A legal residence is where you have your permanent home or principal establishment, and to where, whenever you are absent, you intend to return.
If a client has a current trust, the portal will ask them a series of questions. The attorney will then recommend the best way to bring their documents up to date.
The successor trustee takes over management of the trust when the trustee has become incapacitated or died.
Add the first successor trustee, then determine if you would like to add another one to act if the first one cannot serve. When two successor trustees are added, you will need to indicate if you want them to serve alone in the order listed or together as co-trustees. If successor co-trustees are chosen, consider their relationship and if they will work well together.
The platform allows you to add up to 4 total successor trustees. When more than two are added, they serve in the order listed.
Any person can be disinherited, and ex-spouses are automatically listed in the disinherited section. “Disinheriting” a person communicates to the court that they are intentionally excluded from your estate, not simply forgotten.
Personal property refers to items like furniture, clothes, jewelry, appliances, cars, etc.
Specific bequests are typically expressed as a cash amount or assets of monetary or sentimental value, such as an automobile or a piece of art.
You may avoid probate on the transfer of some assets at your death through the use of beneficiary designations. Laws regarding what assets may be transferred without probate (non-probate transfer laws) vary from state to state. Some common examples include life insurance death benefits and bank accounts.
These allow you to appoint someone you know and trust to make your personal health care and financial decisions even when you cannot. If you are incapacitated without these legal documents, then you and your family will be involved in a probate proceeding known as a guardianship and conservatorship. This is the court proceeding where a judge determines who should make these decisions for you under the ongoing supervision of the court.
This is an agreement with three parties: the Trust-makers, the Trustees (or Trust Managers), and the Trust Beneficiaries. For example, a husband and wife may name themselves all three parties to create their trust, manage all the assets transferred to the trust, and have full use and enjoyment of all the trust assets as beneficiaries. Further “back-up” managers can step in under the terms of the trust to manage the assets should the couple become incapacitated or die. Special provisions in the trust also control the management and distribution of assets to heirs in the event of the trustmaker’s death. With proper planning, the couple also can avoid or eliminate death taxes on their estate. The Revocable Living Trust may allow them to accomplish all this outside of any court proceeding.
Whether you are young or old, rich or poor, married or single, if you own titled assets such as a house and want your loved ones to avoid court interference at your death or incapacity, consider a revocable living trust. A trust allows you to bring all of your assets together under one plan.
If one of the beneficiaries owes money to the trustee, they can subtract the amount from the distribution or forgive the debt.
Unless the trust dictates otherwise, upon reaching age 18, beneficiaries will receive their entire inheritance in a lump sum.
Alternatively, you can continue to hold their assets in trust with delayed distributions over time as your beneficiaries mature.
You can select up to 3 different ages and the percentage to be distributed at each age.
Assets can also be held in trust until certain behavioral conditions are met.
You can choose one or more of the following behaviors:
- Drug-Free
- Alcohol-Free
- Gambling Free
There is specific language in the trust that addresses who is responsible for determining these conditions and how they are enforced. Review the language before finalizing the trust.
Yes, you can change or amend your trust as often as you wish. Your estate plan should change to stay updated as your life changes.
These major changes could include:
- Marriage
- Divorce
- Birth or adoption of a child
- Death of a beneficiary
- Change or add a beneficiary
- Change the trustee or successor trustee
- Change the way the property is distributed
- Change which property is part of the trust
- Change your name
- Having acquired new property that you want to add to the trust
- Having moved to another state where the inheritance laws are different
You can amend your trust online for typically much less than a standard attorney charges.
To send an invitation to any of the other parties mentioned in the estate plan, click the PEOPLE tab on your landing page. From there, you can send or resend an email instructing the person on how to log into the portal.
While not required, if accounts with a POD or TOD are instead transferred into a trust, the grantor can have more ‘control from the grave’ over those accounts. The trust does allow for the sprinkling of assets over time and allows for behavioral conditions on the payouts.
Probate is the court and process that looks after people who cannot make their own personal, health care and financial decisions. These people fall into three general categories: Minor Children (under age 18 in most states); Incapacitated Adults; and People who have died without legal arrangements to avoid probate. Probate proceedings can be expensive and time-consuming. Additionally, the court proceeding and associated documents are all a matter of public record. Many people choose to avoid probate in order to save money, spare their heirs a legal hassle, and keep their personal affairs private.
This is the most common form of asset ownership between spouses. Joint tenancy (or TBE) has the advantage of avoiding probate at the death of the first spouse. However, the surviving spouse should not add the names of other relatives to their assets. Doing so may subject their assets to loss through the debts, bankruptcies, divorces and/or lawsuits of any additional joint tenants. Joint tenancy planning also may result in unnecessary death taxes on the estate of a married couple.
The document a person signs to provide for the orderly disposition of assets after death. Wills do not avoid probate. Wills have no legal authority until the willmaker dies and the original will is delivered to the Probate Court. Still, everyone with minor children needs a will. It is the only way to appoint the new “parent” of an orphaned child. Special testamentary trust provisions in a will can provide for the management and distribution of assets for your heirs. Additionally, assets can be arranged and coordinated with provisions of the testamentary trusts to avoid death taxes.
Sometimes called an Advance Medical Directive, a living will allows you to state your wishes in advance regarding what types of medical life support measures you prefer to have, or have withheld/withdrawn if you are in a terminal condition (without reasonable hope of recovery) and cannot express your wishes yourself. Oftentimes a living will is executed along with a Durable Power of Attorney for Health care, which gives someone legal authority to make your health care decisions when you are unable to do so yourself.
If you die without even a Will (intestate), the legislature of your state has already determined who will inherit your assets and when they will inherit them. You may not agree with their plan, but roughly 70 percent of Americans currently use it.