matters to make sure you and your family remain compliant. Additionally, we consider risk and diversity in all our planning, preparing families for any challenges they may face.

They strike the perfect balance of being friendly but professional, and no matter how grave your current situation is, you know you’re in the safest, most expert hands.

Rooted in our long-standing involvement in private client matters and industry expertise, and informed by decades of working closely with succeeding generations of families, we offer clear, pragmatic advice. Several of our private client partners have ‘grown up’ alongside their family clients, having acted for them since their early days as trainee solicitors at the firm.

How we help our clients

Financial planning

Philanthropy and charitable giving

Family constitutions and dynamics

Protecting and enhancing family wealth

Recovering family assets

Succession planning

Tax advice

Consideration of risk and diversity

Penningtons provided excellent service throughout the matter, with prompt and courteous responses that were always clear and easy to understand.

The team are knowledgeable and responsive … very impressive technically and pragmatic where needed.

Recent work highlights

Lifestyle funding advice

Advising an international family on the funding of the lifestyle of a key beneficiary in the UK, while protecting the trust assets from potential claims by the beneficiary’s new spouse.

Innovative foundation setup

Using a Jersey foundation option in an innovative way to offer a balanced and sustainable solution for both family members and trustees.

Multi-jurisdictional family trust advice

Providing guidance to the beneficiary of multi-jurisdictional family trusts on how best to structure their affairs as a UK resident.

Estate planning for prominent family

Advising the UK resident branch of a prominent foreign family on estate planning, property and business matters, focusing on the succession of family assets held personally and through trust arrangements.

UHNW multi-jurisdictional family

Acting for a family office based in two countries, including drafting and coordinating a significant restructuring of family trusts and foundations with over $1 billion worth of assets.