The Law Office Of Elizabeth Devolder For Quality Estate Planning With Heart 

(Above, l.-r.) Attorney Elizabeth Devolder, case manager Camelia Howard and attorney Rachael Alexander make up the team you’ll have on your side if you choose the Law Office of Elizabeth Devolder in Tampa Palms. (Photos by Charmaine George)

When Dwan Klein’s dear friend of 37 years called to say her checks were suddenly bouncing, Dwan immediately knew something was wrong. 

Her friend, now 86, had been widowed for many years, had no family, and had signed documents appointing Dwan and her husband as her caregivers if she were to become incapacitated. 

Dwan had no idea that day was so close. 

Dwan’s husband, an accountant, realized someone was stealing from their friend. They were able to determine it was an online scammer, but Dwan’s friend didn’t believe it. She refused to close her accounts to stop the perpetrator. 

At an absolute loss of what to do, Dwan turned to attorney Elizabeth Devolder of The Law Office of Elizabeth Devolder, located in the Tampa Palms Professional Center, just off the Bruce B. Downs (BBD) Blvd. exit of I-75. 

“It was the best thing we could have done,” Dwan says. “Elizabeth understood immediately what our issues were, and gave us direction on what do to, and how to do it.” 

Elizabeth says her firm is seeing many instances of such financial exploitation. In addition to this example, she has seen elderly people who have left their financial and medical decisions to some unexpected people, including a dog trainer, someone who painted a person’s car and even a taxi driver. 

“Sometimes, people don’t know who to trust,” Elizabeth says. “Sometimes, their families live far away and aren’t able to be on site, but there’s a neighbor or a person from church who offers to help. We often don’t know those people’s bad intentions until much later.” 

Elizabeth and her team have the legal expertise to help people understand and think through their options when it comes to establishing caregiving and financial responsibility, should they become incapacitated. 

“People come into my office to set up a will and they aren’t thinking about the kinds of decisions that might need to be made if they become ill and can’t make them [for themselves] anymore,” she says. “They have this idea in their mind that, in the future, they will either be dead or perfectly fine. They don’t anticipate incapacity.” 

Elizabeth established The Law Office of Elizabeth Devolder in 2021, five years after she earned her Juris Doctor (J.D.) law degree from the Tampa campus of the Thomas M. Cooley Law School in Riverview in 2016, following a successful career in advertising and sales management. She had previously earned a Bachelor of Arts (B.A.) degree in Corporate Communications from the College of Charleston, SC, in 1997. For five years, Elizabeth worked jointly with her ex-husband Bryan Devolder at their Devolder Law Firm. 

The newer firm’s associate attorney Rachael Alexander was previously a case manager, working closely with Elizabeth and helping her found the firm while going to law school herself. The team also includes case manager Camelia Howard. 

Elizabeth says there are ways to set up your documents to ensure a system of checks and balances, so that no one person has total control and there’s always someone looking out for your best interests, even if it’s not your primary caregiver. 

She emphasizes that this is why setting up an estate plan with an attorney is so important, and that online documents from a website don’t give you personalized, customized advice from an expert who takes your individual circumstances into account. 

There’s another benefit to hiring an attorney, too. The attorney who prepares and signs your documents can testify to your capacity and intentions in court if that becomes necessary. 

Dwan and her husband were grateful for Elizabeth’s immediate action to help their friend. They ended up going to court, where three separate experts evaluated their friend and determined that she was unable to make good decisions for herself. Her paperwork was crystal clear about who she wanted to make decisions on her behalf if that were to happen. 

The court gave Dwan the authority to close the accounts that were being attacked and protect her friend’s assets. By the time they were able to do that, the scammer already had taken $150,000 from their friend. 

“When we met Elizabeth, we knew immediately that she was the right person to help us,” Dwan says. “She knew exactly what we needed to do.” Dwan adds that she is grateful that Elizabeth helped her to ensure her friend’s assets could no longer be stolen. 

“We talk regularly, and we ensure that all of her needs are met,” says Dwan. “It was very difficult, and very hard to see her unable to accept the fact that she was being taken advantage of, but the judge was so kind and actually said, ‘I wish I had a friend like you.’” 

