Living Trust Lawyer in California

Guiding Clients Through the Estate Planning Process

If you want to ensure your family is financially provided for long-term, you need to have an estate plan in place before you pass away. One of the most highly recommended estate planning tools is a living trust, which lets you control the distribution of your assets and bypass the probate process. If you’re ready to learn more about living trusts, you should talk to a Riverside County estate planning attorney.

When you contact the Sheela Stark Law Group, APC, for legal support, you’ll work with a caring, helpful team to create an estate plan customized for your family’s specific needs. Call our Southern California law offices today for a free consultation with an experienced attorney serving Riverside County, San Bernardino County, Orange County, and surrounding areas.

What Is a Living Trust?

Before you decide whether a living trust would benefit you and your family, you should get to know what it is and how it works, starting with the fact that it’s a legal entity that you can transfer your assets to after you set it up. Once your assets are in the trust, you will appoint a trustee to manage them until your death, at which point the trust assets will transfer to your beneficiaries.

What makes a living trust unique is that it takes effect during your lifetime, not after it like a will or testamentary trust does. As a result, you can start seeing the benefits of this legal entity before you pass away. Depending on the kind of trust you create, you can make changes to it as needed, enjoy tax planning advantages, and ensure your affairs are managed if you become incapacitated.

If you’re unsure if you’d benefit from a living trust, you should contact our Southern California law firm to speak with Riverside estate planning attorneys. We’ll go over your estate planning options to determine if opening a trust makes sense for you. Note that estate plans often feature a mix of legal tools to help plan for the future, including last wills, advanced health care directives, financial powers of attorney, trusts, and other estate planning documents. Our experienced lawyers frequently assist clients with estate planning, business succession planning, trust administration, probate litigation, and other legal services. Call our trusted law firm today if you’re seeking legal help in San Bernardino, Riverside, Palm Springs, or other nearby cities.

Should You Make a Revocable Living Trust?

As you consider creating a trust for your estate plan, you must decide whether a revocable or irrevocable trust is right for you. An estate planning attorney can assist with this step after learning more about your specific needs, as each type of trust has its own advantages and disadvantages.

The most popular type of living trust is a revocable trust. This option gives you the most control since you – the grantor – can appoint yourself as the trustee. This means you have the ability to move assets in and out of the trust and add or remove beneficiaries during your life, which is helpful as relationships change and you gain new assets over time. You can also revoke the trust anytime if you need to modify your estate plan.

One of the main benefits of revocable trusts is flexibility. If you’re uncomfortable with agreeing to a legal arrangement that you can’t change in the future, appointing yourself as the trustee and retaining control of your assets may be appealing. You will still need to assign a successor trustee to take over when you pass away or become incapacitated, but until then, you maintain control of your trust.

Another benefit is avoiding probate, since all types of trusts can bypass the probate process, allowing the beneficiaries to get their inheritance as quickly as possible. Avoiding probate also keeps the details of asset distribution private since probate records are public.

In general, this estate planning tool offers several benefits, including flexibility, privacy, and the opportunity to avoid probate. However, compared to some other legal options, the creditor protection and tax planning benefits of a revocable trust are minimal. If you’re interested in these benefits, you should talk to a San Bernardino County estate planning attorney about other options, such as irrevocable trusts.

What Is an Irrevocable Living Trust?

Another type of trust to consider is an irrevocable trust. With this option, you must name someone other than yourself as the trustee, which means you won’t be able to manage your trust like you would with a revocable trust. Instead, the trustee would be expected to manage it according to the trust documents.

Appointing someone else as the trustee means you lose the flexibility you’d have with a revocable trust, but there are some benefits to this. One is protection from creditors. When you’re not in control of your trust in the eyes of the law, you’re not at risk of losing the trust assets to creditors or lawsuits. After all, you can’t lose an asset that’s no longer considered to be part of your estate, so you can rest assured the assets in the trust will safely remain there to be passed to your beneficiaries after your death.

Another benefit of making an irrevocable trust is the chance to minimize your taxes. When an asset is placed into an irrevocable trust, it’s not part of your taxable estate anymore, so you can save money on your estate taxes. Of course, tax law can be complex, so you should contact a skilled Inland Empire tax law firm for advice on reducing your taxes through different estate planning options.

You can set up different varieties of living trusts based on your specific needs, with some examples being special needs trusts, charitable remainder trusts, and irrevocable life insurance trusts. Experienced San Bernardino estate planning attorneys can help you choose the right one for your family, so call our law firm today for a free consultation. Our trust lawyers regularly represent clients seeking help with estate planning, trust administration, probate litigation, probate administration, and more.

Are You Ready to Hire a Living Trust Attorney in California?

If you need quality legal services during the estate planning process, it’s time to contact a skilled living trust attorney. Riverside clients can rely on the Sheela Stark Law Group, APC, for legal advice on everything from estate planning to probate matters of all kinds.

Whether you live in Orange County, San Bernardino County, Riverside County, or anywhere near the Inland Empire, we can answer your questions about living trusts, last wills, living wills, and other estate planning tools. We regularly help local families plan for the future, so if you want to get started on your estate plan, call our Rancho Cucamonga law office today at 909-675-1545.