May 22, 2026

The $100M-plus estate that paid zero in taxes

We hosted a small roundtable in our office this week — a conversation between a handful of advisors who work with private families, family offices, and long-term property owners along the South OC coast.

The featured voice was Brian Van Marter, an estate planning attorney who has spent 33 years working exclusively with high-net-worth individuals who have significant real estate holdings. He's the kind of advisor you don't think you need until you do — and then you really wish you'd had him earlier.

One outcome stayed with me: a significant family estate (well into the nine figures) that paid zero in estate tax. Not through loopholes. Through proper structure, put in place before it was needed. That structure survived an IRS audit without a single change.

Most of the property owners I work with have the real estate side figured out. They know their assets, they know the market, they know when to hold and when to act. What they often don't have is an estate plan that keeps pace with what the real estate is actually worth — and in coastal Orange County, with the assets people are sitting on, that gap is expensive.

A few things Brian shared that I hadn't heard framed this clearly before:

• An irrevocable trust, structured correctly, can remove your property's value from your taxable estate while still preserving the step-up in basis at death — so your heirs don't pay capital gains on decades of appreciation

• Splitting LLC ownership below 50% inside a trust can reduce the taxable value of a property by up to 40%

• California probate is slow and costly — a revocable trust is the baseline fix, and it's simpler than most people assume

None of this requires selling anything or changing how you use your property. It's structure.

f any of this touches your situation — a long-held property, family ownership, assets you're thinking about passing down — I'm happy to point you toward the right conversation. I know who to call.