Over 20 years experience in legal litigation in Orange County , California.

Estate Planning Check List

1. Do you own real property?

If you do own real property with the title in your name alone, valued at more than $10,000.00, you will need to probate your estate to pass title on to your heirs. If your real property is in your trust, you avoid probate.

2. Do you own more than $100,000.00 of personal property (cash, stocks, bonds, autos, furniture, antiques, jewelry, household effects)?

If you do have more than $100,000.00 in personal property, you will need to probate your estate in order to pass the personal property to your heirs. If your personal property is in your trust, you avoid probate.

3. Is your estate worth more than $1.5 million dollars?

If it is, and you leave your estate to someone other than your spouse, you will have to pay estate taxes. At the present time, if you have the right kind of trust, you and your spouse may pass to your heirs $3.0 million dollars without estate taxes.

4. May a trust be changed?

A revocable living trust may be amended while both of the people who set up the trust (the settlors) are alive. It may also be revoked by either of the settlors. After the first spouse dies, the trust is divided into two trusts: one for the surviving spouse and one for the decendent spouse. The decendent's trust is now irrevocable and non-amendable. But the surviving spouse may revoke or amend his/her trust.

5. May I take out and put assets into a trust?

Yes. Assets may be both removed from a trust and added to a trust at any time during your life.

6. Is it more difficult to buy and sell my assets if they are in a trust?

No. You may buy and sell assets just as you always have, but you do so in your name as trustee rather than in your name as an individual.

7. Do I need a will if I have a trust?

The usual procedure is to prepare a "pour over" will with a trust. The pour over will leaves all the assets (not already transferred into a trust) to the trust so that if there are any overlooked assets or later acquired assets not transferred to the trust, they will be added to the trust.

8. Who are the trustees of my trust?

You may name yourself trustee until your death. If you are married, you and your spouse may be the co-trustees and the survivor of the two of you may continue on to be the trustee after the first spouse dies.

9. Who is the trustee after my death?

You may name a successor trustee when you draft your trust to take over after the incapacity or death of you and your spouse.

10. May I change the trustee and/or beneficiaries if I change my mind before I die?

Yes. You may change trustees and the person you want to be your beneficiaries while you are living. However, if you are married, after your death, your trust becomes irrevocable and no one can change whom you name as either the trustee or the beneficiaries.