Legal services
Estate planning, asset structuring and personal legal affairs for individuals and families.
We advise high-net-worth individuals, families and family businesses on estate and succession planning, holding structures, foundations and trusts, and the personal legal matters that come with wealth in the UAE and abroad.
The UAE has become a home for individuals and families with assets in several countries, and its legal tools for holding and passing on wealth have grown accordingly. DIFC and ADGM foundations, RAK ICC and other holding companies, DIFC and ADGM wills, and the ability of non-Muslims to choose the law that governs their estate allow a family to plan with certainty. At the same time, the forced-heirship rules of Sharia that apply by default, the tax rules of the countries where assets sit, and the family's own governance needs must all be taken into account.
The private client practice of Khalifa Al Sada Advocates & Legal Consultants offers services in trust and estate planning, administration and the tax-aware structuring of the affairs of high-net-worth individuals and similar entities, locally and internationally. Our advice is discreet, practical and coordinated with the client's advisers abroad.
We advise:
We work with your accountants, bankers and foreign lawyers so that the plan holds together in every country where you have assets.
We start with a full picture of the family, the assets and the objectives, and we identify the laws that will apply on death, on incapacity and on divorce in each jurisdiction. From that we design a structure that may combine a UAE will registered at the DIFC, ADGM or the local courts, a foundation or trust to hold the family business or property, a holding company for investments, and powers of attorney and guardianship arrangements for incapacity. We draft and register each document and coordinate with the registries and the banks.
We advise on family governance, including family charters, shareholder agreements between family members and succession rules for the business, and on the protection of assets in marriage through prenuptial and postnuptial agreements. After a death we act for executors and heirs in obtaining the succession certificate or probate, administering the estate, transferring property and shares, and resolving disputes between beneficiaries. We also advise on residence by investment and on the personal legal matters that arise from living in the UAE.
Our lawyers are trained in civil law and common law and are fluent in the Sharia rules of inheritance, so we can explain clearly what will happen to your estate without a plan and how each tool changes that. Our succession team registers wills and administers estates before the UAE courts and registries every week.
We work in Arabic and English and coordinate with our associate firms in India, Turkey and Canada and with correspondents elsewhere when a family's assets cross borders.
We map your family, assets, residence and objectives, and the laws that would apply today without a plan.
We propose a structure of wills, foundations, companies and agreements, with the reasons for each and the cost.
We draft, sign and register the documents with the relevant registries, courts and banks.
We review the plan when the law, the family or the assets change, and we act for the family when the plan is needed.
Usually yes. A foreign will may be recognised but only after a slow process, and in the meantime accounts can be frozen. A UAE-registered will covering your UAE assets is faster and more certain.
A foundation holds assets such as a family business, property or investments under a charter and by-laws that set out how they are managed and passed on. It has its own legal personality and no shareholders.
Yes, by registering a will or by relying on the civil personal status law, which allows non-Muslims to choose how their estate is distributed. Without either, Sharia rules apply by default.
No. But assets in other countries may be taxed there, and the structure should take that into account. We coordinate with your tax advisers.
Insights
17 Aug 2026 6 min read
Who can register a will at the DIFC, the types of will available, what the will can cover, the documents and witnesses needed, how the appointment works, and what happens after death.
Read more10 Feb 2025 4 min read
RAK ICC offers nine corporate structures, from a company limited by shares to a foundation. This guide explains what each is for and how we help you choose.
Read moreConsultation
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