Ashford International Law P.C.

The Advisor’s Guide to Cross-Border Matters is a reference work in five volumes for the professionals who advise clients with assets, residences, heirs or trusts in more than one country. The author is Caroline Esche Ashford, PhD, JD, who leads Ashford International Law PC. The set will be published by Clarison Press on January 3, 2027. The five volumes are published together and sold only as a set.

Summary

1. Five volumes and 94 chapters, published together on January 3, 2027, and sold as a set.
2. Four volumes are organized by the type of person the advisor serves: the non-citizen in the United States, the nonresident with United States assets, the foreign beneficiary, and the United States person abroad. The fifth volume gathers the subjects that belong to the estate attorney.
3. The applicable tax treaty is treated as the rule rather than the exception.
4. Foreign law is treated comparatively for five countries: Germany, France, Switzerland, Italy and the United Kingdom.
5. Each subject is explained once, in a single chapter, and cited by reference everywhere else. One glossary, one table of authorities and one index serve the whole set.
6. The law is stated as of October 15, 2026.

Readership

The set is written for advisors rather than for their clients: certified public accountants and enrolled agents, estate planning and tax attorneys, trust officers and other fiduciaries, private banks, registered investment advisers, custodians and family offices. Each of these meets the foreign element in a client file at a different point. The set is organized so that each advisor finds the relevant rules in the volume that corresponds to the client in front of them, and finds the underlying concepts by reference to the chapter that owns them.

Every chapter is written in the third person and carries citation footnotes. Statutes, regulations, treaty articles, cases and administrative guidance are cited in full, in the form prescribed by The Bluebook.

The set at a glance

Volume I. The Non-Citizen in the United States: Resident Alien Clients and Beneficiaries

The volume follows the non-citizen who lives in the United States from the residence and domicile tests through arrival, holdings in the home country, work, marriage to a non-citizen and inheritance, to the return home. It contains the chapters on income tax residence, transfer tax domicile and the treaty tie-breaker on which the other four volumes rely.

1. Part 1. Who Is Resident, and Who Is Domiciled
2. Part 2. Arrival and the Worldwide Net
3. Part 3. Home-Country Holdings
4. Part 4. Working in the United States
5. Part 5. The Non-Citizen Spouse
6. Part 6. The Resident Alien as Heir and Beneficiary
7. Part 7. Going Home

Volume II. The Nonresident Client with U.S. Assets

The volume addresses the non-U.S. person who holds assets in the United States or does business there: situs and the two transfer tax regimes, the treatment of each asset class, the U.S. business, the withholding and reporting system, and the administration that follows the client’s death.

1. Part 1. Situs and the Two Transfer-Tax Regimes
2. Part 2. Investing In and Holding U.S. Assets
3. Part 3. Doing Business in the United States
4. Part 4. The Withholding and Reporting Machine
5. Part 5. When the Nonresident Client Dies

Volume III. The Foreign Beneficiary: Distributions and Inheritances from the United States

The volume addresses the heir or trust beneficiary who lives outside the United States: how the beneficiary’s country taxes what arrives, what the U.S. fiduciary must withhold, report and verify before paying, and the retirement accounts and funds that pass to beneficiaries abroad.

1. Part 1. The Beneficiary’s Country
2. Part 2. The U.S. Fiduciary’s Compliance
3. Part 3. Retirement Accounts and Funds Passing Abroad

Volume IV. The U.S. Person Abroad: Americans Overseas, Retiring Abroad and Leaving the U.S. Tax System

The volume addresses U.S. citizens and green card holders who live abroad, and everyone who retires abroad after working in the United States, whatever their nationality: status and taxation abroad, accounts and investments, retirement income and health coverage, U.S. trusts after the move, and expatriation.

1. Part 1. Status and Taxation Abroad
2. Part 2. Accounts and Investments Abroad
3. Part 3. Retiring Abroad
4. Part 4. Moving Abroad with a U.S. Estate Plan
5. Part 5. Leaving the U.S. Tax System

Volume V. Cross-Border Succession, Trusts and Administration: The Estate Attorney’s Companion

The volume gathers the subjects that are specific to estate attorneys: conflicts of succession law and of marital property regimes, trusts and their substitutes in civil-law systems, estate administration in depth, charitable transfers, disputes and family breakdown, and the running of a cross-border practice.

1. Part 1. Succession Law and Marital Property
2. Part 2. Trusts in Civil-Law Systems
3. Part 3. Estate Administration in Depth
4. Part 4. Charitable Transfers Across Borders
5. Part 5. Disputes and Family Breakdown
6. Part 6. Running the Cross-Border Practice

How the set is organized

Each concept has one owner chapter. Other chapters cite that chapter, in the form “Volume II, Chapter 19”, instead of restating it, and each volume opens with a list of the chapters in other volumes on which it relies. The situs rules and the reading of an estate tax treaty, for example, are explained once in Volume II and cited from the volumes on beneficiaries, Americans abroad and the estate attorney.

No chapter is devoted to a single foreign country. Where the law of the other country matters, the chapter treats it comparatively, in short sections for Germany, France, Switzerland, Italy and the United Kingdom. Detailed German treatment is left to the author’s German-related titles listed below; in this set Germany appears as one of the five countries and in worked examples.

Related titles

• Das amerikanische Vermögen. Steuer-, Vermögens- und Nachlassplanung für Deutsche in den USA, in German, to be published by Clarison Press on October 29, 2026.
• German-American Wealth Planning: A Guide for Americans with German Ties, in preparation.

Publication notice

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About the author

The firm is led by attorney Caroline Esche Ashford, PhD, JD. A graduate of Columbia University Law School, her practice focuses on international estate planning and the cross-border taxation and administration of estates and trusts, including the support of U.S. advisors whose clients hold assets, live or inherit abroad. Dr. Ashford is also licensed to practice law in Germany. She advises in French and German as well as English.

Advisors with a current cross-border matter can reach the firm through the For Advisors and Contact pages. The firm’s guides for advisors are on the Articles and Guides page.

This page announces a forthcoming publication. The title, contents, structure and publication date may change before publication. The cover shown is a provisional design.