Elizabeth says this is a perfect example of how one situation is very different from another. Not everyone has a friend who would take such good care of them and manage their finances in their best interest. In those cases, when a person has no family present, there are professionals who can manage these decisions for them. 

Sometimes, though, a professional isn’t needed. Remember the dog trainer, taxi driver, and car painter who were given control over someone’s entire estate? One of those actually had no bad intentions at all. 

In fact, Elizabeth says the person who asked her taxi driver to care for her had no family. She had formed a bond with the lady who drove her to all of her appointments. That taxi driver ended up caring for her for the rest of her life, ensuring she had all she needed, and looking out for her best interests. 

“Every family and every person’s situation is different,” she says. “The important thing an attorney can do is help to create a system that avoids the potential for abuse, and can provide testimony about your capacity when you signed the documents.” 

Elizabeth says for her clients, she is willing to take the time to be incredibly detailed, as long as that’s what the client wants. She tells of visiting a client in the hospital who was refusing to eat and the client’s nurses were frustrated. Elizabeth glanced at the papers she had brought with her. 

“I told the nurses his favorite treat was ice cream, and they looked at me like I was a genius,” Elizabeth laughs. “You can have sufficient documents that don’t go into that level of detail, but with it, you can provide direction for how to provide better care for you.” 

Elizabeth also specializes in valuating and managing collections of art or other tangible personal property, such as gun or coin collections, or antiques. 

“It may require calling in a special appraiser who is familiar with that type of collection, because 1980s rock posters are very different than a collection of china,” Elizabeth says. “Our goal is to maximize the value of the collection, which takes some effort, and the person who is best at knowing how to maximize the value is the one who collected it.” 

Elizabeth says she and her team offer their clients experience, knowledge and care that may be hard to find, especially as the market grows and many attorneys offer estate planning. 

“In addition to eight years of experience doing estate planning here in our area, we live and work in Tampa, and we work together to answer our own calls in our own office,” she says. “We’re not working out of a coworking space or having a virtual assistant in another country answering our phones. My clients want to walk in and see the person they spoke to on the phone, and meet my staff, who is then also able to testify about you if necessary. Those details are important to look for when hiring an estate planning attorney.” 

The Law Office of Elizabeth Devolder is located at 5383 Primrose Lake Cir., Suite C, in the Tampa Palms Professional Center. It is open Monday-Friday, 8:30 a.m.–6 p.m. For more information or to make an appointment, call (813) 319-4550 or visit ElizabethDevolder.com.

Law Office Of Elizabeth Devolder —  Compassionate Help For Families 

Attorney Elizabeth Devolder (center) and her team at the Law Firm of Elizabeth Devolder, 
located just off the Bruce B. Downs Blvd. exit off I-75. (Photo provided by Elizabeth Devolder)

Attorney Elizabeth Devolder says that, these days, she’s seeing a lot of families who have suffered through the pandemic — and even the stress of having to prepare for Hurricane Ian — and are thinking about what would happen if they or someone they love were to pass away or become incapacitated.

The Law Office of Elizabeth Devolder, which Devolder launched in January 2021, is ready to help. The boutique firm is located in the Tampa Palms Professional Center, just off the Bruce B. Downs (BBD) Blvd. exit of I-75 in Tampa Palms.

Devolder earned her Juris Doctor (J.D.) law degree at the Tampa campus of the Thomas M. Cooley Law School in Riverview in 2016, after a successful career in advertising and sales management. She had previously earned a Bachelor of Arts (B.A.) degree in Corporate Communications from the College of Charleston, SC, in 1997. For five years, Elizabeth worked jointly with her ex-husband Bryan Devolder at their Devolder Law Firm.

Associate attorney Rachael Alexander was previously a case manager, working closely with Elizabeth while going to law school and helping her found the new firm. 

In her new firm, Devolder — with support from Rachael and a growing staff, including a legal assistant and case manager — continues to handle estate planning and probate matters, and Devolder’s clients say she is both smart and compassionate.

When Christine Smith’s husband died four years ago, she says she hired Devolder to help her. 

“It was really overwhelming,” Smith explains, “but she asked me things gently and slowly and spent so much time with me at one of the worst times of my life.”

