Schlender Law Firm, P.C.

General information

Bennett Braverman, J.D.
Founding Partner/Braverman Law Group, LLC

Bennett’s Professional and Community Involvement
The Legal Committee for the Boulder County Community Foundation; The Board of Director for the National Center for Jewish Cultural Arts; Wealth Counsel; The Boulder County Bar; The Colorado Bar Association; The Boulder County Bar Association; The Better Business Bureau; The Boulder Chamber of Commerce; The Advisor’s Forum.

Bennett’s Practice
Bennett practices primarily in the areas of:

Estate Planning
Asset Protection Planning
Business Planning
Estate (Wills and Trusts) Administration

For his select clients, however, he does a wide variety of lawyerly tasks, from writing demand letters, to researching almost unrelated areas of the law.

Bennett’s Life
Born and raised in Southern New Jersey to a food-service business family, no one (including him!) would ever have predicted he would end up practicing estate planning in Boulder, Colorado. He spent many winter vacations in the Ft. Lauderdale area of South Florida, which explains why he went to law school there and began his practice there, with his older brother, upon graduation.

As soon as he saw Boulder (he was visiting a friend), he knew it was where he belonged. Within a day of arriving, he had found the home that he owns and lives in today with his wife, Diedre Braverman, his twins, Gus & Lexi, his canine pal, Beau, and a cat he has never fully trusted around Beau (having seen stealth attacks in the past), Clyde.

As for estate planning, the entrepreneurial bent that all successful small firm owners share was inculcated since birth. His grandparents were immigrants who built the New Jersey food-service business which came to serve all of the Atlantic City casinos from scratch.

Estate planning took some searching to find. Out of law school and joining his brother’s firm, he naturally learned to practice what his brother practiced: family law. But it only took two years of having to carry a handgun for his safety (every year a few family law attorneys were murdered in Florida by unhappy opposing parties), seeing either one person or the other unhappy after every step toward resolution, and having no answer for clients who wanted to control their fees and costs before he decided he wanted to practice a different kind of law. Estate planning was a natural choice, once he realized that he had the perfect storm of previous experience, and would be able to counsel his clients in a very personal and meaningful way.

It was in deepening his expertise in estate tax law that he met his wife, Diedre Braverman (née Dennis, formerly Wachbrit). She was, together with another nationally known speaker, co-teaching the course. They met at a dinner to which a mutual friend invited them, and the rest… changed a committed lifelong bachelor into a family man. Was it meeting his soul mate that changed him? Or was it the magic of Boulder? Maybe a little bit of both…

Now that he is happy in his work and enjoying the benefits of married life, he has the mental freedom to have fun with his family at home, push himself a little more when running along Boulder Creek, relax during his walks along Pearl Street with Diedre and Beau, and enjoy his occasional visits with his sister, brother and multitudes of extended family that he loves dearly (they’ve all stayed on the East Coast, apparently immune to Boulder’s charms).

Bennett’s Experience
Braverman and Rossi, P.A., Ft. Lauderdale, FL, where Bennett practiced family law and then brought estate planning into the firm taught him that it’s all about the client, and how to work passionately to represent them.

The Law Office of Bennett Braverman, LLC, Boulder, CO opened immediately after Bennett moved to Colorado and passed the Colorado Bar Examination. Bennett learned a ton about the unique needs of Boulder individuals and couples with and without children. He also honed his understanding of Colorado wills, trusts and estates law, not to mention healthcare agency and directive law, power of attorney law and fiduciary law.

Stigler, Wussow + Braverman, Ltd., Boulder, CO was where he learned a great deal from his partners and friends, Mike Wussow and Shawn Stigler, about the intersect of estate planning and planning for small family businesses. He also solidified many relationships in the Boulder professional community and made great friends he works with to this day.

Braverman Law Group, LLC, Boulder, CO was the firm Bennett opened with Diedre Braverman when she became admitted to practice law in Colorado in 2010, and is the firm he currently practices under. With Braverman Law Group, he has grown more in his ability to delegate and focus on what he does best than at any previous time. In fact, he’s still learning that and the key player in making that possible is the Firm’s Pparalegal, Jamie Karpo.

Bennett’s Education
University of Miami where Bennett achieved a double-major in Psychology and Sociology. He has always been interested in how individuals, families and larger groups work. He still uses what he learned way back then to help clients present their estate plans in the most pleasing way possible to the people whom they choose to inform during their lifetime(s) in Family Meetings offered by the Firm. He also uses this background to better explain complex laws and even more complex techniques to deal with those laws to clients, their advisors, and, if they choose, in Family Meetings; he’s the Firm’s “infographics” pro.

Nova Southeastern Law School did not immediately follow obtaining his B.A. For Bennett, law school was a careful choice made after years of deliberation as he worked in the family business. Bennett chose this law school for it’s smaller and older student body.

Post-Graduate Education is an on-going process that Bennett doesn’t intend to stop until he retires, if he retires. He is a graduate of the Laureate Wealth Strategies Program, a year-long program in advanced planning strategies for clients whose assets exceed the amount that can be shielded from estate tax by the current lifetime credit. He obtains much of his post-graduate education from the leading provider of estate planning solutions for attorneys in the nation, Wealth Counsel, as well as from the Colorado State Bar, turning to other sources for particular areas of specialty (such as IRA planning or LLC planning).

Personal Development is an important area of education for Bennett and always will be. In addition to voracious reading that he often shares with Diedre, he participates in personal development programs through organizations including Landmark Education and Pransky & Associates. If you share this interest, be sure to ask Bennett about his favorite recent personal development book. But be prepared for a rousing discussion!