1.1
Transactions
Sale, acquisition, and recapitalization of private companies —
from the letter of intent to the escrow release, on either side
of the table.
Counsel · Charlotte, North Carolina
The advice you get before the deal decides what happens after it.
Hale & Marrow advises the owners of closely held companies — on the sale of the business, the partner who wants out, the tax structure that should have been fixed years ago, and the dispute that threatens all of it. Sixty years of files. One kind of client.
01 — Practice
Four disciplines, one balance sheet.
Everything the firm does concerns the value of a private company and the people who own it. The full ledger of engagements is on the services page.
1.2
Succession
Ownership transfer to family, management, or an ESOP, structured
while there is still time to choose among the options.
1.3
Tax structure
Entity design and reorganization that determines what a company
keeps — reviewed before the transaction, not after the return.
1.4
Owner disputes
Deadlock, buyout, and fiduciary claims between the people who
built the company — resolved privately where possible, tried
where necessary.
02 — Approach
Written advice, in plain terms, before you sign.
Most of what goes wrong for owners of private companies goes wrong on paper — in an operating agreement drafted for a different business, or a purchase agreement read closely for the first time during the dispute. The firm's working method is unglamorous: read every document, write down what it actually says, and put the recommendation in a memorandum the client can hold us to.
Fees are quoted at the start of the engagement and revisited only when the scope changes. No client of this firm has ever learned the cost of the work from the invoice.
SINCE 1962
Three generations of the same practice
Founded by two lawyers who left a national firm to represent the companies that firm considered too small. The client base has grown; the definition of the client has not.
03 — The firm
Eleven lawyers. No departments.
Every lawyer at Hale & Marrow works across the four disciplines, because the problems arrive that way: a succession question is a tax question is a dispute waiting to be avoided. The person who answers your first call is the person who argues your last motion.
- LAWYERS
- 11
- DISCIPLINES
- 4
- FOUNDED
- 1962
04 — Engage
Bring us the document you're worried about.
A first consultation is a reading of your situation and a written summary of what we would do — quoted, scoped, and yours to keep whether or not you engage the firm.