Overview
Michael (Mike) J. Sorrow focuses his practice on tax, estate planning, family business and trust and estate administration matters. Mike regularly advises wealthy individuals and families on all aspects of wealth and tax planning matters. In addition, Mike works extensively with families that control significant public and private businesses, counseling them and their family offices on matters relating to effective tax planning, succession and governance planning and the intra-family issues that arise in the management of a family business. Mike also has successfully represented taxpayers on tax controversy matters through audits, administrative appeals and litigation.
Mike is a certified public accountant. Prior to going to law school, he worked as a senior tax accountant for a Big Four accounting firm. While in law school, he served as an extern for the Honorable Amy J. St. Eve of the US District Court for the Northern District of Illinois. He also worked for Northwestern’s Small Business Opportunity Center, where he assisted small business entrepreneurs on a wide variety of legal and business issues confronting their start-up enterprises.
Results
- Developed current liquidity and long-term ownership strategies for multi-generational families that control significant privately held operating businesses
- Collaborated with investment bankers and advisers, corporate trustee and corporate attorneys on families’ diversification of their significant investment in public companies
- Formed private trust companies to implement families’ desired governance structure for their multibillion-dollar family businesses
- Managed complex estate administrations with unique assets, including management of Internal Revenue Service estate tax audits
- Served as counsel and obtained a favorable verdict in US Tax Court for an executor who entered into a “Graegin” loan to satisfy the estate tax obligations of an illiquid estate primarily made up of a family business
Recognitions
- Chambers High Net Worth, Illinois: Private Wealth Law, 2021–2024
- Best Lawyers in America, Trust and Estates, Chicago, 2025
Credentials
Education
Northwestern University School of Law, JD, cum laude, 2007
Illinois Wesleyan University, BA, cum laude, 2001
Admissions
Illinois
