Palo Alto and Los Altos, California (650) 325-8276

What does your family’s future look like?

You’ve built a life. Now, protect it for the next generations.

Law Office of Janet L. Brewer

California & International Estate Planning Lawyer

Deep Experience In These Areas

Deep Experience in

Advanced Estate Planning

When creating an estate plan — especially when you own multiple properties, family businesses, or great accumulated wealth — it’s important to find an attorney with advanced specialized expertise in estate planning. This niche expertise guards against catastrophic errors that might accidentally be made due to inexperience.

For more than 30 years, Janet Brewer has been a certified estate planning and probate attorney* in California, mainly serving clients in Silicon Valley and the Bay Area. She has helped thousands of people create their estate plans. This extensive experience means that almost every scenario a family might face when their loved one dies has already crossed her desk.

Deep Experience in

Estate Planning For Non-residents

Whether you are a non-resident investing in the Bay Area housing market or a U.S. citizen with non-resident spouses, it’s essential that you receive accurate, thorough information from an estate planning attorney with in-depth international estate planning knowledge. About a quarter of the work Janet does involves international estate planning. She’s always had a keen interest in this work.

Experience has taught her the rules that are applied to estate and gift taxes are much more complicated for those who aren’t American citizens, and they can vary depending on the person’s residency status. A person may be an alien (whether resident or non-resident) or a visa holder with a work permit, and this status is a key factor when determining how the government treats taxation on these estates. Janet can help international families make a plan for their US-based assets to minimize the impact of US estate and gift taxes on their US-based assets.

Deep Experience in

Managing the probate process

Death takes a tremendous toll on a family. In addition to emotional turmoil, survivors must deal with a number of financial and tax issues, some of them mundane and some quite complex. The sooner you understand the timelines that the estate executor must comply with, the sooner you can return to the necessary process of grieving your loss.

Attorney Janet L. Brewer is a certified specialist in estate planning and probate administration law. She has been named a Northern California SuperLawyer every year since 2007, and she holds a 10/10 Avvo rating.

Deep Experience in

Trust Administration

Many estate plans include one or more trusts. After the death of the owner of the assets, a successor trustee assumes control. The successor trustee has a special duty of care and responsibility and must take specific steps to protect the assets with which they've been entrusted. 

Attorney Janet L. Brewer has exclusively practiced estate planning and trust administration law for over 20 years. She recently completed a 3-year term as a member of the California State Bar Board of Trustees, the governing body for California’s 200,000+ lawyers.

Advanced Estate Planning

Deep Experience in

Advanced Estate Planning

When creating an estate plan — especially when you own multiple properties, family businesses, or great accumulated wealth — it’s important to find an attorney with advanced specialized expertise in estate planning. This niche expertise guards against catastrophic errors that might accidentally be made due to inexperience.

For more than 30 years, Janet Brewer has been a certified estate planning and probate attorney* in California, mainly serving clients in Silicon Valley and the Bay Area. She has helped thousands of people create their estate plans. This extensive experience means that almost every scenario a family might face when their loved one dies has already crossed her desk.

International Estate Planning

Deep Experience in

Estate Planning For Non-residents

Whether you are a non-resident investing in the Bay Area housing market or a U.S. citizen with non-resident spouses, it’s essential that you receive accurate, thorough information from an estate planning attorney with in-depth international estate planning knowledge. About a quarter of the work Janet does involves international estate planning. She’s always had a keen interest in this work.

Experience has taught her the rules that are applied to estate and gift taxes are much more complicated for those who aren’t American citizens, and they can vary depending on the person’s residency status. A person may be an alien (whether resident or non-resident) or a visa holder with a work permit, and this status is a key factor when determining how the government treats taxation on these estates. Janet can help international families make a plan for their US-based assets to minimize the impact of US estate and gift taxes on their US-based assets.

Probate & Estate Administration

Deep Experience in

Managing the probate process

Death takes a tremendous toll on a family. In addition to emotional turmoil, survivors must deal with a number of financial and tax issues, some of them mundane and some quite complex. The sooner you understand the timelines that the estate executor must comply with, the sooner you can return to the necessary process of grieving your loss.

Attorney Janet L. Brewer is a certified specialist in estate planning and probate administration law. She has been named a Northern California SuperLawyer every year since 2007, and she holds a 10/10 Avvo rating.

Trust Administration

Deep Experience in

Trust Administration

Many estate plans include one or more trusts. After the death of the owner of the assets, a successor trustee assumes control. The successor trustee has a special duty of care and responsibility and must take specific steps to protect the assets with which they've been entrusted. 

Attorney Janet L. Brewer has exclusively practiced estate planning and trust administration law for over 20 years. She recently completed a 3-year term as a member of the California State Bar Board of Trustees, the governing body for California’s 200,000+ lawyers.

Image of Janet Brewer

Get to Know Janet

Attorney Janet Brewer is certified by the California State Bar Board of Legal Specialization as an estate planning and probate specialist — one of fewer than 100 practicing in Santa Clara County. With more than 30 years of experience, an exclusive focus on estate planning and probate, top rankings in her field, Janet can provide peace of mind, closure, and a clean, pain-free path through the distribution of assets. She and her staff give no-nonsense advice without beating around the bush, then work on every detail until the client has total confidence in the strength of their estate plan. Through this process, clients often come to consider Janet and her staff as members of the family.

What Janet's
Clients Say

Let’s make sure
the right people get your stuff.

Planning and protection
for everything you own
and everyone you love.

Planning and protection
Planning and protection