Alberta Farm Inheritance Lawyer

ALBERTA FARM INHERITANCE LAWYER

Farm Inheritance - Challenges & Disputes

When the family farm passes from one generation to the next, it is important that as an heir to your parents’ family farm, you adequately protect your stake in the farming inheritance. This is particularly important where there is an effort to effect an inequitable division of the family farm or the proposed approach is inconsistent with what you believe your parents’ true intent was for their farm and their estate. Given the underlying value that is often attributable to a family farm, you should not simply accept presented outcome without proper investigation and analysis from a knowledge lawyer committed to protect your interests.

And even when you aren't personally looking to be engaged in the farming business, that does not mean that you aren't entitled to your fair share of the farm's value. What is critical is having a solid legal position with which to effectively argue, if appropriate, for an enhanced stake from the inheritance that is to be divided amongst family members.

Farm Inheritance Issues

Inheriting the family farm in conjunction with your siblings (brothers and sisters) can be significantly more problematic than one might anticipate, even where your recently deceased parents made an apparently equitable conferral of the family farm to their children. For when the family farm was held by your parents, they generally has a commonality of interests with respect to the farm, even though they would also have their normal spousal disputes and disagreements. This is considerably different from the situation of siblings granted an equitable interest in the family farm, yet having different pursuits in life and levels of commitment to the operation and advancement of the farm. This divergence in interests and inputs can create enormous conflicts, which is only exacerbated by pre-existing sibling rivalry and predispositions as to not working or relying upon one's brothers and sisters to do what you necessarily believe is best for the family farm's future.

Advance Planning for the Family Farm

Given the significant problems that can arise from inadequate legal preparation for transitioning the family farm to future generations, retaining legal counsel to formulate and implement solid legal plans for the future of one's family farm should be a priority for every farm owner. Not only does effective planning allow you to make aut appropriate decisions with respect to the transference of the family farm so as to reduce the potential for inter-family disputes, but also enables tax planning such that more wealth can be transferred with minimal intervention from the government and the tax authorities.