Home/Who We Help/Private Clients & Families
Who We Help
For private clients and families
When the family’s wealth sits in a structure someone set up decades ago - and something has finally tested it.
Family wealth in Australia is usually held through a trust, one or two companies and a self-managed fund. It works quietly for years. Then a parent dies, a child moves overseas, an inheritance arrives from abroad, or the ATO writes a letter and the structure has to answer questions it was never designed to answer.
We act for individuals and family groups on those questions. The work is technical, but the decisions are personal and the advice has to be readable by the people who have to make them.
What we help with
The work
- ATO audits, reviews, objections and settlements
- Amended assessments, penalties and interest remission
- Trust structures: deeds, resolutions, appointor succession and vesting
- Intergenerational transfers and succession, including farming families
- Deceased estates: CGT, testamentary trusts and distributions to beneficiaries
- Tax residency, departures from Australia and returning residents
- Foreign inheritances and distributions from overseas trusts
- Land tax, including principal place of residence and surcharge land tax
- Stamp duty, including first home buyer exemptions and surcharge purchaser duty
- Self-managed superannuation fund issues with a tax or legal dimension
Common situations
When families come to us
- A letter has arrived from the ATO or Revenue NSW. The first response matters more than people expect. So does the deadline printed on it.
- A concession has been clawed back: first home, principal place of residence and surcharge exemptions are all reviewed after the fact, sometimes years later.
- Someone in the family lives overseas and one non-resident beneficiary changes the tax treatment of the whole structure.
- The person who understood the structure has died and the will does not control the assets everyone assumed it did.
How we work
How it works
Plain advice. Written advice that a non-specialist can read, with the technical analysis behind it where it is needed.
Cost certainty. A costs agreement and fee estimate before work starts and phased scoping so you can stop at any point.
Discretion. Family matters stay in the file. We do not publish case studies or name clients - ever.
Common questions
Do I need a tax lawyer or an accountant?
For compliance and returns, an accountant. For a position that has to be defended, a dispute with a deadline, a document that has to be legally effective, or anything where legal professional privilege matters, a tax lawyer. Most of the time both are involved and we are used to working alongside an existing accountant.
Related insights
Further reading
Trusts
Trust vesting: the deadline nobody diarised
What happens when a discretionary trust vests: the discretions end, income splitting stops and the CGT and duty consequences that follow.
State taxes
First home buyer duty and the residence requirement
Chew [2026] NSWCATAD 200
A NSW decision on the first home buyer residence requirement where a medical need interrupted occupation.
Have a matter you want a straight answer on?
Most engagements start with a short conversation about the issue and the exposure.