Smith says Devolder’s compassion is only half of the reason she is so pleased with her experience with the firm.

“She’s also probably the smartest person I’ve ever met in real life,” says Christine Smith. “She’s really sharp.”

Elizabeth Devolder

After working out her own estate plan, Smith brought her young adult son in, too, to set up documents that would allow her to make medical decisions for him if he were to ever become temporarily or permanently incapacitated. Devolder recommends a number of documents — such as a Power of Attorney and others that may apply to your unique situation — for everyone, so that someone you choose has the authority to care for you if something unexpected happens.

 Christine then introduced her 91-year-old father to Elizabeth, who handled his documents, as well. “We’re multigenerational clients,” she says.

Devolder says she helps many families like Christine’s, who are experiencing the crunch of what she calls the “sandwich generation,” where children are becoming adults but still need a lot of support from their parents, while their older parents also are becoming increasingly needy.

“You have a lot of people depending on you,” Devolder says.

Another multigenerational client is JoAnne Tucker, a Hunter’s Green resident who first hired Devolder to help her handle her brother’s estate when he began showing signs of dementia and ultimately passed away.

“The entire process can be so confusing,” Tucker says. “But, sitting down with Elizabeth was very comfortable. She and Rachael always answered all of my questions — no matter how many times I asked — and helped me to be confident that I had all of the information I needed and knew exactly what to do next.”

Later, Tucker went back to Devolder to prepare her own documents. Then, her mother and sister worked with Elizabeth, as well.

Devolder says you shouldn’t do what you heard your neighbor did, or take a friend’s generic advice.

“My job is to take what I know about the law and apply it to a specific set of facts,” Devolder explains, “because the documents you might need depends upon the makeup of your family — such as how many kids you have, if your family is blended, if there is conflict in the family, and the makeup of your assets.”

Devolder says that the entire Baby Boomer generation will be age 65 by 2030, and that 75 percent of people over age 65 will need some type of long-term care. She says she can help you plan for that care to help your family avoid spending too much of its resources on that care.

While many people don’t want to think about the possible need for long-term care — which is required when someone needs help bathing, feeding, dressing or going to the bathroom — Devolder says that now is the time to start planning for it.

“When it was time for your kids to go to college, you didn’t first start looking at colleges the week before they were supposed to start classes,” she says. “The time to plan for that is well in advance. It’s the same with long-term care.”

Attorney Elizabeth Devolder is pictured here with her grandfather Harry Constantine Demosthenes and great aunt Electra Demosthenes Kageorge (both now deceased). Elizabeth’s new business venture, The Legacy Studio, will be a video studio located inside her law firm that will help families capture and preserve the stories of their older generations.

The Legacy Studio

Devolder’s desire to help families goes beyond just preserving their financial assets and planning for the future. She says she has a passion to help people protect their entire respective legacies, including their memories. 

To that end, she is opening up a second business located inside the law office that will allow families to preserve their older generation’s most precious recollections.

She says the idea came to her when a client told her he thought he knew the stories his grandmother told, but after she passed away, they were lost. Then, the client’s mother also passed away, and he realized her stories were lost, as well. He told Elizabeth he wanted to write his own stories down for future generations, so that those precious memories would be preserved.

The idea of preserving people’s memories resonated with Devolder, but she realized that technology allows us to do much better than just writing things down.

“How you tell the story is part of the story,” she says, adding that video is the ideal medium for preserving these legacies. So, she created The Legacy Studio to provide that opportunity for not only her legal clients, but for anyone who wants to preserve their precious memories.

She says her clients have welcomed the idea and that the studio website will be up and running soon at www.LeaveYourLegacyStudio.com, although Devolder says she doesn’t yet have a scheduled grand opening date.

She is hoping The Legacy Studio will bring families together, and allow grandparents and parents to leave their stories as a legacy for their children.

The Law Office of Elizabeth Devolder is located at 5383 Primrose Lake Cir., Suite C, in the Tampa Palms Professional Center. It is open Monday-Friday, 8:30 a.m.–6 p.m. For more info or to make an appointment, call (813) 319-4550, or visit ElizabethDevolder.com.