Succession and Estate Planning in Burnaby, Richmond and Coquitlam
Canada has no inheritance tax. What it has is a deemed disposition at death — and for a British Columbia owner whose wealth is locked inside a company, that is often the largest single tax event of their life.
What this covers
Tranquility Tax Solutions is an estate and succession planning accounting practice in Burnaby, British Columbia, led by Ray Loucks, CPA, CA, TEP, FEA, for business owners and families across Metro Vancouver, BC and Canada. We do not draft wills or trust deeds: your lawyer does, and we work out what each document will cost in tax. Succession planning decides who takes over a business and when. Estate planning decides what happens to everything you own. In Canada the two are joined by one hard fact: death triggers a deemed disposition of your property at fair market value, so the tax bill arrives whether or not a plan exists. Planning determines its size, its timing, and who has to find the cash.
Who this is for
- Owners whose shares have grown substantially in value and will keep growing
- Owners of manufacturing and other operating companies planning to pass the business to their children
- Families running a real estate portfolio together, often across several corporations, with investments alongside
- Parents wanting to bring children into ownership without handing over control
- Executors and surviving families dealing with an estate that was not planned for
What you end up with
The point of the exercise
A capped, quantified liability
You know what the tax bill is, when it lands, and where the money to pay it comes from.
Growth in the right hands
Future increases in value accrue to the next generation instead of enlarging your own final tax return.
Deadlines that do not surprise anyone
Trust anniversaries and estate windows are tracked, so the remedies are still available when they are needed.
Succession and Estate Planning in detail
What happens on death
For tax purposes you are treated as having sold everything at fair market value the moment before death. Shares, real estate and investments are taxed on the final return; registered plans are brought into income unless they roll to a spouse. A transfer to a spouse defers all of it, which is why the real bill usually lands on the second death, when the estate holds a company and no cash.
The estate freeze
A freeze fixes the value of your shares at today's number, usually by exchanging them for fixed-value preferred shares, and sends future growth to new common shares held by your children or a trust. Your eventual bill is capped at today's value. A freeze done at two million caps a very different liability than the same freeze at eight.
Estate freeze planning: who it suits, the numbers, what it costs
Trusts, probate and the BC arithmetic
A discretionary family trust decides later which child receives what and can let several family members claim the capital gains exemption on a sale; it also brings the twenty-one-year rule. British Columbia charges probate at roughly 1.4 percent of what passes under the will, so private company shares usually sit under a second will and pass outside it.
After a death
Without planning, company shares are taxed twice: as a gain on the final return, then again as a dividend when the company pays the family. The remedies are time-limited. The loss carryback and the graduated rate estate both end thirty-six months after death at the latest. Executors who wait routinely lose the best option.
Why an estate planning accountant
Your lawyer writes the wills and the trust deed. We work out what each document will cost in tax when it operates, which structure costs least, and which elections have to be filed, on which dates, for the plan to hold. Ray holds the TEP designation of STEP, the Society of Trust and Estate Practitioners: the estate side of the plan is his specialty, not an occasional job.
How it runs
What working together looks like
Inventory and value
Every corporation, trust, property, and registered plan gets listed, with adjusted cost base, paid-up capital, and a working view of fair market value.
Quantify the current exposure
We calculate what the tax bill would be if death occurred today, and identify where the cash to pay it would have to come from.
Choose the structure
Freeze, trust, multiple wills, insurance, or some combination — selected against your actual objectives, including the ones that are not financial.
Implement with counsel
Wills, trust deeds, share reorganizations, and elections are drafted and filed with your lawyer so the legal documents and the tax positions match.
Diarise the deadlines
Twenty-one-year trust anniversaries, graduated rate estate windows, and valuation refreshes go into a schedule rather than into memory.
Questions
Succession & Estate Planning, answered
General information about how the rules work, current at the time of writing — not advice about your situation. Speak to Ray Loucks before acting on any of it.
Does Canada have an estate tax or inheritance tax?
No. There is no federal estate tax and no inheritance tax payable by beneficiaries. What Canada has instead is a deemed disposition: immediately before death you are treated as having sold your capital property at fair market value, and the resulting gains are taxed on your final return. Provinces also charge probate fees on the value of the estate. The practical effect can be similar to an estate tax, but the mechanism is different, and the difference is what planning works with.
Read moreWhat is an estate freeze, and when should we do one?
An estate freeze fixes the value of your shares at today's value and redirects future growth to the next generation or a family trust, capping your eventual tax liability at today's number. The right time is when the business has real value, is expected to keep growing, and you have a view — even a provisional one — about who should benefit from that growth. Because a freeze caps value as at the date it is done, waiting is rarely neutral.
Read moreHow much are probate fees in British Columbia?
On the gross value of the estate passing under the will: no fee on the first $25,000, $6 per $1,000 on the portion between $25,000 and $50,000, and $14 per $1,000 on everything above $50,000. That works out to roughly 1.4 percent on a large estate, plus a filing fee. Assets passing outside the will — through a properly structured trust, a valid beneficiary designation, or a second will covering private company shares — are not included in that calculation.
What is the twenty-one-year rule for family trusts?
A Canadian trust is deemed to dispose of its capital property at fair market value every twenty-one years, triggering tax on accrued gains even though nothing has been sold. The usual response is to roll the property out to Canadian-resident beneficiaries before the anniversary date, but that has consequences of its own and needs several years of lead time. If a trust was settled around the turn of the century, the anniversary is imminent and should be on the agenda now.
Read moreCan I leave my company shares to my children without triggering tax?
A rollover on death is automatic only for a spouse or a qualifying spousal trust, and for qualified farm or fishing property transferred to a child. Ordinary private company shares left to children are a taxable deemed disposition. The lifetime capital gains exemption may shelter part of the gain if the shares qualify, and the intergenerational business transfer rules enacted in 2024 create a route for a genuine transfer of the business — but each of those depends on conditions that have to be satisfied in advance.
My parent has died and there was no plan. Is it too late?
Often not, but the window is short. Several of the most valuable remedies — the subsection 164(6) loss carryback, pipeline planning, and the graduated rate estate rates themselves — depend on steps taken within tight timeframes, all inside thirty-six months of death. If you are an executor dealing with private company shares, this is worth a conversation in the first months rather than at the first filing deadline.
Read moreDo I need an estate planning accountant as well as a lawyer?
For an estate that includes a company, rental property or a trust, yes. The lawyer drafts the documents; the accountant works out what they will cost in tax, which structure costs least, and which elections and filings keep the plan valid. Most of the expensive mistakes in estates are tax mistakes inside perfectly good legal documents. Where the estate is a home and some savings, a lawyer alone is usually enough.
Often needed together