As a State Bar of California Certified Legal Specialist in Estate Planning, Trust, and Probate Law, Ms. Gutierrez focuses her practice on the design and implementation of sophisticated estate planning and wealth transfer strategies including planning for multinational families. With more than 16 years of legal experience, she advises her clients on the full range of estate planning issues, including wills, revocable trusts, irrevocable trusts for lifetime gifts and life insurance, qualified subchapter S trusts, charitable lead and remainder trusts, and entity formation. She also provides post mortem services, such as probate and trust administration and disclaimer planning, as well as state and federal tax return preparation.

Ms. Gutierrez brings to her estate planning practice the added experience of a transactional real estate and corporate law background.

Special Expertise

• Tax planning for individuals and families, including designing multigenerational plans to foster family harmony while minimizing the effect of estate, gift and generation-skipping transfer taxes.
• Developing and implementing complex disclaimer plans to effectuate post-mortem wealth transfer strategies and tax planning.
• Advising California fiduciaries concerning trust and estate matters.
• Trust and probate administration of complex estates.

Academic Credentials

• J.D., University of San Francisco
• University of San Francisco Law Review
• American Jurisprudence Award for Legal Research and Writing
• B.A., University of California, Berkeley
• State Bar of California Certified Specialist in Estate Planning, Trust and Probate Law

Professional Affiliations

• Northern California Planned Giving Council, Board Member
• American Bar Association - Real Property, Probate and Trust Law Section
  
• State Bar of California - Trusts and Estates Section; International Law Section
• Society of Trust and Estate Practitioners (STEP)
• San Francisco Estate Planning Council
• Bar Association of San Francisco
• San Mateo County Bar Association

Civic Affiliations

• Burlingame Library Foundation, Former Board Member
• Peninsula Community Foundation Professional Advisory Council, Former Co-Chair
• San Mateo County Health Foundation, Board Chair
• Northern California Planned Giving Council, Board Member

Publications

• 'New Rules for Allocating Generation-Skipping Transfer Tax Exemption', California Trusts and Estates Quarterly, Spring 2002

Honors and Awards

• Selected to the Northern California Super Lawyers® list, 2008-2010

• Estate Planning,Trusts & Wealth Transfer