Barbara E Little

Barbara E. Little is an attorney in the Trust and Estates practice group at Obermayer Rebmann Maxwell & Hippel.  Barbara knew she wanted to focus her legal career on what was most comfortable - making personal connection with individual clients and making a difference in her community.  And that is what she does as an estate planning and administration (probate) attorney.  Barbara personally knows estate planning is not just for the ultra-rich - it is a service needed by every individual, family and business owner.  

From young professionals, new parents, blended family, retiree to the small business owner or high net worth individuals, Barbara takes life's puzzle pieces and creates a comprehensive compassionate estate plan.  Through various planning techniques, she helps individuals create a legacy, roadmap for the transfer wealth (to family, friends and charity, minimizing what is taken by the government!) and create systems to protect loved ones.  Her clients feel comfortable speaking openly about important, but sensitive personal issues which provides her with a deeper understanding of their unique situations, needs and goals. 

She layers on top of these individual needs her wealth of knowledge about state and federal tax issues. She strives to make sure her clients are not starry eyed, but instead understand the complicated legal concepts that are the foundation to each estate plan.  Through clear everyday language, she applies her writing skills to create documents (e.g. Wills, Power of Attorneys, Living Wills, Revocable Trust, Irrevocable Trusts and Charitable Trusts) that connect the dots and give her clients a piece of mind. 

Barbara intimately understands the joys and pains of family owned business - She is married to a small business owner.  In supporting her husband, and now her clients, Barbaraserved as a human resources consultant to both for profit and nonprofit companies. She created hiring standards, employee evaluation systems and drafted employee handbooks. She has parlayed this experience into serving as corporate counsel for several family businesses in southern New Jersey. 

Prior to entering the field of law, Barbara served as a university administrator working with students who pushed the limits (student's misconduct).  She also opened doors and ensured students with disabilities had fair access to achieving their dreams.  And she held the hands of mother's grieving the death of their child and coordinate the end of life celebration for these students that were taken too soon.  Due to these experiences, Barbara understands the difficult of facing mortality, the grieving cycle and the burden that can be lifted from a family by an experience estate administrator focused on the administration, bureaucracy and taxes of the estate. 

Serving as clerk for the New Jersey Supreme Court did not fill Barbara's craving for research, analysis and writing, so she simultaneously received her LLM in Taxation and Certificate in Estate Planning from Temple University Beasley School of Law.  This foundation allows Barbara to cruise through the tax code to find the best outcome for her clients.    

Barbara fights for her client's rights in court and during the estate administration process by slashing through the bureaucracy. She helps clients exploring the need for wealth preservation and transfer, or those that are accepting the need to protect a loved one, realizing the business must live on.      

Barbara's clients often smile and declare the estate planning or administration process was nothing like they expected.