Living trusts for homeowners
A revocable living trust holds your house and accounts while you’re alive and passes them on without a probate case. You stay in charge of everything in it.
You sign the trust, then move your things into it: the house by a new deed, and each account by a form from the bank or the brokerage. While you’re well you run the trust yourself. If you can’t, or after you die, the successor trustee you named steps in without asking a judge.
Funding is where trusts fail
A trust only controls what’s been moved into it. We prepare and record the deed for your home ourselves, and give you a written checklist for every other account, with the wording each bank wants. Then we call a month later to see what’s left.
Property in two states
Families with a house in Omaha and farmland or a cabin in Iowa often choose a trust for that reason alone: one trust can hold both, so nobody needs a probate case in each state.
What the trust package covers
One fee, quoted in your fee letter. It includes one deed; each additional property is quoted separately.
Trust package for a couple
A joint trust with pour-over wills and the documents below for both of you.
- A revocable living trust
- Pour-over wills for both of you
- Powers of attorney and health care directives
- The deed that moves your home into the trust
- A checklist for retitling each account
- County recording fees
Trust package for one person
The same package for one person.
- A revocable living trust
- A pour-over will
- Powers of attorney and a health care directive
- The deed that moves your home into the trust
- A checklist for retitling each account
- County recording fees
County recording fees for the deed are billed at cost.
Trust questions from homeowners
Does a trust save taxes?
A revocable trust doesn’t change your income tax, and most families don’t owe estate tax either way. Its job is to avoid probate and to plan for incapacity.
Can we change it later?
Yes. A revocable trust can be amended or ended while you’re both living and able to sign.
Who should be the successor trustee?
Someone organised and trusted by the rest of the family. Many parents name one grown child, or two who work well together.
Find out if a will would do instead
On the free call we’ll tell you plainly whether a will would do the same job for less.