Melvin A. Warshaw has nearly 40 years of experience as an estate planning and tax lawyer. He  currently represents U. S. and non-U. S. families and companies on a wide range of personal  and business tax matters, including cross-border income and estate tax planning, corporate and  partnership tax issues, S corporations and income taxation of trusts and estates. 

Mr. Warshaw advises non-U. S. clients on structuring inbound investments to minimize federal  and state income and estate tax liability. He advises U. S. clients on the tax aspects of foreign  investments, including the anti-deferral rules, entity classification issues and reporting issues  for U. S. persons as well as for foreign entities and trusts. His work in this area also  encompasses pre-immigration and expatriation planning, tax issues of foreign trusts with U. S.  beneficiaries and corporate structuring for foreign companies operating in the U. S. 

Mr. Warshaw’s legal career has included a variety of roles in the field of sophisticated  international wealth transfer and estate planning. He is a past partner of McDermott Will &  Emery’s highly regarded Private Client Department, having established the Boston office  practice in 1997. He also served as a senior wealth advisor in JP Morgan Private Bank’s Boston  and Greenwich CT offices. He was also formerly general counsel to a large national brokerage  that focused on delivering liquidity planning strategies to domestic and international clients  through the use of an array of onshore and offshore life insurance products. Mr. Warshaw  began his legal career in the Office of the General Counsel at the Internal Revenue Service  National Office in Washington, D.C.

He is currently a member of the international section of the editorial board of Trusts and  Estates magazine and has published numerous articles in the magazine over the last decade. In  2018, he published a two-part article in Trusts and Estates that focused on the planning  implications of the repeal of the 30-day CFC rule in the 2017 tax act and possible entity  structure solutions as well as consideration of offshore PPLI. Recently he published a two-part  article on the U. S. inheritance tax (IRC Section 2801) implications for certain long-term Green  Card holders. Most recently, in November 2020, he co-authored an article on alternatives to a  traditional EB-5 investment leading to a green card for Hong Kongers wishing to move to the U.  S. Over the years, has also published other articles for the magazine in both the international  cross-border and life insurance areas. 

Mr. Warshaw has been a Full Member (TEP) of the Society of Trust and Estate Professionals  (STEP) since 2006. He earned a STEP Advanced Certificate in Cross-Border Estates in 2017. He is  currently a member of the STEP Special Interest Groups on International Client and Cross Border Estates. He presented at the STEP Wyoming 2019 conference on China – U. S. Cross Border Planning. In May 2020, he presented a webinar for the STEP Mid-Atlantic (Washington,  DC chapter) on the same topic. He will again present on this topic in Fall 2020 to the members  of the STEP Boston chapter.  

Mr. Warshaw is an Academician of The International Academy of Estate and Trust Law. The  Academy is an international peer-reviewed organization comprised of a small select group of  highly accomplished international private client lawyers. It members focus on the tax  consequences of the transfer of wealth, including the use of different entities to preserve  family businesses with multinational contacts. 

Mr. Warshaw is a member of the Boston Probate and Estate Planning Forum. 

Mr. Warshaw is also a member of the International Bar Association (IBA) Private Client Tax  Committee. 

He is also a member of the American Bar Association Real Property and Probate Section,  International Committee of the Income and Transfer Tax Planning Group. 

He has been an active member of the Massachusetts bar since 1981. He is a past Chair of the  Trusts & Estates Section of the Boston Bar Association. He is currently a Fellow of the  Massachusetts Bar Foundation, which administers the IOLTA Grants Program in Massachusetts  by awarding approximately 100 grants annually to non-profit organizations that provide civil  legal services to low-income clients in the state. 

Mr. Warshaw is also currently a trustee of his synagogue’s endowment fund and a past  Treasurer of the synagogue.

Mr. Warshaw received an L.L.M. (Tax) from Georgetown University Law Center. He received a  J.D. from St. Louis University School of Law and he received a B.A. cum laude from the  University of Rochester.

Melvin A. Warshaw, Esq. 

International Tax and Estate Planning Lawyer, 

U. S. Income and Estate Tax and Wealth Transfer Planning

Wellesley, Massachusetts 

Melvin.warshaw@gmail.com ; 617-939-3825