Estate Taxes Are a Planning Issue, Not a Filing Issue
Most people treat estate taxes the way they treat income taxes: something to deal with when the time comes. That thinking can cost your family dearly.
For families with significant wealth, estate taxes represent one of the largest avoidable expenses they will ever face. The key word is avoidable. But only if you plan ahead.
Estate tax planning is about decisions you make during your lifetime that shape how your wealth transfers and how much of it actually survives that process. By the time a loved one has passed, most of the best planning opportunities are gone.
Estate planning attorneys Thomas Steelman and John Crow see this regularly. Clients come to them after spending decades building significant wealth with little or no attention paid to the tax consequences of transferring it. They were focused on growing what they had, which makes complete sense. But the tax exposure that comes with that success requires its own strategy, and the window for the most effective approaches is always wider when you start early.
One important advantage for Tennessee residents: the state has no inheritance or estate tax of its own. That is a genuine benefit. But the federal estate tax is still very much a concern for large estates, and it is the one that demands serious, coordinated planning.
Who Needs an Estate Tax Attorney in Franklin, TN?
Not everyone needs this level of planning, and being honest about that matters. Estate tax planning is most relevant for individuals and families who have built substantial wealth and want to make sure it transfers efficiently to the people and causes they care about.
If your estate is approaching or exceeding $5 million, or if you expect it to grow there over time, an estate tax review is worth having. Appreciating assets, life insurance proceeds, and business interests can push an estate above relevant thresholds faster than most families expect, particularly when growth has been steady for a decade or more.
Business owners with closely held companies are among those who most need this planning. Business value is often illiquid, and transferring it to the next generation without a thoughtful strategy can trigger significant tax liability at the worst possible moment, typically when your family is least equipped to handle it.
Real estate investors face a similar challenge. Large real estate portfolios present both estate tax and capital gains planning issues that require coordinated legal and financial strategy. The same assets that built your wealth can become a liability without the right structures in place.
Families expecting significant future appreciation also need to be thinking about this now. Planning while asset values are lower locks in better transfer terms and creates more flexibility. Waiting until the estate has grown substantially limits the options available to you.
Why Estate Tax Planning Still Matters, Even with High Exemptions
With the federal exemption at $15 million per person in 2026, it is easy to assume estate tax is someone else’s problem. For many people, that is true today. But today’s exemption is not a permanent promise.
Federal estate tax law has changed repeatedly over the past two decades, sometimes dramatically and often with little notice. The exemption was as low as $675,000 as recently as 2001. Clients who rely on the current high exemption as a reason to delay planning are placing a significant bet with their legacy, and it is not a bet worth making.
Asset growth adds another layer of risk. If your estate is worth ten million dollars today and continues to appreciate over the next ten to fifteen years, you could easily find yourself well above the current threshold, particularly if Congress reduces the exemption in the meantime.
And here is what makes the federal estate tax the most consequential tax many wealthy families will ever face. It is not a tax on your income. It is not a tax on your gains. It is a tax on the transfer of wealth itself: the land, the business, the investment accounts, the life insurance, everything you have accumulated over a lifetime, taxed at 40% on every dollar above the exemption. One generation of poor planning can erase what took two or three generations to build.
That is why the families who have the most to lose are the ones who cannot afford to wait.
The Real Cost of Not Planning
The consequences of not planning are concrete, and estate lawyers Thomas and John see them regularly in their practice.
When an estate has not been structured properly, families are often forced into reactive decisions during an already painful time. Assets that could have been transferred tax-free years earlier become subject to significant estate tax. Strategies that were available during life, certain trust structures, gifting programs, and business planning techniques, are simply no longer on the table.
Liquidity is another problem that catches families off guard, particularly when an estate is heavy in real estate or closely held business interests. Those assets do not come with a check attached. If an estate owes significant taxes and the bulk of the wealth is tied up in illiquid assets, families often face pressure to sell quickly and on unfavorable terms.
Unresolved estate tax exposure also contributes to family conflict. When there is no clear plan in place, disagreements about how to handle a large tax liability can divide families during a time when they should be supporting one another.
Effective tools exist to prevent all of this. They simply need to be put in place while there is still time to use them.
John Crow 
Thomas Steelman 
