Lexern Law Group

10/06/2026

Filed an extension for your 2025 individual federal income tax return?
For most taxpayers with a valid extension, October 15 is the filing deadline.

As you review your finances, it may also be a good time to ask whether your estate and business succession plans still reflect where you are today.

A growing business, new assets, ownership changes, or a different intended successor may be reasons to review your documents with your legal and tax advisers.

Official IRS filing information and online filing options are linked in the comments.

General educational information only not legal or tax advice.

10/05/2026

Being named executor can mean taking on an unfamiliar role while grieving someone you love.

There’s paperwork to find, property to look after, and questions about what needs to happen before anything can be distributed.

This checklist covers five core responsibilities for executors in Illinois.

Save it to refer back to, and find Lexern’s full executor guide in the comment section below.

10/02/2026

Your will says who gets the business. It doesn’t say who signs off on payroll Tuesday morning while you’re in a hospital bed.

For most owners, that gap never comes up until it’s the only thing that matters.

An estate plan does real work. It names who inherits your interest and gives your family some sense of what you wanted done with what you built. But inheritance is a slow question. The urgent ones come first.

Can anyone besides you get the bank on the phone?
Is there someone with authority to release payroll or sign a contract that can’t wait a week?
Who has the logins, the records, the vendor contacts?
And if you’re out for three months or for good who’s running the place?

Those answers are usually scattered. Some of it sits in a power of attorney. Some in the operating agreement or shareholder agreement. Some in a buy-sell agreement, the bank’s signature cards, an insurance policy, or the estate plan itself.

Any one of those documents might have been drafted well. What owners rarely check is whether they all work together.

A common example is that the person you want to inherit the value isn’t the person you’d want making decisions at the company. Or a buy-sell agreement forces a transfer on terms your will never contemplated. Authority during incapacity is another. It can depend on both your personal documents and the company’s documents, and they don’t always line up.

None of this means you need a pile of new paperwork. Often, it just means pulling what you already have onto one table and reading it as a set against the business you run now and the family you have now.

If you own a business in Illinois and you’ve never looked at these documents side by side, it’s worth an hour before someone else has to make the decision for you.

Lexern’s integrated estate and business planning guide is linked in the first comment.

10/01/2026

Thank you WisLawNOW for sharing our post!

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09/28/2026

If you couldn’t work tomorrow, who would make sure your staff got paid?

You probably have someone in mind. It’s worth checking whether they’d have access to the accounts, authority to sign, and enough information to step in.

When you’re busy running a business, it’s easy to leave those details for later. Working through them now can make things easier for your family and the people who work with you.

The person you’re counting on should know what they’d need to do and have a plan they can follow.

Read Lexern’s five-step succession-planning guide to learn more. The link is in the first comment.

Lexern Law Group
Illinois: (847) 777-6838
Wisconsin: (414) 810-7070

General information only, not legal or tax advice.

09/23/2026

A lot of business owners come to us with the same feeling “I have an estate plan, and I have business documents. I thought I was covered.”

And often, they have done a lot right.
Their documents were simply created at different times, with different advisers, and for different reasons. The question is whether they would all work together if the owner could not step in tomorrow.

Who could make an urgent decision for the business?
Who could access what they need to keep things moving? What happens to the ownership interest? Would a spouse, business partner, or employee know where to turn?

For Illinois business owners, physicians, dentists, and other licensed professionals, the issue is usually not whether documents exist. It is whether those documents are giving the same people clear direction.

Our latest guide walks through the questions worth reviewing together: decision-making authority, ownership and management rights, buy-sell terms, beneficiary designations, funding, and family goals.

Read the full guide through the link in the first comment. And if you would like advice based on your business and the people relying on it, Lexern can help you review what you have and talk through what may need attention.

07/26/2026

📢 We're growing! Lexern Law Group is hiring a full-time Legal Assistant in our Libertyville office.
We help business owners and families with estate planning, business law, and probate — and we're looking for someone organized, reliable, and great with people to join our team. Prior legal experience is a plus but not required, and Russian/English bilingual skills are welcome given our clients.

Know someone perfect for this? Tag them or share. Full details and how to apply 👇

Legal Careers in Libertyville at

07/15/2026

We believe legal planning should never feel overwhelming.

Thank you to this client for recognizing our team's commitment to making complex matters easier to understand and navigate. Your feedback means the world to us.

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

07/01/2026

A review like this reminds us why we do what we do.

Our goal is always to provide clear guidance, practical solutions, and peace of mind for every client who walks through our doors. Thank you for trusting us with your planning and for sharing your experience.

⭐ Read today's featured review.

06/17/2026

We're honored by every review we receive and grateful for the trust our clients place in us. Thank you for sharing your experience and allowing us to be part of your planning journey.