Most people work a lifetime to build something worth leaving behind. Yet without the right planning, a significant portion of what you have accumulated can pass to HMRC rather than to the people you intended.
Inheritance tax is sometimes called a voluntary tax. Not because it is optional, but because with thoughtful, timely planning, its impact can often be reduced significantly. The rules are complex, the thresholds have been frozen for years, and more families than ever are now caught by inheritance tax who never expected to be.
As financial planners, we do not give specific tax advice, but we work closely with solicitors and accountants and help you understand how your financial decisions interact with your estate. We look at the bigger picture and make sure the right professionals are involved at the right time.
Estate planning spans a wide range of decisions, from understanding your current position to putting the right structures in place for the future.
We help you map what you own, what it is worth, and how it is structured, covering property, pensions, investments, savings, and business interests, to identify where inheritance tax exposure sits.
Everyone has a nil-rate band (currently £325,000) and, where applicable, a residence nil-rate band (up to £175,000). Understanding how these interact and how to protect them is a fundamental starting point.
Giving assets away during your lifetime is one of the most straightforward ways to reduce an estate. We help you understand annual exemptions, potentially exempt transfers, and the seven-year rule.
Pensions sit outside your estate for inheritance tax purposes and can be a highly effective way of passing wealth to the next generation. Getting this right matters more than ever following recent legislative changes.
Where an inheritance tax liability cannot easily be reduced, a whole of life insurance policy written in trust can provide the funds to meet it without requiring assets to be sold.
Trusts can be useful for protecting assets, controlling how wealth passes, or removing assets from an estate over time. Where trusts are relevant, we work alongside legal advisers to ensure everything is structured correctly.
Inheritance and estate planning is relevant for anyone who has accumulated assets they want to pass on, whether that is a family home, an investment portfolio, a pension, or a business. It becomes particularly important when your estate exceeds, or is approaching, the inheritance tax threshold.
It is also relevant if you have recently experienced a change in circumstances that has materially changed the size or shape of your estate.
Planning early gives you more options. But it is never too late to start.
Effective estate planning rarely sits with one adviser alone. Where your situation calls for a Will review, trust drafting, or specific tax advice, we will work alongside your solicitor and accountant, or help you find the right ones if you do not already have them.
Our role is to ensure your financial plan and your estate plan are telling the same story.
Get in touch with the RowanTree team for a free, no-obligation conversation. We are here to help you plan with confidence.
