Lisa Weinstein Burns

Lisa Weinstein Burns is a partner in Rimon’s Private Client Group. For over 20 years, Ms. Burns has concentrated her practice in the areas of tax planning, multi-generational wealth transfers, business succession planning, estate planning and estate administration.

Ms. Burns approaches estate planning as a holistic process.  Estate planning is one of the most important investments a person can make. Ms. Burns seeks to protect a family’s well-being by preserving the wealth that has taken a lifetime or more to acquire through creation of a plan to promote family harmony and minimize taxes to the extent feasible. She listens to clients’ needs and coordinates with their advisors to customize documents and overall planning strategies to meet those needs.

Her work with clients includes drafting a variety of estate planning documents including wills, revocable trusts, irrevocable insurance and generation-skipping trusts, qualified personal residence trusts, charitable trusts, durable powers of attorney and healthcare proxies. Ms. Burns also assists executors and fiduciaries with estate and trust administration matters.

Ms. Burns has achieved an AV Preeminent Rating in Martindale Hubbell from her peers, which is the highest possible rating for both ethical standards and legal ability. Ms. Burns has been elected as a Fellow to the American College of Trust and Estate Counsel (ACTEC), which recognizes attorneys who have established outstanding reputations among their peers in terms of skill, experience, and high standards of professional and ethical conduct in the practice of trusts and estates law. Ms. Burns has been recognized by Boston Magazine and Law Politics magazine as a “Super Lawyer Rising Star” in the area of Trusts and Estates.

In the April 2008 issue of Women’s Business Boston, Ms. Burns was named one of The Top 10 Lawyers by readers. Ms. Burns is a lecturer for Massachusetts Continuing Legal Education (MCLE) and has published several articles on various legal topics. Ms. Burns has served as a member of the Nominating Committee for Shir Tikvah synagogue in Winchester, Massachusetts, and as a member of the Winchester Hospital Foundation Advisory Council.

A few examples of Ms. Burns’ work are as follows:

• Designed a transfer strategy utilizing Grantor Retained Annuity Trusts (GRATs) to move appreciation from targeted assets from parent to trust for children while minimizing transfer taxes and enabling parent to retain an interest in the principal asset.
• Executed sale of multi-million dollar family-owned business to future generations via grantor dynasty trust without incurring capital gains tax and minimizing gift and estate taxes for the grantor.  The dynasty trust, which is fully generation-skipping tax exempt, will protect and preserve the family business stock from estate tax and creditor claims in future generations, as well as help maintain consistent and orderly management of the company.
• Developed strategy to pass $5 Million family vacation home to the next generation in trust over a term of years by establishing multiple long-term Qualified Personal Residence Trusts (QPRTs) to minimize use of federal gift tax exemption.