Estate Planning

Philadelphia Estate Planning Lawyer Joseph Gembala

For reliable advice about wills, trusts, and end-of-life health and medical treatment issues, contact Joseph A. Gembala III, Esq. & Associates, in Philadelphia. For more than 20 years, we have drafted testamentary and trust instruments that accurately reflect our clients' wishes concerning the transfer of their assets to their heirs, as well as their preferences for decision-making authority when they are no longer able to make their own difficult financial or health care decisions.

Our basic estate planning services involve a will, medical and financial powers of attorney, and an advance health care directive for physicians and surgeons. The powers of attorney allow you to designate persons you trust to make decisions concerning your health care and financial affairs in the event of an illness or accident that leaves you unable to communicate your own objectives. We can draft the powers of attorney to give your designated agents guidance as to your preferences in particular situations.

An advance health care directive documents your intention that a physician suspend or terminate efforts to keep you alive under certain circumstances, such as a persistent vegetative state of a given duration, or other conditions from which there's no prospect of recovery. If you have no advance health care directive or other form of living will in place, Pennsylvania physicians are required by law to do everything possible to keep you alive under any circumstances.

With respect to your assets, our review of your estate, tax characteristics, and objectives will generate alternatives for living trusts, educational trusts, life insurance trusts, tax-free gifts to family members, charitable trusts, and other wealth preservation and transfer devices that can reduce your tax exposure while making sure that your assets go where you intend them. In addition, Philadelphia estate planning attorney Joseph Gembala can help you with family business succession planning, when you intend that your operations continue smoothly and profitably after your retirement or death.

We also advise families about special needs trusts for the continuing care of adult children who are developmentally disabled or for other reasons are unable to manage their own affairs. Estate planning lawyer Joseph Gembala can advise you whether you're in Pennsylvania or South Jersey, and if necessary, he can meet with you at home or in a hospital or nursing home. Contact us in Philadelphia for further information about our ability to handle your life care planning, estate planning, or probate needs.