Trust Funding Attorney

Assets left in your individual name without an effective beneficiary designation, survivorship right or other transfer mechanism may require probate. The result depends on each asset and applicable law; an unfunded trust may not carry out the intended plan.

Sometimes. Retirement accounts are generally not retitled into a living trust during life — doing so is normally a taxable distribution. Naming a trust as beneficiary can make sense when beneficiaries are young or need protection, but only where the trust is drafted for it: under the SECURE Act rules a trust beneficiary can accelerate taxable distributions. Every designation gets an account-specific review with your CPA before it is changed.

Usually not, but there are two questions. On the loan: the federal Garn–St Germain Act generally prevents a lender from calling the loan when a residence is transferred into an inter vivos trust in which the borrower is and remains a beneficiary and the transfer does not shift rights of occupancy. That exemption is narrow — it does not cover every trust or every transfer — so we confirm the deed language and notify the lender where appropriate. On tax: transfers to a revocable trust are typically treated as non-events for income tax, but transfer-tax and property-tax exemptions are state and county specific, and homeowner’s and title insurance need to be updated. We verify each of those before recording rather than assuming.

Some of it, yes — beneficiary forms and straightforward account retitling are often paperwork the custodian will walk you through. Deeds, entity assignments, and anything touching a lender, an operating agreement, or a retirement account should run through us, so the transfer is actually effective and does not create a new problem. Where funding coordination is part of your engagement, the scope says so in writing.