Hope Leibsohn featured in the cover story of Public Accountant

G R E AT E R P H O E N I X E D I T I O N | M A R C H 2 0 1 3
M A G A Z I N E®
Cover Story:
Hope Leibsohn of
Sherman & Howard L.L.C.
Also Inside:
Accounting & Financial
Women’s Alliance
Association Profile
Cover
Hope
Leibsohn
of Sherman
& Howard L.L.C.
By Dan Baldwin
16 | Greater Phoenix Public Accountant Magazine® March 2013
Helping People Create a Legacy
“(My job) involves posing questions to clients so that they can
get clarity on their deepest beliefs and their values. They can then
create a legacy that’s meaningful to them, their families, and their
communities, depending on whom they are seeking to benefit,”
says Hope Leibsohn of Sherman & Howard’s Scottsdale office.
“I specialize in estate planning. It’s a pleasure to come to work.
It’s really about helping people create visions defining the essence
of their lives,” she says.
Sherman & Howard L.L.C. is a regional firm with
approximately 180 lawyers serving a national client base that
includes individuals, privately held businesses, multi-national
corporations, and government entities. The firm was founded
in Denver in 1892. Estate planning and related services are an
integral part of the corporate makeup. In addition to Denver
and Scottsdale, the firm has offices in Phoenix, Aspen, Atlanta,
Colorado Springs, Las Vegas, Reno, St. Louis, Steamboat Springs,
and Vail Valley.
Leibsohn says, “I have a variety of clients. I have some clients
who are entrepreneurs, some clients who are current or retired
executives, some clients who own their own closely-held
businesses, and some clients who are professionals. There isn’t
one prototype client.”
Local Contact with Regional Support
Sherman & Howard’s business philosophy is to produce high
quality work in a broad area of interests, which includes estate
planning. Typically, attorneys specialize, selecting an area
of emphasis in which they become an expert so that they can
provide a higher level of expertise and overall service. Leibsohn
adds, “My personal business philosophy is to always add value
and to inspire others to really create the legacy that they want to
leave behind. It is more inspirational. What is going to empower
a beneficiary to really invest his or her day in something the
beneficiary is passionate about, as opposed to living life from
the perspective of what the person is expected to do or what the
person happens to show talent for pursuing. What makes the
person lose track of time? What really makes the day one that if
the person had to repeat it, it sounds like a meaningful growth
experience rather than a drudgery.”
The firm’s Scottsdale office was expanded in the summer of
2011, which provided an opportunity for Leibsohn, her clients,
and the firm.
She had been practicing estate planning for more than 20 years
and most of her clients lived in Scottsdale or Paradise Valley. She
felt it unnecessary for her clients to have to travel to downtown
Phoenix (where she worked at another firm) when estate planning
is such a personal area of the law and does not require proximity
to a courthouse.
“I went on a search for other estate planning firms or firms
that had a substantial estate planning department with whom I
could affiliate. Sherman Howard’s estate planning department is
extraordinary. It is the oldest law firm in the Denver area and
we have tremendous talent in our tax department. I really enjoy
the collaborative experience with those in our Colorado offices,
as well as working with the talented team of attorneys in our
Arizona offices. Our firm works on projects together whether
a client is in our Denver office or our Scottsdale office. Location
of the attorneys is not the paramount factor. It’s who has the
particular expertise and who has the available time to best serve
the client.”
A Learning Experience for the Client
“The initial client consultation is often a learning opportunity
and I hope a positive experience. People think about death and
taxes as such negative topics. They don’t want to focus on end of
life issues, so often they put them aside until something critical
happens. Really, the field can be quite positive, as the existential
discussions can encourage a person to step back and evaluate his
or her life and say, ‘What is it that I want to accomplish in my
“We’re not just helping
clients create documents,
but rather we’re bringing
them to life.”
lifetime? What do I really want my legacy to be? What is the final
message I want to leave to my family members?’ Yes, they’re going
to have a lot of legal documents that have a significant amount of
legalese, but they can also accomplish so much more by leaving
an intangible legacy of their values and their hopes and dreams
for the people or organizations they intend to benefit,” Leibsohn
says.
