Miami is built by newcomers. Walk through Doral, Brickell, or Sweetwater and you will find businesses owned by entrepreneurs who arrived from Latin America, Eastern Europe, and beyond. If you are one of them, you have likely spent years on your immigration case and your company. What often gets overlooked is the place where those two worlds collide: your estate plan. For immigrant and non-citizen business owners, estate planning and immigration law are not separate errands. They shape each other, and getting one wrong can quietly undo the other.
The non-citizen spouse problem
One of the most common surprises for immigrant families involves the federal estate tax marital deduction. When a U.S. citizen dies and leaves assets to a U.S. citizen spouse, the unlimited marital deduction generally lets those assets pass with no federal estate tax. But that unlimited deduction does not apply when the surviving spouse is not a U.S. citizen, even if that spouse is a lawful permanent resident living here in Miami.
The tool that fixes this is a Qualified Domestic Trust, or QDOT. A properly drafted QDOT lets a non-citizen surviving spouse benefit from the trust assets while preserving the deferral of estate tax that citizen couples take for granted. This is a technical, requirement-heavy structure, and it has to be in place before death to work. If your spouse holds a green card rather than citizenship, this is not optional planning, it is essential.
Estate tax exposure for non-resident clients
Immigration status also changes how the federal estate tax reaches your assets. Non-resident aliens who own U.S. situs property, such as Florida real estate or shares in a U.S. company, can face estate tax on those assets with a far smaller exemption than citizens and residents receive. If you split time between Miami and another country, or you hold property here but have not established domicile, your exposure may be very different from your American-born neighbor’s. Coordinating your immigration status with your estate plan is the only way to see the real picture.
How status affects your heirs
Your beneficiaries’ immigration status matters too. A relative living abroad or in uncertain status can still inherit, but distributions, trustee selection, and timing all deserve thought. Naming a guardian for minor children is especially important for immigrant parents. If both parents travel for visa interviews or face removal proceedings, a clear guardianship designation under Florida law decides who cares for your children, rather than leaving it to a court that does not know your family.
Florida-specific rules you cannot ignore
Florida law adds its own layer. Your will must meet the execution formalities of Florida Statutes §732.502, signed and witnessed correctly, or it may fail entirely. Florida’s constitutional homestead protections shield your primary residence from most creditors and restrict how it can be devised, which can interact in complicated ways with mixed-citizenship families. Revocable and irrevocable trusts are governed by Chapter 736, the Florida Trust Code, and a well-structured trust can keep your business and real estate out of probate while you continue running things.
Powers of attorney for clients who travel
Immigration cases require travel, sometimes on short notice and sometimes for months. A durable power of attorney and a health care surrogate designation ensure that someone you trust can sign documents, pay payroll, and keep your Miami business operating while you are at a consulate abroad. Without these, your company can stall the moment you board a plane.
Why you need both kinds of counsel
Our firm handles estate planning, not immigration. The two have to be coordinated, though, because a pending green-card or naturalization case can change the smartest sequence for setting up a QDOT, a trust, or a gifting strategy. That is why we work alongside dedicated immigration counsel. For the immigration side, we recommend Fitenko Law, including their work on marriage-based green cards, which directly affects the marital deduction questions above. Many of our clients are more comfortable explaining sensitive family details to a Russian-speaking immigration attorney, and we are glad to coordinate with their team on your behalf.
If you have built a business in Miami and your immigration journey is not finished, do not wait for the case to close before you plan. An estate plan that ignores citizenship status, and an immigration strategy that ignores estate tax, are both incomplete. Bringing the two together protects your family, your company, and everything you came here to build.
For more on our Florida practice, see our overview of probate and estate administration in Florida. Morgan Legal Group's affiliated New York office also handles Article 81 guardianship in New York.
