Our latest video covers the basics of what a Trust is and what it can do for you.
A Trust is an estate planning tool that can be utilized to bypass probate, the state court process for closing up a person’s estate after they pass away.
Compared to a general Will, a Living Trust can get inheritance to your beneficiaries quicker and with less hassle.
A Living Trust will hold your assets during your lifetime and then allow them to be distributed to exactly who you choose upon your death.
When you create a living trust, you transfer the ownership of your assets to the trust itself. This is called funding the trust. When you complete this, all of these assets together creates a trust fund.
To avoid overcomplicating it, think about your trust as an empty box. You put your assets into this box and during your lifetime, you have complete control over the box. You can use, sell, or do anything you want to with the items in it.
And when you pass, whoever you named as successor trustee takes control of the box and begins carrying out the instructions you have laid out in your trust document for distributing those assets.
Additionally, if you become disabled, a Trust allows for the successor trustee to step in and use the Trust funds to take care of you financially and manage your assets.
The living trust takes effect while you’re still alive, hence the name living, and it continues even after you pass. That is, unless there is a provision to terminate the Trust on a specified date.
A living trust can be revocable or irrevocable, which we will go more in depth with on videos to come, but that is a brief overview of the basics when it comes to trusts.