Michael W. Reagor
As a successful litigator and transactional attorney with 30 years of experience, Mr. Reagor brings his passion and attention to detail from the courtroom to the business and estate planning table. Mr. Reagor’s practice focuses on personal relationships and building value through tested values including honesty, character and integrity. Outside his practice, Mr. Reagor is actively involved in numerous national and local charities and boards.
Comprehensive Solutions and Dependable Experience
Mr. Reagor’s practice focuses on complex trust, estate and business planning; trust, probate and fiduciary litigation; business acquisitions (including asset and stock purchases); non-profit and exempt organization formation and counseling; and intellectual property counseling and litigation (including trademark and copyright prosecution and litigation). Mr. Reagor is a trusted problem solver for a variety of individual and business clients. He ensures that his clients understand the process, problem and solutions to enable to them to make the best decisions for their business and family.
Trust, Estate and Busines Planning
Mr. Reagor is experienced in effective trust-based solutions for your family, including gift and estate tax issues. However, he believes that financial and family goals should not be focused primarily on tax considerations. Just as every family is unique, so is each client. Mr. Reagor creates plans specially tailored to each client’s desires and needs. Trust-based planning and solutions may include revocable living trusts, irrevocable gift trusts, Irrevocable Life Insurance Trusts (ILITs), Health Education and Exclusion Trusts (HEET), Spousal Access Trusts and Charitable Trusts. As a member of WealthCounsel, Mr. Reagor is an expert at creating comprehensive plans and agreements to accomplish client goals. Mr. Reagor seeks to stay current in all valuable and appropriate planning techniques in order to always be ready to offer best practice solutions to clients.
Trust, Probate and Fiduciary Litigation
Mr. Reagor is engaged by clients throughout the Western U.S. to lead in trust, probate and fiduicary disputes and litigation. Mr. Reagor employs comprehensive and creative soutions for clients involved in matters very often involving or centered in family conflict. Mr. Reagor’s experience, training, worldview and concern for clients enable him to work toward solutions that resolve complex property and relational disputes.
Practice Areas
- Trust and Estate Planning
- Trust and Estate Administration
- Trust, Probate and Fiduciary Litigation and Dispute Resolution
- Charitable planning
- Private/family foundations
- Asset protection planning
- Estate and gift tax
- Elder Law
- Business Planning
- Mergers and Acquisitions (Asset and Stock Purchases)
- Start-Up and Emerging Businesses, LLCs, Partnerships and Corporations
- Succession and exit planning, including buy sell and related agreements
- Nonprofit Organizations Formation and Counseling
- Intellectual Property
- Trademark Counseling, Prosecution and Litigation
- Copyright Counseling, Prosecution and Litigation
- Real Estate Law
- Employment Law
- Litigation practice now limited to trust/probate/fiduciary and intellectual property matters
mreagor@drc-law.com
Background
Bar Admissions- Colorado, 1992
- Other states: California, Wyoming
- U.S. District Court, District of Colorado, Tenth Circuit, Ninth Circuit, Fourth Circuit
- Southern Nazarene University (B.A. magna cum laude, 1988)
- University of Texas at Arlington (M.A., summa cum laude, 1990)
- University of Houston (J.D., 1992)
- American Jurisprudence Award Recipient, Commercial Transactions
- Academic All-American, Men's Soccer, 1987
- Conflict Coaching Certification, Peacemaker
- Conflict and Mediation Certification Training, Peacemaker
- United States Army Reserve, 1984-1991
- WealthCounsel, ElderCounsel, Advisors Forum
- Douglas County, Colorado and American Bar Associations
- Colorado Bar Association, Trusts and Estates Section, Uniform Trust Code Committee
- Metropolitan Denver Christian Legal Society (Board Member)
- Centennial Institute Business Council
- Colorado Supreme Court Committee on Reciprocity
- Elder, Missions Hills Church, Littleton, CO
- Christian Medical Ministry to Cambodia/Jeremiah's Hope, Board Member, Board Secretary
- HighPointe Services (a Colorado based non-profit serving disabled adults), Board Member
- Praise Him Ministries, Ridgway, Colorado, Board Member
- Voice of Refugees, Anaheim, California, Advisory Board Member
- Laughter For All, Corona, California, Board Member
- HeadwatersLife, Inc. (OneFamily/IronMen), Board Member
- Centennial Institute Business Council
- Council for National Policy (past member)
- STEM School and Academy, Highlands Ranch, Board Member 2012-2014
- Denver Festival with Franklin Graham (2011 "Rock the Range"), Board Member
Presentations / Publications
- Probate Boot Camp, for Colorado attorneys
- Ethical Implications for Practitioners Under the American Taxpayer Relief Act of 2012, November 2014, Colorado WealthCounsel Forum
- Running a Paperless Estate Planning Practice, National Business Institute, April 2015
- Practical Considerations in Settlement Agreements for Trust Disputes, June 2016, Colorado WealthCounsel Forum
- Wall Street Journal, “Joining Church and Estate” April, 2012
- “Assisting CPAs to Reduce Malpractice Exposure in Real Estate Matters,” Colorado Society of CPAs
- “Colorado’s Construction Defect Action Reform Act (“CDARA II”), Navigating the Way”, Presented to Various Contractor and Subcontractor Groups
- Legal Commentator, ESPN Radi0
- Various Estate Planning presentations throughout Colorado
Respresentative Cases
- Estate of Smith v. Slifer, Smith & Frampton, 2009 WL 482603 (D. Colo. 2009)
- Porter Construction Services, Inc. v. Ehrhardt, Keefe, Steiner & Hottman, P.C., 131 P.3d 115 (Colo.App. 2005)
- Chalk v. Compware Corp., 101 Fed.Appx. 273, (10th Cir. 2004)