Peck Baxter represents individuals, families, business owners, executives, and family offices in the legal matters that affect their families, wealth, businesses, and legacies. Our Private Client & Personal Services practice combines sophisticated estate and wealth planning with experienced counsel in estate and trust administration, probate, family matters, and other significant personal legal issues.

For many clients, personal, business, and financial interests cannot be separated neatly. A business owner considering succession may also need to address estate taxes, generational wealth transfers, trusts, and the future ownership of a closely held company. A family office may require counsel regarding investments, private credit, governance, and wealth preservation in addition to traditional estate planning. We take an integrated approach designed around the complete circumstances and long-term objectives of each client.

Estate Planning, Wills & Trusts

Peck Baxter assists individuals and families with estate plans ranging from straightforward wills and revocable trusts to sophisticated structures for substantial and complex estates.

Our attorneys advise clients regarding wills, trusts, powers of attorney, health care directives, beneficiary designations, asset ownership, incapacity planning, and other components of a comprehensive estate plan.

Estate planning is ultimately about more than preparing documents. A well-designed plan should provide clarity during incapacity, protect family members, facilitate the efficient administration of an estate, address tax and creditor considerations where appropriate, and provide a thoughtful framework for transferring assets according to the client's wishes.

We work with clients to develop plans that reflect not only what they own, but also their families, businesses, values, and objectives for future generations.

High-Net-Worth Estate & Wealth Planning

Peck Baxter maintains a sophisticated private wealth practice for high-net-worth and ultra-high-net-worth individuals, families, and business owners whose planning needs extend beyond a traditional estate plan.

Our attorneys advise on advanced trust structures, estate and gift tax planning, business succession, asset protection considerations, charitable planning, and strategies for transferring substantial wealth across generations. These matters often involve closely held businesses, real estate portfolios, investment entities, trusts, and other complex assets requiring coordinated legal and financial planning.

We work alongside clients' accountants, financial advisors, investment professionals, insurance advisors, and other professionals to develop and implement strategies that address the client's complete financial picture.

Generational Giving & Legacy Planning

The transfer of wealth from one generation to the next presents both opportunities and challenges. Effective planning requires consideration not only of tax efficiency, but also of how and when assets should pass, who should exercise control, and how wealth can be structured to benefit future generations responsibly.

Peck Baxter assists families with lifetime gifting strategies, multigenerational trusts, business and investment interests, charitable giving, and other wealth-transfer structures.

For families with closely held businesses or substantial investment assets, we also help coordinate estate planning with succession and governance considerations so that the transfer of wealth does not unintentionally disrupt the businesses and investments that created it.

Family Offices & Private Capital

Families with substantial and diversified assets often require legal counsel extending beyond traditional trusts and estates.

Peck Baxter advises family offices, family investment entities, and private clients regarding governance, entity structuring, investment transactions, private credit, lending arrangements, real estate investments, and other private-capital matters.

Our broader experience in corporate transactions, finance, real estate, and litigation allows us to advise private clients on investments and business matters within the context of their larger wealth and estate-planning objectives.

We understand that sophisticated private clients often value continuity, discretion, and counsel who understand the relationships among their family, operating businesses, investment portfolio, and estate plan. Our goal is to provide that integrated perspective.

Estate & Trust Administration

Peck Baxter represents trustees, personal representatives, beneficiaries, and families in the administration of trusts and estates.

Following a death, even a well-designed estate plan must be properly implemented. Our attorneys guide fiduciaries through the administration process, including identifying and collecting assets, interpreting governing documents, addressing creditor claims, coordinating tax matters, making distributions, and fulfilling fiduciary obligations.

Where substantial businesses, real estate, investment assets, or complex trusts are involved, administration may require coordination across multiple legal and financial disciplines. We help clients navigate those issues while working toward an orderly and efficient resolution.

Probate & Fiduciary Matters

When probate is required, Peck Baxter guides personal representatives and families through the court process and advises them regarding their responsibilities in administering the estate.

We also represent trustees, personal representatives, beneficiaries, and other interested parties when disagreements arise concerning wills, trusts, estate administration, fiduciary duties, distributions, asset ownership, or the conduct of a fiduciary.

Because these matters often involve both significant assets and important family relationships, we look for practical resolutions where appropriate while remaining prepared to litigate contested probate and trust matters when necessary.

Family Law & Guardianships

Peck Baxter represents clients in significant family-law matters, including divorce, property division, custody and support issues, and related proceedings.

Our attorneys also assist families with guardianships and conservatorships involving minors or adults who are unable to manage their own personal or financial affairs.

Family-law matters can involve substantial financial consequences as well as intensely personal concerns. Where a divorce or other family dispute involves businesses, real estate, trusts, investments, or significant marital assets, our attorneys can draw upon the firm's broader corporate, real estate, estate planning, and litigation experience to address the financial issues accompanying the family-law proceeding.

Criminal Defense

Peck Baxter represents individuals facing criminal investigations and charges. We understand that a criminal matter can threaten a client's freedom, reputation, employment, professional standing, and family.

Our attorneys provide strategic representation from the earliest stages of an investigation through negotiations, motion practice, trial, and other proceedings. We approach criminal matters with the same emphasis on preparation, advocacy, and courtroom experience that defines the firm's broader litigation practice.

Our Approach

The most important personal legal matters rarely fit within a single practice area. Wealth, family, business ownership, investments, succession, and estate planning are often interconnected, and significant life events can affect several of them at once.

Peck Baxter's Private Client & Personal Services practice is designed around that reality. Our attorneys work across the firm's estate planning, corporate, real estate, finance, family law, and litigation practices to provide coordinated counsel when a client's needs require more than a single legal specialty.

For some clients, that means preparing a first estate plan. For others, it means structuring the transfer of substantial wealth and business interests across multiple generations, advising a family office on private investments, administering a complex estate, or navigating an unexpected personal legal matter.

Whatever the circumstances, our objective is to protect what our clients have built, provide clarity during important transitions, and help preserve their families, businesses, and legacies for the future.