Robert F. McGuirk, Esq., CFP®

How I got here

I started out as a financial advisor, at large firms and small ones. The same thing kept happening. I would build a plan with a client, reach the part where the legal documents mattered, and hand them off to an attorney. Then I would watch a sound financial plan and a sound estate plan fail to line up with each other.

So I went to law school instead of continuing to make the referral.

I am admitted in New York and in Florida, and I am a CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER™. That combination is uncommon, and it is the entire point of this practice. Most of what families own now sits in retirement accounts, and those pass by beneficiary designation, outside the will, under tax rules that have nothing to do with estate law. Drafting documents without understanding the accounts produces plans that are technically correct and practically broken.

What I do here is legal work: wills, trusts, asset protection, probate, retirement division orders, and planning for the cost of long term care. This firm does not manage investments or give investment advice. What the financial background lets me do is explain the money side in language that makes sense, and work alongside your financial advisor and your accountant so the three of us are not building three different plans.

I would rather be the person you call when something changes than the person who handed you a binder once. Most of my clients come back when something happens: a house sale, a divorce, a diagnosis, a new grandchild. That is how this is supposed to work.