What Is… international planning?

An interesting area of my practice (and one I absolutely love) is international planning, but it is also one of the most misunderstood aspects of my work!

International planning presents itself in a number of different ways.  At its core, however, it is ensuring that your planning works for and is cohesive across all of the jurisdictions involved.  Sometimes this means planning for a person who owns assets in multiple jurisdictions.  Other matters involve someone moving from one country to another.  Still others are considered international due to a fiduciary (one of the people who are named to a role in your plan) or beneficiary being a citizen or resident of another country.  Sometimes, the planning is for non-US persons regarding their US interests while other planning is for US persons regarding their non-US interests.

A large part of international planning is the coordination and collaboration with other advisors.  This is necessary due to the differences in laws, practices, and licensing across jurisdictions.  Having one person coordinate your team of professionals is essential to ensure that the plan works to achieve your goals without unintended negative consequences across all jurisdictions (without your US planning negatively affecting your Hong Kong planning or your German taxes, for example).  The expense of doing this varies greatly depending upon the advisors selected and the complexity of the work involved; sometimes it is only a little more than domestic only planning while other times it is an expensive (though necessary) endeavor.  We can work together to determine what is needed at what point and ensure that all is done as efficiently and effectively as possible.