Silverman Law Office, PLLC

Focus and practice areas

This is a Montana law firm that opened in May 2012. Its core work sits in five areas: estate planning, probate, business law, real estate transactions, and tax matters. Those areas anchor most of what the firm describes on its own pages.

Planning and transactional work

Much of the practice is built around planning documents and deals. The firm handles wills and trusts, probate, and the formation of Montana LLCs and companies. It also covers real estate transactions and tax planning. Business formation, acquisition, sale, and reorganization all appear on the list.

The firm says it does more than draft paperwork. It states that it coordinates communication among a client's financial advisors, accountants, and insurance agents. That points to a practice that treats legal work as one part of a wider file.

Disputes and licensing

Alongside the planning side, the firm takes on contested matters. That includes business and estate litigation, will and trust contests, and real estate and probate litigation. It also handles tax controversy work.

A further set of areas covers licensing and compliance. The firm names gambling and liquor licensing, cannabis business licensing, and professional licensing defense. Labor and employment and regulatory compliance round out the stated work.

How the team is put together

The site lists a group of attorneys and associate attorneys, supported by paralegals and administrative staff. In my opinion the roster is the clearest signal of how the firm runs, so it is worth reading name by name.

The founder

Joel Silverman founded the firm and serves as CEO. His profile also lists him as an attorney and author. He attended Lewis and Clark School of Law.

His own practice covers a wide slice of the firm's work. That runs across wills and living wills, trusts, and business matters such as formation, acquisition, sale, and reorganization. It also takes in mergers and acquisitions, employment and labor, tax, and oil and gas. He speaks Spanish as well.

Others named on the roster

Several other attorneys appear on the About Us page. They include Chris Walker, Mark Josephson, Michelle Ostrye, Katie Verderber, Ivy Newman Fredrickson, and Morgan E. Tuss. The associate attorneys named are Ben D'Alton, Tony Dalton, and Cody Townsend.

A few of these lawyers carry fuller profiles. Michelle Ostrye works in business litigation and is based in Bozeman. Cody Townsend also works from the Bozeman office, though his profile does not name specific practice areas.

Ivy Newman Fredrickson has the most detailed public bio of the group. She is a fifth-generation Butte resident who works with Montana families and businesses on estate planning, probate, real estate, business, and other transactional matters. She chairs the Butte-Silver Bow Board of Health, a role she has held since 2016. She also chairs Action, Inc., a nonprofit that provides housing assistance across six counties in Southwest Montana.

A statewide footprint

The firm runs five offices spread across Montana. They sit in Bozeman, Helena, Big Timber, Butte, and Billings. That is a broad base for a firm founded in 2012.

Reach extends past those five towns. The firm says it serves clients throughout the state, naming places such as Great Falls and Kalispell alongside its office cities. For clients outside the main hubs, that spread can shorten the distance to a lawyer.

Working alongside other advisers

One point the firm makes about itself is worth pulling out. It says it coordinates communication among a client's financial advisors, accountants, and insurance agents, on top of the legal work itself.

That approach fits the kind of matters the firm handles. Estate plans, business sales, and tax questions often pull in people outside the law office. A firm that manages those conversations can take some of the back and forth off a client's plate.

What stands out to a reviewer

Two things stand out to me. The first is the range: estate, business, real estate, tax, and litigation work all sit under one roof. The second is the statewide setup, with five offices and a client base that reaches beyond them.

As a reviewer, I would point anyone weighing the firm toward the attorney profiles first. The practice areas are stated plainly, and the founder's background in tax and business is easy to trace. The firm has operated in Montana since May 2012, and the focus it describes has stayed steady across those years.