Sarah J. Schmidt

Sarah focuses her practice on estate planning, estate and trust administration, guardianships and conservatorships, and estate litigation. She also assists clients with formation of business entities, business succession planning, as well as with mergers and acquisitions.

Sarah has significant experience advising clients to plan for death and disability utilizing wills, trusts, powers of attorney and advance medical directives. Developing plans which incorporate trust funding and business succession planning where appropriate, she works to help clients achieve their estate planning objectives while also ensuring those objectives are implemented efficiently and effectively.

Sarah also advises trustees and court appointed executors in the administration of trusts and estates in the Commonwealth ensuring the proper administration from the date of death through the notices to creditors, final distributions, and court ordered accounting requirements. She brings a unique and valuable perspective to her estate planning and estate administration practice after working as a paralegal for over six years in law firms in Arizona, Alaska, and Virginia prior to attending law school.

Sarah has experience representing clients in contested guardianship and conservatorship actions. She also has experience representing fiduciaries where litigation arises after death or during the administration, including actions to construe a will, petitions to terminate or modify irrevocable trusts, petitions for aid and direction, court appointment of testamentary trustees, and partition actions.
Recognition:
  • Recognized in 2020 & 2021 as a “Top Lawyer” in Wills, Trusts, and Estates (Coastal Virginia Magazine)​
  • ​Recognized as a “2020 Best Lawyers: Ones to Watch”
  • Law clerk to the Honorable H. Thomas Padrick, Jr., and the Honorable Steven C. Frucci, in the Second Judicial Circuit of Virginia
  • Judicial intern to the Honorable Mark S. Davis, in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia
  • Recipient, National Association of Women Lawyers Outstanding Graduate Award
  • Senior Editor, Regent University Law Review
  • Book Awards for achieving the highest grade in Contracts I, Civil Procedure I, Civil Procedure II, Evidence, UCC I, Drafting Contracts, Elder Law, Advanced Evidence, and Constitutional Criminal Procedure.
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Court Admissions:

  • Supreme Court of Virginia
  • ​U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia

Memberships:

  • Virginia State Bar
  • Virginia Beach Bar Association
  • Secretary of the Hampton Roads Chapter of the Virginia Women Attorneys Association

Education:
  • ​Regent University School of Law, J.D., magna cum laude
  • Ashford University, B.S.
Contact Sarah
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sarah.schmidt@reavescoley.com
757.410.8066 office