CPA & Tax Advisor Referral Program
Your Client's Tax Return Tells You What Their Estate Plan Is Missing
An unfunded trust, a missing buy-sell agreement, a retirement account with the wrong beneficiary — you see these every tax season. We draft the documents that fix them. You refer your client to us. We handle the rest and communicate back.
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What You See Every April
The Estate Planning Gaps That Show Up in the Tax Return
Every tax season, you see it. A client files a Form 1041 because their spouse died without an estate plan and the family is now in probate. A business owner’s pass-through return is clean, but there is no buy-sell agreement and you know what happens when one of the partners dies without one. A client’s trust was set up ten years ago and the retirement account beneficiary still says “estate” instead of the trust name.
You cannot fix any of those things yourself. Estate planning documents are outside your practice area. But you see the gaps before anyone else does, which puts you in the best position to make the referral before the problem becomes a crisis for your client.
The attorneys who handle estate planning for CPAs in Atlanta are not hard to find. What is hard to find is one who communicates back, does not create more work for you, and does not try to take over the financial advisory relationship your client has with their other professionals. That is what this program is built around.
What the Tax Return Shows
- An unfunded trust is a liability on your client's tax return and a crisis waiting to happen — the trust exists on paper but owns nothing
- A retirement account beneficiary that says "estate" instead of a person or trust triggers probate and may cost the family the stretch option
- A business owner with no buy-sell agreement leaves their partner, their spouse, and the IRS in a three-way dispute over the company's value
- A client who files Form 1041 for the first time is managing an estate that went through probate — the gap your referral prevents
- A stale power of attorney that names a deceased or estranged person leaves your client legally unrepresented during incapacity
How It Works
A Referral That Takes One Message
You make the introduction
When you see the gap in a client meeting, send one message: "I work with an estate planning attorney who handles exactly this. Here is her contact." That is the whole referral. No estate planning advice required from you.
We respond within 24 hours
Your client gets a call from Melissa's office the same business day. We review their situation, explain exactly what needs to change, and quote a flat fee. No hourly billing surprises for your client.
You get confirmation when it's done
When the plan is complete, we let you know. If the engagement surfaces questions about your client's tax situation, we send them back to you. Your client remains your client. We stay in our lane.
How the Partnership Works
You Identify the Gap. We Close It.
CPAs have told us the same thing: they mention estate planning to a client and the client says they will take care of it. Six months later, nothing has changed. The gap stays open because the client does not have a clear next step and the CPA does not have a reliable attorney to send them to.
This program gives you that attorney. When you identify an estate planning gap during a client meeting, you send one message: “I work with an estate planning attorney who handles exactly this. Here is her contact.” From there, we respond within 24 hours, handle the planning and the paperwork, and tell you when the plan is in place.
We do not give tax advice. We do not manage investments. We do not compete with your practice or your client’s financial advisor. When a client comes to us with a question outside estate planning, we tell them to talk to you. Your client remains your client.
Most CPA referral relationships to an attorney go quiet after the first handoff. No update, no follow-through, and eventually nobody bothers referring again. This one is built so that does not happen.
Beyond The Referral
Every estate attorney asking CPAs for referrals says the same three things: fast response, no poaching, no fees. That is the floor. It is not a reason to pick one firm over another.
Here is what actually comes with being an active partner, whether you send one client this year or twenty:
A Free Personal Estate Plan
Once you complete partner orientation, we draft your will at no cost. Not a discount. Free, one time, no strings.
A Spot in a Small Group of Vetted Professionals
We connect active partners with insurance agents, real estate agents, and other professionals who serve the same clients you do, so referrals move in more than one direction.
A Feature in a Real Client Story
When a shared client agrees to it, we build a short video covering their situation and how the plan came together, and you are part of that story.
An Annual Look at Your Own Practice
Once a year, we review your book from an estate-planning risk angle and flag anything your own clients are exposed to.
Training Built Around What Actually Comes Up in Your Client Meetings
Tell us the questions you are fielding every tax season, and we build a session around it you can send to your own client list.
Portfolio Growth
Every client we work with gets asked who handles their taxes. If they do not have a CPA, or their current one has not looked at how their estate plan affects their filing, we send them your way.
It goes further than a new referral. When we restructure a business owner’s entity or fund a trust that changes how income flows, that creates new tax questions on a client you may already have. We flag it back to their CPA. If that is you, it is new engagement work on an account you already hold, not a cold lead you have to find.
Melissa Breyer
Georgia Estate Planning Attorney
Melissa Breyer works with the clients CPAs refer most often: business owners with no succession plan, married couples with unfunded trusts, and individuals whose estate plan no longer matches what they actually own. She drafts every plan personally and communicates directly with the referring professional when the engagement is complete. When you refer a client to her, she handles the documents and the follow-through. You do not have to wait for a referral to give a client something useful. Ask us for the year-end estate planning checklist built for tax season conversations, and use it with anyone on your list.
Common Questions
A free estate plan of your own once you are an active partner, an annual look at your own practice, a connection to other vetted professionals in the same client world you serve, and the chance to be featured in a real client story. None of it is tied to referral volume.
The four we see most often: unfunded revocable trusts (the document exists but no accounts were moved into it), outdated beneficiary designations (a beneficiary form from 2011 on a $400,000 IRA), no buy-sell agreement or a buy-sell that names a price from five years ago, and missing or stale powers of attorney. Most of these surface at tax time when Form 1041 is filed, when a business return shows ownership that does not match any succession plan, or when a surviving spouse realizes the trust was never funded.
Yes. We stay in our practice area. When a client we are working with needs tax guidance, a financial advisor, or a CPA review of how their estate plan affects their filing, we refer them back to a trusted professional. If that professional is you, the referral comes back to you.
We confirm with you when your client has engaged with us, and again when the plan is in place. You know the referral was handled, and you know when it is finished. We do not leave you guessing about whether your client followed through.
Often yes. A plan that is more than three years old, or that was drafted before a major change (new business, second marriage, sale of an asset, death of a named trustee or beneficiary), may be technically valid but operationally outdated. A quick review costs the client nothing. If the plan is current, we tell them that. If it is not, the gap gets closed.
No. Georgia Bar Rule 7.3(c) prohibits attorneys from paying referral fees to non-lawyers. This program is built on reciprocal referrals: when clients come to us who need a CPA for trust accounting, estate tax returns, or annual filings on a funded trust, we refer them to CPAs we trust. That is the exchange.