You Should Probably Own Your Home in a Trust - Here’s Why:

Your home may be the most valuable asset you own, and that home is often a large part of the legacy, or inheritance, that you want to leave to your spouse, children, or other loved ones. Unfortunately, if you die without an estate plan in place, your home may not pass to the individuals as intended, and it will need to go through a lengthy and expensive court process called probate in order to get there. With an estate plan, you can ensure that your home passes to the beneficiaries quickly, privately, and as intended.

Estate planning is the process of preparing the legal documents to prepare for your death and incapacity. There are various ways to manage your real estate within an estate plan, however, the most common is to title the real estate into a revocable trust.

What happens if I do not have a revocable trust?

If you own real estate and you did no estate planning during your life, then on your death your family will need to go to probate court. Probate court is a lengthy process during which a judge will oversee the distribution of your estate’s assets, such as real estate. The Probate process can, and often does, cost more than creating an estate plan, and it takes a significantly longer amount of time.

Why should I put my house into a revocable trust?

There are several benefits of placing your home in a trust. First, and foremost, on your death, your home will pass to your beneficiaries without your family going to probate court – saving your family time and money. Probate court takes a minimum of 6 months, but often takes 14 months or more. 

Second, by placing your home into a revocable trust you can ensure that if you are ever incapacitated, your successor trustee will be able to maintain your home for you. If you are ever unable to manage your home due to your incapacity, the successor trustee will be able to quickly step in to maintain the home, and they will be able to utilize other trust assets in order to pay for the continued maintenance of the home.

Third, by keeping your home in a revocable trust, upon your death, your home will be passed to your intended beneficiaries. If, upon your death, you have minor children, children with special needs, or are in a second marriage, you may not want your home to be distributed outright to your intended beneficiaries. With a revocable trust, you can allow an individual to live in your home without transferring the title directly to them – this allows the trustee to manage the home for the beneficiary’s benefit, without the beneficiary squandering the opportunity or taking advantage. Additionally, you may put limitations or contingencies on the beneficiary’s ability to live in the home, such as a time limit, or you may wish to limit your surviving spouse from cohabitating with another individual in the home. Alternatively, if, on your death, you simply want to gift the home to your children, or any other beneficiary, then your trustee will ensure that this gift occurs as intended.

What does it really mean to put my house in a trust?

Simply put, to put your house into a revocable trust, your estate planning attorney will prepare a deed transferring the home to your trust - instead of you owning the home as an individual, you will own your home as trustee of your revocable trust. If you choose to buy or sell additional real estate in the future, you would simply buy or sell that real estate as trustee of your revocable trust.

As experienced estate planning attorneys, we at Lavelle Law work with our clients to create holistic estate plans uniquely tailored to our clients’ individual needs. Generally, putting your home in trust can help give you peace of mind, and ultimately save your family time and money. While not everyone owns real estate, everyone needs an estate plan. If you would like to schedule a free consultation to hear more about the importance of estate planning, please call attorney Heather A. McCollum at (847) 705-7555 or email her at hmccollum@lavellelaw.com.