“Mistakes Trust Attorneys Help Your Avoid” by Attorney Nicole Livingston
An Annapolis trusts lawyer provides you with help in making sure you choose the right type of trust and making sure you follow Maryland laws for trust creation. Trusts are powerful legal tools that can do many different things for you, including providing strong protection for assets. You cannot afford to make mistakes when it comes to creating a trust, as substantial financial loss could occur if you believe you have taken steps to protect assets and have not actually done so.
Sinclair Prosser Gasior has extensive experience with trust creation and our legal team can guide you through every step of the trust creation process. We can also help you to avoid the types of errors that could result in you not getting the protections that you are creating the trust to provide. To find out more, give us a call. Our legal team will offer personalized advice and take care of the technical aspects of making the trust document for you. We’ll also help you to avoid making the following three key mistakes that could cost you.
Making the Wrong Type of Trust
There are many different kinds of trusts, and they do not all provide the same benefits. For example, if you create a living trust, you can benefit by having your assets transfer outside of the probate process. This will make it much faster for your loved ones to inherit, which is important if you have family members counting on an inheritance or if you have assets that need to be transferred to a new owner right away because an executor may not be able to manage them properly.
However, while a living trust allows assets to transfer outside of the probate process, it doesn’t protect your wealth if you need to qualify for Medicaid for nursing home care and it doesn’t help you to avoid estate tax. You don’t want to think you’re protected from a potential source of loss when you aren’t, so talk with an experienced attorney about what kind of trust will provide you with the desired advantages.
Not Making Your Trust Document Correctly
If you do not follow Maryland law to ensure that you have a legally valid trust document, it is possible that your trust will not be considered valid. You may not discover this until it is too late. If creditors are coming after assets you thought were protected or if you or a loved one is not eligible for Medicaid benefits because you didn’t use the right kind of trust to ensure eligibility, you could lose hundreds of thousands of dollars.
There is too much money at stake to not get the proper legal advice for trust creation. Sinclair Prosser Gasior will help you to not only follow formalities for creating your trust document but can also help you to select the right trustee by explaining what the job of the trustee will entail and the fiduciary duty that will apply to the trustee.
Failing to Properly Fund Your Trust
Creating a trust is only the first step. You also need to transfer the assets into the trust that you want to benefit from the trust protections. This often means taking steps like changing titles and deeds to property, all of which can require specialized legal knowledge to do correctly. Our legal team will help you with the process of transferring ownership of all of the appropriate assets into your trust.
We can also assist you with understanding the implications of moving different kinds of property into a trust. You could also give up certain kinds of tax benefits when transferring a home into a trust. You don’t want to fund a trust without talking to a lawyer first about the legal implications of every decision that you are making.
Getting Help from An Annapolis Trust Lawyer
Sinclair Prosser Gasior can assist you with deciding whether you need a trust and can guide you through the entirety of the trust creation process. To find out more about how trusts work and what they can do for you, join us for a free seminar. Get started on creating your trust before it becomes too late to protect your wealth and our family.
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