"I have had the ongoing pleasure of working with Dirk on a comprehensive estate planning matter for close to a year and could not be more impressed with his knowledge, experience, creativeness and professionalism" - A Satisfied Client

Biography

Dirk M. Simpson advises business owners, executives, investors, professionals, and high-net-worth individuals and families in connection with estate planning, complex tax and administration issues relating to inter-generational wealth transfer, asset protection planning, charitable planning, and the structuring and transitioning of closely held businesses.

Client Experience

  • Clients looking to develop customized estate plans that integrate their vision values with proactive estate and income tax planning

  • Executors and trustees requiring experience and guidance to navigate challenging family dynamics 

  • Executors and trustees administering estates and trusts involving closely-held businesses and those with significant real estate holdings 

  • Business owners and entrepreneurs seeking to grow and protect their company and personal assets. This involves a focus on business exit planning, with shareholders and partners requiring independent individual counsel for resolving differences in situations involving conflicts of interest

Representative Experience

  • Implemented personalized estate plans for hundreds of clients over the past 20 years.

  • Represented C-suite executives and closely-held business owners with estate planning and asset protection involving the transfer of company equity to irrevocable trusts.

  • Counseled non-resident aliens with U.S. based-assets as well as U.S.-resident taxpayers with foreign assets in estate planning matters. 
  • Created several charitable structures, including the conversion of a private equestrian training facility into an IRS-approved private operating foundation providing equine therapy. 
  • Counsel and board member of a 501(c)(3) medical research institute that is commercializing medical research through an innovative public-private corporate structure that facilitates commercialization by nonprofits.

Personal Insights

My Greatest Strengths
  • Thinking visually to better understand concepts and realizing, to my thankful surprise, that many clients appreciate diagrams, flow charts, and pictures to simplify the complexity of estate and business plans.
I WANT YOU TO KNOW
  • I began my career in a private family office that was subsequently acquired by a local bank and trust company.  
WHAT MAKES ME UNIQUELY ME 
  • I find balance and draw inspiration through the creative process of making art: www.dirksimpson.com.

What Drives Me
  • Good lawyering is the art of creative problem solving and clear communication. 

Focus

Practice Focus
  • Gift, Estate, and Generation-Skipping Transfer Tax Planning

  • Estate and Trust Administration

  • Wills, Revocable Trusts, & Irrevocable Trusts

  • Business Succession Planning

  • Business Formation

  • Asset Protection Planning

INDUSTRIES

  • Private companies

  • Real estate owners and developers

  • Life sciences

  • Family offices, banks, and trust companies

  • Public charities and private foundations

News

Publications
  • Publication, RCCB Private Client Services Alert, 2020
  • COVID-19 Tax Alert
    Publication, RCCB Tax Alert, April 2020
  • The Best Estate and Financial Planning Topics
    Speaking Engagement, New York State Society of CPAs
  • Applying Integrated Estate, Financial and Asset Protection Planning
    Speaking Engagement, Virginia Society of Certified Public Accounts
  • Integrated Estate, Financial and Asset Protection Planning
    Speaking Engagement, Pennsylvania Institute of Certified Public Accountants

Community & Professional

Community & Professional
  • Temple University College of Science & Technology, Adjunct Faculty, External Advisory Board, Professional Science Master’s in Bioinnovation

  • Sbarro Health Research Organization, Director
  • Philadelphia Estate Planning Council, Member

Education

LL.M., Taxation, Villanova University Charles Widger School of Law, 2003

J.D., Villanova University Charles Widger School of Law, 1999

B.A., cum laude, Colgate University, 1996

Admissions

  • Pennsylvania
    New Jersey

Honors

Best Lawyers, 2024

  • Trusts and Estates
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