QSBS trust stacking can increase the exclusion available across eligible taxpayers. For stock acquired on or before July 4, 2025, the dollar-limit component is $10 million; for later acquisitions it is $15 million, indexed after 2026. In either regime, compare the remaining dollar limit with the 10-times-basis alternative under Section 1202(b). Acquisition-date, exclusion-percentage, prior-gain and trust-aggregation rules still apply. I lead the tax analysis; estate planning attorneys at Carney Badley Spellman draft the trust instruments. One engagement, one firm, with confidential legal advice subject to the applicable attorney-client privilege rules. See Section 1202(b).
Why the Planning Quality Matters Right Now
Treasury has said publicly that guidance limiting stacking is coming. Assistant Secretary for Tax Policy Kenneth Kies told a tax conference on May 20, 2026: "Let me just warn you: we don't like stacking." A second Treasury official made similar comments on May 9, and the Wall Street Journal reported on June 29 that Treasury and the IRS are preparing guidance. Per that reporting, ordinary family estate planning appears less likely to be targeted — Treasury's stated concern is overlapping or synthetic trusts that multiply exclusions for the same economic beneficiaries.
No regulations have been proposed as of this writing, and stacking built on genuine family and estate planning purposes remains grounded in the statute — §1202(h) expressly preserves QSBS character on transfers by gift. But the environment has changed: structures that looked adequate in 2024 will be read, if guidance issues, against a standard nobody has seen yet. That argues for planning that is documented, differentiated, and defensible from the start — and for advice you can assert privilege over.
Put plainly: if guidance issues and your structure is examined, the difference between a template and privileged counsel is not the setup cost — it is what happens next.
What the Engagement Covers
Tax architecture. How many trusts, for whom, funded with which shares, and when — analyzed against §643(f)'s multiple-trust rule, the assignment-of-income doctrine (gifts made near a sale can be recharacterized), and the per-issuer cap mechanics for your acquisition dates, including mixed pre- and post-OBBBA holdings.
Genuine non-tax purpose, documented. Trusts with real, differentiated beneficiaries, terms, and trustees — the pattern Treasury has distinguished from the structures it says concern it. We document the estate planning purpose contemporaneously, not after the fact.
Bespoke trust drafting. Carney Badley Spellman estate planning attorneys draft the non-grantor trust instruments to fit your family, your state, and your exit timeline. Washington founders get the community-property analysis — community-property characterization can collapse a two-cap position into one, and it has to be addressed in the documents, not assumed away.
Substantiation, per trust. Each trust holding QSBS needs its own eligibility file — issuance records, gross-asset support, active-business documentation across the holding period. That is the same discipline behind our attestation letter practice and QSBS Sentinel™ annual substantiation, extended to a multi-trust structure.
How This Differs From Trust Platforms
GetDynasty advertises a QSBS trust package starting at $1,500 per year, with up to four trusts on its homepage, as checked September 10, 2026. Its pricing page lists formation, administration and federal trust tax-return services, with higher fees if it manages investments. See GetDynasty’s pricing page.
GetDynasty’s terms state that the platform is not a law or accounting firm and does not create an attorney-client relationship or privilege. They also contemplate an optional introduction to an independent partner law firm, whose representation requires a separate engagement. Trustee services through its affiliate have a separate services and fee agreement. See GetDynasty’s terms.
An engagement with us provides an attorney-client relationship, legal advice on your specific facts, and trust instruments drafted for your family. Attorney-client privilege can protect qualifying confidential legal-advice communications; it does not make the underlying QSBS facts privileged or shield everything in a planning engagement. The factual substantiation file and any planned disclosures need a separate privilege review. See Upjohn Co. v. United States, 449 U.S. 383, 395–396 (1981).
Compare written scopes and fee agreements before choosing a provider. GetDynasty’s current public pricing page does not state the previously quoted $3,000-per-trust post-liquidity schedule, so it does not support a $240,000 twenty-year projection. Its terms distinguish platform subscriptions from trustee services; the “cancel anytime” statement should not be read as describing termination of the trust or the separate trustee agreement. Our engagement covers scoped legal analysis and drafting. For either approach, confirm ongoing trustee, administration, investment-management, tax-return and legal costs, and the arrangements for changing providers.
Who This Is For — and Who It Isn't
This engagement fits founders, early employees, and investors whose expected gain meaningfully exceeds their own per-issuer cap — typically exits in the $25M+ range — and who have family members or charitable goals that give the trusts a genuine purpose. If your expected gain fits within your own exclusion, you likely don't need stacking at all; start with the QSBS guide or an attestation letter instead. It also isn’t for founders whose exit is purely hypothetical — an irrevocable trust created “just in case” carries real annual administration costs for decades against a payoff most startup equity never produces. The planning window is a band: when a cap-exceeding exit is reasonably foreseeable, but before sale discussions begin. And timing is a real constraint: gifts made after sale discussions begin carry assignment-of-income risk that no drafting can fully cure. Earlier is better. If a transaction is already in motion, book the call anyway — the answer may be that only part of the strategy is still available, and it's better to know that now.
Who You'd Be Working With
Joe Wallin is a startup and tax attorney at Carney Badley Spellman, P.S. in Seattle, with 25+ years of practice and a Tax LL.M. from NYU. He chairs the Angel Capital Association's Legal Advisory Committee and co-authored Angel Investing: Start to Finish. His QSBS work includes attestation letters, §1202 planning for founders and funds, and the analysis behind this blog's QSBS coverage, including ongoing tracking of Treasury's stacking guidance.
Next Step
A 20-minute call is enough to determine whether stacking fits your facts, what the structure would look like, and what it would cost. Book a 20-minute call →
This page is for informational purposes and does not constitute legal or tax advice. No attorney-client relationship is formed until an engagement agreement is signed. Treasury guidance on QSBS stacking may issue at any time and could affect the strategies described here; the status statements above are current as of August 2026.