Highland Park families have a saying, even if no one ever writes it down: the house comes with the name, and the name comes with the responsibility.
Walk down Beverly Drive or Armstrong Parkway and you’re looking at homes that have belonged to the same families for three, sometimes four generations. A few blocks away, Knox-Henderson tells a slightly different story, boutiques and restaurants where a newer generation of Highland Park-adjacent families are building businesses, buying their first historic bungalow, or renovating a home that’s been in the family since the 1940s. Both versions of this neighborhood share the same underlying truth: what you’ve built here, whether inherited or earned, needs a plan behind it.
That’s the conversation we have every week at Coleman Jackson, P.C. And for most Highland Park families, it starts later than it should, not from a lack of care, but because no one has made the time.
What Brings Highland Park Families to Our Door
Highland Park carries some of the highest property values in the state, and with that comes an estate planning picture that’s rarely simple. A family might hold a historic home that’s appreciated for decades, a business built along the Knox-Henderson corridor, investment property, and a next generation that includes both young children and adult heirs with very different needs.
We also see something distinct to this neighborhood: families who bought into Highland Park’s identity, not just its real estate, and want their estate plan to reflect that. They want the home to stay in the family. They want the business their parents built along Knox Street to transfer cleanly. They want their children to understand not just what they’re inheriting, but why it matters.
What we find, again and again, is that these are exactly the families who’ve done the hard work of building something worth protecting, and haven’t yet gotten around to protecting it.
Estate Planning Services We Provide for Highland Park & Knox-Henderson Residents
Wills, Trusts, and Estate Administration
A will names your wishes. A properly structured trust makes sure those wishes actually happen, without a probate court making the decisions instead. For Highland Park families holding historic property, this distinction matters enormously.
Our attorneys draft and administer:
- Revocable Living Trusts maintain control now, avoid probate later
- Irrevocable Trusts asset protection, estate tax reduction, and Medicaid planning
- Testamentary Trust trusts created through your will for minor or disabled beneficiaries
- Special Needs Trusts preserve government benefit eligibility for disabled family members while still providing meaningful financial support
- Wills and Pour-Over Wills the legal backbone of your estate plan
- Trust and Estate Administration representing beneficiaries and holding trustees accountable
For a deeper look at how Texas law governs these instruments, including the Texas Trust Code, the Texas Probate Code, and the Texas Property Code, visit our Trusts, Estates, and Will Administration page.
Guardianship for Children and Aging Parents
Highland Park is a neighborhood where multiple generations often live within walking distance of each other, sometimes in the same home they grew up in. That closeness is a gift, but it also means guardianship questions come up constantly: who raises the kids if something happens to both parents, and who steps in if a parent living nearby begins to need more care than anyone anticipated.
Without documentation in place, Texas courts decide both questions for you. At Coleman Jackson, P.C., we help families designate guardians for minor children, establish powers of attorney and healthcare directives for aging parents, and handle the formal guardianships process for both the person and the estate when court involvement becomes necessary.
Educational Planning for Children and Grandchildren
Highland Park families take education seriously, and many want that commitment written into the estate plan itself, not left to chance or to whoever happens to be managing the money later.
Texas law shields 529 Education Savings Plan funds from creditor claims under TX Property Code § 42.0021, whether vested or not. For grandparents wanting to fund multiple grandchildren, or families whose needs are more complex than a standard 529 can handle, educational trusts under the Texas Trust Code provide more structure and more control.
We help families weigh 529 plans, Coverdell accounts, and educational trusts against each other, and we walk grandparents through the five-year gift tax election that allows a lump-sum contribution to a 529 plan to be treated as spread across five years, one of the more underused planning tools available to Highland Park families with the resources to use it well.
Tax Planning Within Your Estate Plan
This is where our practice differs from most estate planning firms in the Park Cities area.
We don’t treat tax planning as a separate service you add on later. Every trust, every transfer, every business succession plan we build for a Highland Park family is evaluated for its tax consequences from the start. For families here, that typically means federal gift and estate tax thresholds, generation-skipping transfer tax planning, capital gains and step-up in basis strategies on long-held real estate, and charitable structures for those who want philanthropy built into their legacy. None of this is static law. The estate tax exemption has changed multiple times in the last two decades, and a plan built for today’s thresholds needs room to adapt.
The Part That Doesn’t Show Up in a Brochure
Estate planning requires real technical command of trust law, tax law, and property codes, and we hold ourselves to that standard.
But the harder half of this work isn’t technical. It’s the conversation about which sibling should manage the family home on Beverly Drive after both parents are gone, and whether the others will feel it’s fair. It’s the conversation with a business owner on Knox Street who hasn’t told a single partner that a succession plan is coming. It’s sitting with a parent who’s noticed early memory changes and hasn’t signed a power of attorney, because signing it makes it feel real.
These aren’t legal questions so much as human ones. Answering them honestly, with someone who actually knows your family, is what separates a real estate plan from a stack of documents.
Highland Park clients tend to stay with us for years. They call when a grandchild is born, when a business restructures, when a parent’s health shifts. That continuity is the point.
Tax Law. Business Law. Estate Law. Together.
Coleman Jackson, P.C. was built around three practice areas because most families don’t have problems that fit neatly into one category. They have a business, a historic home, an aging parent, and a next generation, all at once.
If you own a business along Knox-Henderson, your estate plan has to account for how it’s valued and transferred, and what that transfer costs in taxes. If you’re holding property that’s appreciated for decades, your plan has to weigh the capital gains consequences of selling against inheriting. If Medicaid may eventually be part of the picture for an aging parent, your plan needs that timeline built in now.
That’s why we practice tax law, business law, and estate law under one roof, not as three departments, but as one body of counsel.
Frequently Asked Questions
Ready to Start the Conversation?
If your estate plan hasn’t been reviewed in years, or doesn’t exist yet, the right time to act is now, not because anything is wrong, but because the people you love deserve better than good intentions. We care about helping Highland Park and Knox-Henderson families protect what they’ve built, and we enjoy the conversations that get them there. Contact the attorneys at Coleman Jackson, P.C. today at 214-599-0431.
