1998
Year Pete Halloran opened the firm in Richmond, Virginia.
Practice Areas
Six places most families begin.
Every elder law and legacy-planning question we hear tends to land in one of six categories. Use this page to find yours, then read the deeper guide for the road you are about to walk down.
What Brings People to Our Door
Where to begin when the family has more questions than answers.
Most calls start with a worried son or daughter, a recent diagnosis, a hospital discharge notice, or a letter from a nursing home admissions office. These are the six service lines we have built around the questions we hear most often. Find the one that sounds like your family’s situation, and we will take it from there.
-
01
Long-Term Care & Medicaid Planning
The problem: Mom or dad needs a nursing home, the monthly cost is north of ten thousand dollars, and the family is staring down a five-year spend-down that will erase the house and the savings.
How we help: Our in-house Medicaid specialists pre-qualify 92% of applicants before we ever file a paper with the state, then structure assets, transfer timing, and caregiver agreements so the spouse at home is protected and the family home stays in the family.
Read the long-term care guide → -
02
Estate Planning & Legacy Documents
The problem: The will on file is from 2009, the beneficiaries have changed twice, and nobody knows where the original power of attorney is. If something happens this week, the family is heading straight to probate.
How we help: Revocable living trusts, pour-over wills, durable powers of attorney, healthcare directives, and beneficiary audits — drafted so a non-lawyer can read them, and so the family never has to appear in probate court.
Read the estate planning guide → -
03
Veterans Benefits & Aid & Attendance
The problem: Your father served twenty years and now needs daily help at home. You have heard he might qualify for a tax-free monthly benefit, but the application form is eighty pages long and the regional office is slow.
How we help: We prepare and submit the Aid & Attendance claim, gather the medical evidence and discharge paperwork the VA actually wants, and follow the file until the first check lands. No fee unless the benefit is approved.
Read the veterans benefits guide → -
04
Probate & Trust Administration
The problem: A parent has passed, the family is grieving, and the house, the brokerage account, and the antique collection are all still in the deceased name. The bank will not talk to you without a letter from a lawyer.
How we help: We step in as the attorney for the executor or trustee, handle the probate petition, marshal the assets, pay the final bills, and prepare the federal and state estate tax returns — usually in nine to fourteen months.
Read the probate guide → -
05
Caregiver Guidance & Family Decision-Making
The problem: You are the adult child doing the driving, the medication management, and the check-writing. Your siblings disagree about what to do next, and you are burning out.
How we help: Family meetings facilitated by a licensed attorney, care-coordination agreements between siblings, and caregiver contracts that compensate the family caregiver legally — so the work is recognized and the relationships survive.
Read the caregiver guide → -
06
Small-Business Succession for Founders
The problem: Your father built the company from a single pickup truck. He is seventy-two, slowing down, and there is no written plan for what happens to the business, the building, or the key employees if he steps back.
How we help: Buy-sell agreements, family-limited partnerships, and succession timelines that move voting and non-voting interests to the next generation without triggering a tax event — built to fit a Virginia, Maryland, or D.C. company of one to fifty employees.
Read the succession guide →
Not sure which door is yours?
Book My Free Strategy CallWhy Specialization Matters
Elder law is not a side practice. It is the whole of ours.
A general practice can draft a will. A certified elder law practice knows how that will interacts with a Medicaid look-back, a VA pension, a second marriage, and a family business. These are the documentary facts behind the work.
11,400+
Families served across Virginia, Maryland, and the District of Columbia.
$312M
In family wealth preserved from long-term-care spend-down since 2014.
CELA — since 2005
Certified Elder Law Attorney. Fewer than one percent of U.S. attorneys hold this credential.
- National Elder Law Foundation — Top 100, 2019–2024
- BBB Accredited, A+ rating since 2002
- Best Elder Law Firm in the Mid-Atlantic, Aging Today (six years running)
- 4.9-star average across 612 verified Google reviews
From the First Phone Call to a Written Plan
Three steps. No salesperson on the line.
The first conversation with this firm is always with a licensed attorney, never a closer. Here is what happens next, in plain language.
-
Chapter I 01
Pre-Qualification With Our Medicaid Team
Before the call, our in-house Medicaid specialists quietly review the family’s assets, income, and the parent’s level of care. By the time you sit down with an attorney, we already know whether a spend-down strategy will work, how long it will take, and which documents we will need from you.
-
Chapter II 02
The 30-Minute Attorney Strategy Call
You meet with a Pete the Elder attorney — never a paralegal, never an intake specialist. We walk through the family’s situation, name the legal options in plain English, and answer every question you brought. You leave the call knowing what the next ninety days should look like.
-
Chapter III 03
A Written Family Plan
If you choose to engage, you receive a written plan in a binder: every document to be drafted, every filing to be made, every milestone in the timeline, and a flat fee in writing. The binder travels with the family. So does your attorney’s direct line.
“My mother had been in the nursing home eleven months when I finally called Pete’s office. I was exhausted, I was out of money, and I did not know what to ask. Within three weeks they had the house protected, the Medicaid approved, and a plan written down on paper that I could hand to my brother. The first time in a year I slept through the night was the night after that binder showed up on my kitchen table.”
A 30-Minute Call, Answered by an Attorney
Find the right door before you walk through it.
Bring your questions. Bring the documents you cannot make sense of. Leave the call with a written summary of what to do next, whether or not you ever hire us.
Since 1998 · Richmond, Virginia · 4.9 stars across 612 verified reviews