Category: Estate Planning

Several years ago, many people in the Idaho Falls area, due to pushy sales campaigns, bought trusts and placed their property in trust.  People changed the names on their deeds to the name of the trust.

Problem is, many of these trusts have gone missing–if they even existed at all.  When the person who bought the trust passes away, their family may or may not have a will, but if they don’t have the trust, it’s difficult to probate the property because the property is in the name of the trust.

In other words, the family can’t sell the property without spending quite a bit of money on an attorney to get the name on the deed changed.

Don’t leave your family in this position.  Check your current deed.  If it names a trust, make sure you and your children have copies of that trust.  If you can’t find the trust, do whatever you can to change the name on that deed now, before it becomes a major headache for your children.

I’ve posted previously about whether a trust is something you really need or not.  For most people in the Idaho Falls area, it’s not–a simple will should be enough.  I can assist you in making that decision.  If you’re trying to do probate on a deed that lists a missing trust as the owner, give me a call, and we can fix it.

If you have life insurance–regardless of the type–chances are you told your life insurance company at the time of your application who you wanted as your life insurance beneficiary.

You may have listed a spouse, or perhaps a child or children.

When you created a Will, you also listed beneficiaries.  However–and this is important–your will has nothing to do with who will inherit from your life insurance.

A common example: You set up a will and list your spouse as a beneficiary.  You set up a life insurance policy, and list your spouse as a beneficiary.  Years later, you get a divorce.  After the divorce, you decide to update your will so that your ex-spouse is no longer on it.  Instead, your adult children are the beneficiaries.

At this point, you may think the beneficiaries listed on the will are the individuals who’ll receive your life insurance.  They’re not.  Your ex-husband is still listed as beneficiary on the life insurance policy.  In order for your children to inherit, you’ll need to contact your life insurance company and change the beneficiaries.

Life insurance policies aren’t the only thing a will won’t cover.  Talk to an attorney familiar with estate planning and probate to make sure your loved ones are protected.

Do I need a trust?

This is a complicated question.  For most people in the Idaho Falls and Blackfoot areas, the answer is: probably not.  However, you should consider some of the advantages of a trust:

1. If you’re wealthy.  Currently, your estate is exempt for estate taxes up to around 5 million dollars.  Be careful, however–this number changes fairly frequently, and it could easily become less.  However, unless you’re fairly wealthy, you don’t need to worry about estate taxes.

2. If you own real estate property outside of Idaho.  In order to probate property outside of Idaho, your heirs will have to open up probate proceedings in each state where you own real estate.  This can get expensive, depending on where your property is.

3. If  you want to protect your assets from Medicaid.  However, you need to take action early here, as the government looks back five years to make sure you haven’t given away money–to individuals or to a trust–within that time.  If you place your money and property into a trust, and three years later you end up needing Medicaid for your nursing care needs, you’ll have problems.

4.  Other reasons.  There may be other reasons for you to set up a trust; however, a will may be a better option, and a will is certainly less expensive.  Some attorneys may try to sell you a trust when you have no need of one; I usually recommend a will instead, but may recommend a trust depending on the circumstances.

Call me at 208-206-1475 to discuss your options.

Why get a will?

A will allows you to choose who gets what when you die.

More importantly, if you have minor children, a will allows you to specify who you’d want as a guardian if you were to pass away.

If you don’t specify those details in a will, a judge may make that decision–and he or she may make the wrong decision.

Wills aren’t expensive.  Make sure you get one done right by contacting an Idaho attorney with experience writing wills.  Keep in mind that some attorneys will try to sell you a much more expensive trust–call me for a second opinion before you buy something as pricey as a trust, which often isn’t necessary.