Boston, Massachusetts
Founded · Autumn 2008
75 Federal Street, Suite 1420
Boston, Massachusetts 02110
+1 (617) 555-0184
A third-generation
practice in fiduciary
stewardship.
Penhallow Estate Planning, LLP, was founded in Boston in the autumn of 2008 by Margaret Penhallow, J.D., LL.M. Taxation. Seventeen years on, the firm remains intentionally small — twenty-two professionals, two anchored offices, and a single bar of practice serving families whose planning requires the discretion of a private bank and the scholarship of an estate law journal.
Founded 2008
ACTEC Member
Concierge Intake by Referral
The Founder
Margaret Penhallow, J.D., LL.M. Taxation
Margaret Penhallow is a third-generation trust attorney. Her grandfather administered trusts from a single desk on State Street in 1947; her father chaired the fiduciary practice of a Hartford firm before her. She holds a Juris Doctor and a Master of Laws in Taxation from New York University (1992), and was elected to the American College of Trust and Estate Counsel in 2011.
Before founding the firm, she served for fourteen years as a private-client partner advising on multi-generational wealth structures, grantor-retained annuity trusts, and closely-held business succession. She is the author or co-author of fourteen peer-reviewed articles in Trusts & Estates Quarterly since 2017, and is admitted to the bar of the U.S. Tax Court.
The firm she founded is named for the family practice that preceded it. It is, by design, smaller than the practice her father ran, and slower than the pace at which most estate boutiques now close their engagements. The discipline of the work — and the long memory it requires — is the point.
- LL.M. Taxation
- New York University, 1992
- Bar Admissions
- Massachusetts · Connecticut · New York · U.S. Tax Court
- Fellowship
- American College of Trust and Estate Counsel (ACTEC), since 2011
- Published
- 14 articles in Trusts & Estates Quarterly, 2017–2024
The Practice
Two offices, by deliberate choice.
A national practice, by quiet reputation.
The firm maintains two anchored offices — Boston, where it was founded in 2008, and Greenwich, opened in 2016. There are no satellite desks, no regional partnerships, and no plans for either. The work is brought to clients in thirty-eight states under remote-engagement protocols that mirror the conventions of a private bank.
Greenwich, Connecticut
Opened · Spring 2016
88 Field Point Road, Third Floor
Greenwich, Connecticut 06830
+1 (203) 555-0142
22 professionals across the two offices — seven licensed attorneys, four CFP® practitioners, three in-house tax analysts, and a dedicated concierge intake desk. The team is intentionally small; it has not grown materially since 2019.
Standing in the Profession
Four signals the firm's peers recognise — and that bar associations, courts, and journals have published on the record.
2011
Fellow, ACTEC
Margaret Penhallow was elected to the American College of Trust and Estate Counsel in 2011. The firm has maintained continuous ACTEC membership across every subsequent admission cycle.
2022
2024
Top 25 Boutique Firm
Named to Private Wealth Magazine's list of the Top 25 Boutique Trusts & Estates Firms in both 2022 and 2024 — the only New England firm so recognised in consecutive editions.
14
Peer-Reviewed Articles
Fourteen articles in Trusts & Estates Quarterly since 2017, addressing grantor trust drafting, decanting, and the tax-elastic architecture of multi-generational holdings.
4
U.S. Tax Court Admissions
Four attorneys admitted to the bar of the United States Tax Court — a credential required to argue contested matters before the Court on behalf of any client whose planning reaches audit.
An Archive of the Firm
Five chapters, in chronological order — from the founding desk to the symposium the firm convenes each September.
-
MMVIII — Autumn 2008
The founding of the firm.
Margaret Penhallow, J.D., LL.M. Taxation, opens the practice at 75 Federal Street, Boston, with three colleagues and a single client. The firm's first engagement is the restructuring of a third-generation family trust on State Street.
-
MMXI — 2011
Election to ACTEC.
Margaret Penhallow is elected to the American College of Trust and Estate Counsel. The firm subsequently achieves continuous ACTEC representation across every admission cycle to date.
-
MMXVI — Spring 2016
The Greenwich office.
A second office opens at 88 Field Point Road, Greenwich, Connecticut — eight years after founding — to serve families whose principal residence, or principal fiduciary, sits along the New York–Connecticut corridor. The team grows from fourteen to twenty-two over the following three years.
-
MMXIX — 2019
The 7-Layer Dynasty Audit™.
The firm codifies its proprietary 7-Layer Dynasty Audit framework — a diagnostic method now applied at the outset of every engagement, and subsequently to more than 1,800 client files. The framework is presented in Trusts & Estates Quarterly in the spring of 2020.
-
MMXXII — 2022
The Penhallow Legacy Forum.
The firm convenes the first Penhallow Legacy Forum — a private symposium, held each September, hosting eighty-plus family principals from across the firm's multi-generational accounts. The 2024 edition is the firm's largest to date, and the only such symposium in New England.
A Closing Note
If the next chapter of your
family's archive is being
drafted this year, we should
speak privately.
Concierge intake is by appointment. Each prospective principal is offered a single paid private strategy session with a senior estate strategist, after which a written engagement letter — and no other document — is issued.
Schedule Your Private Strategy Session