Family Office Services

We provide integrated legal services to family offices to protect wealth, facilitate growth, and manage governance from generation to generation.

Family Office Formation and Governance

Management of family wealth is a complex business. High net worth families increasingly address this through the use of family offices. A family office can serve a wide variety of functions, from investment management, strategy, and oversight, to accounting and payment services, coordination of tax planning and financial reporting, and education and stewardship of the next generation.

Regardless of a family office’s focus, it operates as a private company, owned and managed by individuals. For more than a century, integrated services to private companies and their owners have been a core part of ArentFox Schiff’s practice.

We understand the unique challenges that can affect all aspects of the business life cycle of family-owned businesses. We are proud to have represented many established private companies through several generations of owners, helping them execute their vision, and counseling each generation as they assume responsibility for and continue to grow the business.

We apply our experience together with best-in-class tax and estate planning to help clients create family offices, design their governance structures, determine appropriate compensation models, and facilitate managing their family’s investments.

Coordinated Legal Services

Our attorneys work together across practices and offices, allowing families to benefit from coordinated access to the wide array of resources and capabilities we provide. These include:

Corporate Governance
Investment Regulatory Compliance
Real Estate Investments
Life Events and Milestones
Succession Planning
Educating the Next Generation
Tax and Estate Planning
Private Trust Companies
Trust Administration and Fiduciary Risk Management
Labor and Employment
Mergers and Acquisitions
Employee Benefits and Executive Compensation

Awards & Honors

Chambers High Net Worth
- Private Wealth, National and Illinois (2016-2022); New York (2022)
Chambers USA
- Wealth Management, Nationwide (2011-2016)
U.S. News – Best Lawyers® “Best Law Firms” – National Tier 1
- Trusts & Estates Law (2014-2022)
- Corporate Law (2020-2022)
- Mergers and Acquisition Law (2020-2022)
U.S. News – Best Lawyers® “Best Law Firms” – Metropolitan Tier 1
- Closely Held Companies and Family Businesses Law, Chicago (2020-2022)
- Corporate Law, Chicago (2020-2022)