Coonen Law

Estate Planning and Probate Attorneys in Comstock Park, Michigan

Coonen Law, PLLC is an estate planning, probate and business planning firm in Comstock Park serving clients in the Grand Rapids area and throughout Michigan. Led by attorney Rose A. Coonen, the firm works with families at many different stages of life, from parents deciding who should care for young children to business owners preparing for retirement, disability or an eventual transfer of the company.

The firm's planning work extends beyond preparing wills and trusts. Coonen Law addresses what can happen when a parent dies unexpectedly, a beneficiary has special needs, a remarriage brings together children from previous relationships, or the people someone considers family do not have automatic legal rights. The firm also helps families administer estates and trusts after a death and works with business owners on succession and exit planning.

What Happens to the Children if Both Parents Are Gone?

For parents with young children, an estate plan has to answer questions that have little to do with the size of the estate. One of the most important is who should care for the children if neither parent is able to do so.

Coonen Law places particular emphasis on planning for families with children. Its work includes helping parents nominate legal guardians and consider how children would be cared for if their parents died or became unable to raise them. The firm also provides educational resources specifically devoted to protecting children through estate planning.

Parents also need to decide what should happen to the property they leave behind. The person a parent trusts to raise a child is not necessarily the same person who should manage an inheritance. Trust planning can establish how money and other property will be managed for children rather than leaving those decisions unresolved after the parents are gone.

These issues can be especially important for a young family that has accumulated life insurance, retirement accounts, a home and other assets but has never created a coordinated plan for what happens to them.

Providing for a Child With Special Needs

Special-needs planning is a significant part of Coonen Law's practice. Rose Coonen identifies working with families who have children with special needs as a focus of her work and has written and taught on the subject.

For parents, the central concern may be much larger than deciding who receives an inheritance. They may be thinking about who will look after their child when they are no longer able to do so, where financial support will come from, and how inherited assets could affect eligibility for government assistance.

Coonen Law helps families consider these issues as part of a broader estate plan, including the use of special-needs planning designed to provide resources for a beneficiary without unnecessarily disrupting access to benefits. The firm's approach recognizes that planning for a person with special needs may require coordination among family members and others who will play different roles over that person's lifetime.

For parents who have spent years managing a child's care, finances and support system themselves, creating that structure can be an important part of preparing for a future in which they may no longer be able to fill those roles.

When a Family Includes Children From an Earlier Relationship

A second marriage can create competing estate-planning concerns. A person may want a surviving spouse to remain financially secure while also wanting to make certain that children from an earlier relationship ultimately receive an inheritance.

Simply leaving everything to the surviving spouse does not necessarily accomplish both objectives. Circumstances can change after the first spouse dies, and property inherited outright by the survivor may ultimately pass in a way the deceased spouse never intended.

Coonen Law addresses estate planning for blended families and helps clients consider how wills, trusts and beneficiary arrangements can be structured around obligations to a spouse and children from previous relationships.

The firm also works with single parents, unmarried couples and people whose closest relationships may not fit traditional family structures. This can be particularly important when someone wants a partner, friend or other member of a "chosen family" to inherit property or participate in healthcare and financial decisions. 

Without appropriate legal documents, the people someone trusts most may not automatically have the authority or inheritance rights the person assumed they would have.

An Estate Plan Has to Keep Up With a Changing Life

Signing estate-planning documents does not prevent a family's circumstances from changing.

People buy and sell property. Children are born and grow up. Marriages begin and end. Beneficiaries develop new needs. Financial accounts change. Businesses grow. Someone originally selected to serve as trustee, personal representative or agent may no longer be the best choice years later.

Coonen Law emphasizes continuing attention to estate plans rather than treating planning as a one-time transaction. That can include reviewing whether documents still reflect the client's wishes and whether assets and beneficiary arrangements remain coordinated with the plan.

Trust planning also requires attention to how assets are owned. Creating a trust on paper does not necessarily accomplish the intended result if property that was supposed to be associated with the trust is never properly coordinated with it. For families who created a plan years ago and have experienced significant financial or personal changes since then, a review can identify areas that no longer fit their current lives.

