Monday, August 13, 2007 6:19 AM
There has been much speculation and conversation about whether the practice of law is becoming niche-driven, wherein lawyers develop a reputation for particularly deep experience and knowledge in some unique area of law. Typically, the niche area is part of a larger area of law, but one which has suddenly grown in terms of demand for any number of reasons, from demographics to globalization.
I love reading about lawyers who not only see a niche opportunity, but then take action so as to both grow their practice and provide a needed-service to people looking for assistance.
Case in point is attorney Stuart Hollander and CottageLaw.com. Mr. Hollander practices real estate and estate planning law in the heart of Michigan vacation country along the shores of Northern Lake Michigan (Suttons Bay to be exact). In Michigan (and really, the Midwest in general), generations have long talked about "going up north" for vacation and it seems almost every extended family has a cabin or cottage on a lake they visit every Summer.
What happens as families age, and the ownership of the family property is set to pass down from a mother and father to a range of children or other extended family members? Especially, when some family members wish to sell the property, while others wish to keep it in the family. By many accounts, this situation can lead to much acrimony, leaving families searching for professional assistance in easing the transition.
According to a recent Detroit Free Press article Cottage Quandary, Mr. Hollander, realized that a growing part of his already established practice was tied to estate planning involving the family vacation property (i.e., the family cottage). In response, he developed the niche into a central theme describing his practice and expanding his reputation in this area in a bid to gain clients from all over the country. Here is an excerpt from his interesting CottageLaw.com website:
The focus of our practice is cottage succession planning. We also have significant experience in estate planning, tax, probate, real property, and business law.
"Cottage law" refers to the legal tools we employ in cottage succession planning. The goal of cottage succession planning is to establish a legal arrangement that keeps a cottage in the family over multiple generations. The arrangement is a success only if it is perceived to be fair by each successive generation of owners.
With families today spread out all across the country, Mr. Hollander's potential client list goes much further than even the borders of Michigan, let alone his local community. And, through his website and now a book on the subject of cottage succession planning (entitled Saving the Family Cottage: A Guide to Succession Planning for your Cottage, Cabin, Camp or Vacation Home) he is reaching out to these potential clients while marketing himself, his team and even some of his ideas and methodologies.
Crafting a Cottage Plan
A cottage plan usually addresses these concerns through the creative use of a limited liability company (LLC), often paired with an endowment established by the founders. The endowment may be funded during the founder's lifetime through a gift to the LLC, or with cash proceeds from one or more policies insuring the life of the founder. If there is more than one founder, a second-to-die policy held by an irrevocable life insurance trust is an ideal tool for creating the cottage endowment.
The cottage plan must take into account common law rights of owners of real property. For example, it is typical for parents to leave a cottage equally to their children. The legal consequence is a "tenancy in common" among the children. These parents rarely realize that any of the children now can force the sale of the cottage through a court proceeding known as "partition."
Parents often do not consider the consequence of a child's leaving his share of the cottage to a spouse, the hardship imposed on a child who can't afford to maintain his share of the cottage, or the hard feelings among their children that result from a forced sale of an interest in the cottage.
Cottage planning is important if a family wishes to keep its cottage for several generations. It is a specialized field. We look forward to assisting your family with preserving its most important asset.
Alas, Mr. Hollander has not yet incorporated a weblog into his site, a step which I think would help his placement even more with the big search engines, but, all in all, I am impressed with his efforts. For any potential client searching the web for help with their succession planning involving a Michigan vacation property, it appears Mr. Hollander's practice would be hard to miss. It may be a niche, but given the "pig in the python," the bulging Baby Boom population in the United States represents, something tells me this niche could be lucrative for those positioned to provide needed services.
Good stuff.
See also, Saving the Family Cottage in the Leelanau Enterprise