Elena spent the first thirty days reading. Not selling, not promising — reading. The audit memo found seven things our previous firm had missed in fifteen years.
Marchetti is a boutique estate-planning and wealth-transfer practice serving families with complex assets, multigenerational holdings, and the privacy concerns that come with both.
Most affluent families have a will, a trust, and an advisor — on paper. The gaps show up at exactly the moment they shouldn't: in transition. We meet families before that moment. Sometimes we meet them at it.
The trust was solid in 2014. Since then: a new business, a divorce, two grandchildren, a tax-law overhaul, and three property purchases. The plan no longer matches the family. The plan is the gap.
Stewardship is taught, not inherited. When the documents arrive without context, the family conversation happens through lawyers — usually in conflict, usually too late, almost always with regret.
Accountant, financial advisor, attorney — each with a slice. No one holds the full picture. Decisions get made in isolation, compounding small misalignments into estate-level exposure no single advisor can see alone.
Marchetti is a fixed-fee practice. We work with a limited number of families — sixty-two as of this writing — so that every plan can be reviewed, restructured, and rehearsed on the schedule the family actually needs.
We read every document — trusts, agreements, policies, business filings, tax returns — and produce a written gap analysis before any plan changes are proposed.
We bring your CPA, financial advisor, and trust officer into one room (or one Zoom). Decisions are made with full context, not piecemeal.
Fixed-fee, fully scoped, signed before drafting begins. No hourly surprises, no charge for revisions inside scope.
We sit with the next generation — with the principals' permission — to explain the plan, the reasoning, and the responsibilities. No surprises at inheritance.
Calendar-set every 90 days. Tax changes, life events, business shifts — the plan adjusts before the family has to ask.
Most families don't notice the cost of fragmentation until something happens. Below is what shifts in the first ninety days of a Marchetti engagement — quietly, and on the family's existing calendar.
Plan drafted years ago. Advisors operating from partial information. Family conversations deferred to "when the time comes."
Annual cadence the family can rely on. Cross-advisor convening twice a year. Family meetings, when desired, on a four-year cycle.
A capped book of families, a fixed-fee engagement, and a counsel of record who knows every document — so the plan stays current instead of arriving from storage when it's needed most.
By the end of week one, you have a written audit of every existing document, a gap analysis ranked by exposure, and a recommendation — whether to engage Marchetti, refer you to a firm better suited to your facts, or simply update the existing plan with your current counsel. All three are honest answers.
Inquiries are reviewed by Elena or Thomas personally. Response within five business days.
Submit a private inquiryEvery existing trust, agreement, policy, and filing — read, ranked, and reported.
One 90-minute session with the principal(s); optional with existing advisors.
Every plan provision tested against current federal and state law.
Engage Marchetti, refer elsewhere, or stay with current counsel — with reasoning.
If we engage: every dollar quoted upfront, with revision allowance written in.
Names abbreviated; details adjusted with consent. Verifiable references provided privately during engagement evaluation.
Elena spent the first thirty days reading. Not selling, not promising — reading. The audit memo found seven things our previous firm had missed in fifteen years.
The family meeting was the part I dreaded. Thomas ran it for two and a half hours and every one of my children walked out understanding why the plan was the way it was. I'd waited twenty years for that.
Our CPA, our advisor in London, our trust officer in Bermuda — Marchetti got everyone on one call. Within ninety days the plan was current for the first time since my husband passed.
I'd been told my foundation structure was "fine." Elena's memo found three exposures that would have surfaced at my passing — not before. The fix took six weeks. I sleep differently now.
The fixed fee was the thing that convinced me. Every other firm wanted hourly. Marchetti scoped the restructure in writing, named the number, and didn't deviate by a dollar.
Quarterly reviews sound like overhead. They're not. The third one caught a tax-law change that would have cost the next generation seven figures. Worth every quarter, every year.
Every Marchetti engagement begins with the discovery audit. If, after thirty days, we can't identify a material gap, exposure, or improvement opportunity in your current plan — we refund the $4,800 audit fee. Not partial credit. The full fee. No conditions, no signed waiver of disagreement. We expect to find something. We've not yet refunded.
Marchetti has never had more than seventy-five active family engagements at one time. The cap is the practice. It is what allows the work.
Elena founded the practice in 1989 after a decade in private trust administration at a global private bank. Her LL.M. in Taxation underpins thirty-seven years of work with families across business succession, charitable structures, and international asset coordination.
Thomas joined Marchetti in 2008 after seven years at a regional firm and a clerkship with the federal tax court. He leads engagements involving operating businesses, family governance design, and next-generation transition planning.
If the answer you need isn't here, write to us. Inquiries are read by a partner and answered within five business days.
Fit. We consider complexity, scope, advisor environment, and family alignment. About one in three inquiries becomes an engagement; we refer the rest to firms whose practice fits better. The audit fee is refundable when we determine fit isn't there.
Quarterly retainer, scoped to family complexity, typically $9,000–$28,000 per year. Includes all quarterly reviews, advisor convening, document maintenance, and family meeting facilitation. Fixed, predictable, no hourly add-ons within scope.
No. We coordinate with them. Marchetti is legal counsel only. We do not manage assets, prepare returns, or sell insurance products — and we have no referral relationships with firms that do. Our independence is the practice.
Engagement records are held in a closed-system document repository, accessed only by the partners and named paralegal on each engagement. No marketing testimonials with full names. No third-party data processors for client documents. Privacy practices are documented and audited annually.
A capped book allows quarterly review for every family without surrogate review by associates. The maximum is seventy-five. Above that, the practice changes character — we'd rather refer than dilute.
Yes — thirteen seats currently open. Inquiry intake reviewed weekly. We do not run waiting lists; if we're at capacity when you write, we'll refer you to two or three firms we trust for similar work.
No. Marchetti is a transactional and advisory practice. If a dispute arises, we coordinate referral to trial counsel and remain available for record-keeping and substantive context. The boundary keeps our drafting work clean.
Yes. A 30-minute introductory call with Elena or Thomas is free — this is the conversation where we determine whether the audit makes sense. If we mutually decide to proceed, the engagement letter and fee follow.
Submit a private inquiry and a partner will respond within five business days. Mention how you found us, the rough shape of the situation, and a window we can reach you. That is all.
Submit a private inquiry