back

Entrepreneurial inheritance law and asset succession

It is important for entrepreneurs to address the issues of corporate succession and inheritance law at an early stage. Only by setting the course at an early stage can they guarantee long-term success and the security of their own life’s work.

As an entrepreneur, you have developed your company over many years with hard work and great dedication. You created economic values as well as jobs for your employees. Naturally, it is of great concern to you that your company is best prepared for the future and is in good hands. After all, it is important to secure the value of the company for yourself or the next generation, and also to ensure the continuation of the company after your own departure.

You should therefore take precautions as early as possible and deal with the topic of inheritance law and business succession. Only by setting the course at an early stage can you guarantee that your company will continue to be successful and secure even after you retire and hand it over to the next generation or a successor.

Company succession

After all, it is crucial that you do everything in good time to prepare suitable successors, especially your own children, for their future tasks in the best possible way. In this way, you do not have to relinquish the management of the company even in the transitional years and can check whether the family members or third persons considered as successors are suitable for taking over the company. Meanwhile, you yourself stand by the successors with advice and support.

When dealing with succession issues, it is also important to keep an eye on tax burdens and possible ways to avoid them. We present this important aspect either together with your existing tax advisor or, if you wish, with proven tax partners.

The correct regulation of business succession is an important part of your overall asset and wealth succession and must be coordinated with this in a conflict-free manner. This presupposes knowledge of the essential legal regulations under inheritance law in the German Civil Code (BGB) and the principles of company law in the corresponding laws.

Inheritance law

To avoid later conflicts under inheritance law between the heirs and possible other beneficiaries and to ensure that one’s own ideas are implemented after death, it is advisable to make appropriate arrangements under inheritance law during one’s lifetime.

For entrepreneurs, their own company is their life’s work, created over years if not decades, and much more than just an asset and their own place of work. It is therefore all the more important for entrepreneurs to ensure that their life’s work will continue after their own death – for the future of their employees as well as for possible successors from their own family. For this reason alone, the entrepreneur should deal with the topic of inheritance law and company succession at an early stage and make the necessary decisions and legal arrangements with care and expertise.
We would like to support you in this process.

Our services in this respect include the following aspects:

  1. Advice on inheritance law before and after succession

  2. Advice on succession

  3. Drafting of wills and other testamentary dispositions

  4. Legacies

  5. Inheritance contracts

  6. Anticipated succession

  7. Enforcement or defence of inheritance claims

  8. Settlement of communities of heirs

  9. Enforcement or defence of compulsory portion claims, compulsory portion supplementary claims or compulsory portion residual claims

  10. Lasting powers of attorney and general powers of attorney

  11. Guardianship decrees, living wills

  12. Negotiations with banks, tax offices, public authorities

  13. Limitation of liability towards creditors of the estate

  14. Strategies for avoiding compulsory portions

  15. Execution of wills

Your contact persons

We will be happy to provide initial clarification in a non-binding, absolutely confidential discussion or telephone call.

Martin Zeil

„Trust, competence and life experience are the foundations for a successful cooperation with my clients.“

Martin Zeil
Rechtsanwalt (Lawyer)
Bavarian Minister of State (retd.)

„Competent - Performance - Success - Together“

Dr. Christian Strassberger
Rechtsanwalt (Lawyer), Partner
Certified Specialist Lawyer for Corporate and Commercial Law
Dr. Christian Strassberger

Voices of our clients

Special thanks to Sandra for her outstanding professionalism and her mediation between the parties that has been so valuable to close the deal.
Cristiano N., Executive Chairman of a leading Italian industrial company with focus on renewable energies
Casual Friday Look
ONOFF