OUR GENERAL ESTATE PLANNING APPROACH
In California, most attorneys use an inter-vivos trust to avoid probate. Under this approach, if you are married, you each would execute “pour-over” wills which provide that everything passes into a Family Trust. The wills are only a stop gap measure, because the purpose is to convey everything into trust now to avoid probate later.
The Family Trust would house all of your assets. Immediately following the signing of the Trust document, you would convey your house and any other real property you own, assign all securities, IRA accounts, change the names of your bank accounts, and assign all intangible and tangible personal property to the Trust. Otherwise, there would be a requirement of probate in your estate when the survivor of the two of you passes away. Joint tenancy only works for this purpose on the first death. IRA accounts may require special handling which we will discuss separately if necessary. Our new documents contain up to date fail safe provisions to insure that assets not transferred a covered in the event of death.
The Family Trust operates to provide for the typical “estate splitting “bypass arrangements to preserve the estate tax exemptions of both spouses. In order to provide maximum planning flexibility for the surviving spouse, we use a disclaimer trust approach under which the surviving spouse makes the election as to whether or not to split the estate to tax purposes and to what extent. For larger estates, a bypass trust is automatically set up and the deceased spouse’s full tax exempt amount will automatically be allocated to that trust.
We also have extensive background regarding more specialized estate planning arrangements, most typically, irrevocable life insurance trusts (“ILITS”).
Our Fee Arrangements:
We generally offer to prepare wills, a Family Trust, and health care and financial durable powers for a low fixed fee. Any special arrangements (such as life insurance trusts or more complex benefit structures) are charged at an hourly rate. We also assist in making asset transfers as part of our fee structure.