William R. Culp Jr.

Bill Culp helps clients structure their business and personal affairs to minimize taxes and maximize their wealth. He represents a variety of clients, from entrepreneurs and private investors to large corporate clients. Clients look to him for guidance in structuring complex business arrangements and transactions, and for solutions to the most challenging business problems.

Bill has extensive experience in federal and state income, estate and gift taxation. His practice includes family business planning, wealth preservation planning, tax controversies, and trust and probate controversies. He is also involved in business and real estate matters including acquisitions, dispositions, and complex entity ownership planning.

Bill advises clients on multi-generational trust arrangements. He serves as trustee for a number of large trusts and as trustee is intimately involved in all aspects of trust administration. Over the years, Bill has assisted numerous clients in the preparation for sale and sale of their family businesses.

• Assisted clients in transfers of multi-million dollar businesses from older generation family members to younger generation family members.
• Assisted clients in the creation and funding of numerous multi-generational irrevocable trusts.
• Litigated income tax and estate tax cases in US Tax Court.
• Successfully represented clients in the examination on appeals divisions of the IRS in “no change” audits of multi-million dollar conservation easements.
• Represented numerous clients in the sale of family businesses to third party purchasers.
• Advised clients in complex estate and probate litigation.
• As a member of the NC Legislative Committee of the Estate Planning and Fiduciary Law Section of the North Carolina Bar Association, Bill has extensive experience in the drafting and enactment of trust legislation in North Carolina.
• Designed and implemented numerous business organization structures to own family business assets through a series of trusts, limited liability companies and corporations.
• Assisted clients in the design, structure and implementation of foreign trusts to own business and investment assets.
• Represented foreign individuals in the formation of trust and investment entities in the U.S.
• Designed innovative and effective “Partnership Exit Strategies” to receive assets tax-free from partnerships.
• Designed and implemented innovative and effective transactions for real estate developers to trigger losses to be carried back to prior year to obtain refunds of taxes paid in prior years.
• Assisted clients in “decanting” assets from existing trusts to new trusts for various purposes including modernization of trust processes, extention of trust terms and preservation of assets.