Carrying Out an Estate or Trust After a Death

Planning documents are only part of the process. After someone dies, another person may suddenly become responsible for carrying out those instructions.

Coonen Law assists executors and families with probate administration when assets must pass through the probate court. Probate can require identifying and gathering property, addressing debts and other obligations, following court procedures and eventually distributing the remaining estate to the appropriate beneficiaries.

The firm also assists with trust administration. A successor trustee may have been chosen years earlier but have little experience with the legal and practical responsibilities that begin after the person who created the trust dies. Administration can require the trustee to understand the trust's instructions, deal with assets and beneficiaries and carry out the plan properly.

Coonen Law's team includes attorneys whose work encompasses estate planning, probate administration and related disputes. Of-counsel attorney Cristopher Hogan also has experience with probate litigation, giving the firm resources for matters in which administration develops into a contested proceeding.

When the Business Dad Built Can No Longer Depend on Dad

For a family business, the owner's death or incapacity can create two crises at once. The family has lost someone important, while employees, customers and other owners may immediately need to know who can make decisions for the company.

Coonen Law has substantial material devoted to this problem. Rose Coonen is a Certified Exit Planning Advisor and works with businesses from formation and growth through succession and exit planning. The firm's business succession work considers what should happen if an owner retires, becomes disabled or dies.

The questions can be intensely practical. Is a child actually prepared to run the company? Should ownership remain in the family even if management does not? What happens to a deceased owner's interest when there are other owners? Could a surviving partner afford to purchase that interest? Are key employees important to the company's continuation? How will the business be valued?

Succession planning can involve buy-sell arrangements, insurance, ownership transfers and other strategies for creating an orderly transition. It also needs to coordinate with the owner's personal estate plan so that instructions concerning the business do not conflict with what happens to the rest of the estate.

For an owner whose company represents a substantial portion of the family's wealth, these decisions can affect not only the future of the business but also the financial security of a spouse, children and other beneficiaries.

Estate Planning for Different Levels of Wealth and Complexity

Not every family needs the same estate plan. Coonen Law works with clients whose needs range from foundational planning to more complicated wealth-transfer and asset-protection concerns.

Its work includes wills, trusts, powers of attorney and beneficiary planning as well as asset protection, charitable planning and estate-tax planning. Attorney Rebecca Johnson's practice includes grantor and non-grantor trusts, beneficiary designations, gifting strategies and charitable planning in addition to wills and powers of attorney.

The appropriate structure depends on the client's family, assets and objectives. For some people, the priority is making sure trusted people can act during an incapacity and that property passes efficiently after death. Others may need to consider taxation, creditor exposure, substantial business interests, charitable goals or the long-term management of inherited wealth.

An Estate-Focused Team in Comstock Park

Coonen Law practices from its office at 4582 West River Drive, Suite F, in Comstock Park.

Rose A. Coonen concentrates her work on estate planning, business planning and probate administration, with particular attention to families with children and families planning for people with special needs. Rebecca Johnson's work includes estate and wealth-transfer planning, while of-counsel attorney Joshua Farrell focuses much of his practice on estate planning and probate 

administration. Of-counsel attorney Cristopher Hogan adds experience involving probate litigation and asset protection.

Together, the firm's practice allows it to address both everyday family planning and circumstances in which estate planning intersects with special needs, substantial assets or ownership of a closely held business.

Practice Areas

• Estate Planning

• Wills

• Revocable and Irrevocable Trusts

• Powers of Attorney

• Beneficiary Designations

• Planning for Minor Children

• Guardian Nominations

• Special Needs Planning

• Blended Family Estate Planning

• Planning for Unmarried and Chosen Families

• Asset Protection Planning

• Estate Tax Planning

• Gifting and Charitable Planning

• Probate Administration

• Trust Administration

• Probate Litigation

• Business Planning

• Business Succession and Exit Planning