She notes that many clients come in motivated to handle tax
planning. In fact, their typical number one initially expressed
goal is to minimize taxes. Yet, throughout the course of the
conversation, the client discussions with Leibsohn touch on many
other areas. For example, the client may have family members
who have special challenges in which outright distributions
would be fine from a tax perspective, but wouldn’t be ideal from
an interpersonal perspective considering their long-term best
interests. A lot of the discussions frequently go beyond what the
clients believe they are coming to plan for and touch upon who
they are currently, who they desire to become and their vision for
their family for generations to come.
Leibsohn says, “They believe they’re coming to plan for taxes
and to specify distributions to be made when they’re gone.
However, they often leave with a much more comprehensive
plan for how they can truly best benefit their family members,
friends or charities. Maybe that is giving someone an outright
distribution or maybe it is crafting something more of an ongoing trust that provides some asset protection, some divorce
protection, some multi-generation legacy planning and also some
motivating factors so their family members are encouraged to be
productive rather than merely passively living off the trust assets.
Often the documents are drafted so as to discourage that trust
fund baby mentality.”
With her compassionate and upbeat style, Leibsohn strives
to truly understand the client’s personal worldview and to help
her clients carry out their customized visions. Her clients are
generally people who have worked hard throughout their lifetimes
to acquire significant assets and are seeking to leave behind
something positive. They are individuals who have amassed a
significant net worth and who need to incorporate tax planning
strategies. “They are also people who are desirous of
March 2013 Greater Phoenix Public Accountant Magazine® | 17
organizing their affairs during their lifetimes through
thoughtful legal planning to ensure that the inheritance they
leave behind is received as a true blessing,” Leibsohn says.
The firm’s typical client has several million dollars of net worth
and their financial affairs tend to be more complex than most.
Leibsohn is often involved in what she calls a two-step process in
handling a client’s estate planning challenges.
Step one may include such basics as a revocable living trust,
pour-over wills, and powers of attorney. Step two is designed
to meet other potential challenges or opportunities. These
services may require certain types of irrevocable trusts, or certain
freeze techniques, or ways to restructure the life insurance so
it is preserved as a way to pay estate taxes without the funds
themselves being taxed.
Assuring the Legacy
Leibsohn helps clients think about their messages they will
leave to their family members. As part of the estate planning
and legacy process, she sometimes encourages a client to write a
final wishes letter to his or her children or grandchildren about
who they have experienced them to be and what their hopes
and dreams are for their future. Sometimes the process involves
putting on a seminar for a charitable organization on something
Leibsohn calls “legacy value wills” where the person starts with
what has been his or her life lesson. What are the values that he or
she believes are guiding life principles and what are the person’s
hopes and dreams for those loved ones left behind?
Leibsohn works with clients and their families in helping them
realize that estate planning is just a springboard for creating
something larger and more meaningful.
Leibsohn says, “I spend a lot of my time with people who have
family foundations that I help them establish and in working on
bringing everybody in the family together. Typically you have
a whole mixture of personalities and talents within a family. In
many cases, you can work with that base to create a business
endeavor where, for example, there is a certain dollar amount
that has to be given annually to charities. We can help them
create a family mission statement for their philanthropy and have
each family member find a way to use his or her unique talents
to support that mission. Leibsohn further comments, “We’re not
just helping clients create documents, but rather we’re bringing
them to life.”
“Our clients usually feel great when they sign the documents.
They know their plan is complete. If the clients feel well served
and that they truly received value, then my job was well done,”
says Leibsohn.
18 | Greater Phoenix Public Accountant Magazine® March 2013
At A Glance
Sherman & Howard
7033 East Greenway Parkway
Suite 250
Scottsdale, AZ 85254
480-624-2710
Home Office:
633 Seventeenth St., Suite 3000
Denver CO, 80202
• Serving national clients from a Southwest base
• Extensive estate planning department
• Advanced estate planning and related services
• Lawyer specialization
• Typical client has several million dollars in assets
• Branch offices in Scottsdale, Phoenix, Aspen, Atlanta,
Colorado Springs, Las Vegas, Reno, St. Louis,
Steamboat Springs and Vail Valley.
• Founded 1892
• Denver’s oldest law firm