Trust Attorneys in Lehi, UT

Providing Clients with the Legal Tools to Protect Valuable Assets

If your goal is to ensure your family is taken care of financially after you pass away, researching your estate planning options is a good idea. You’ll find that one of the most popular tools is a trust, which can protect your assets before and after your death so you can rest assured that they will pass to your beneficiaries. A skilled Lehi trust attorney can help you understand the advantages of trusts and set up the right one for your needs, so it’s recommended that you reach out to a local law firm for legal help.

When you hire Trusted Estate Planning Attorneys for estate planning assistance, you’ll have a team of experienced attorneys ready to create a comprehensive estate plan that could include wills, trusts, life insurance policies, and more. Call our Lehi law office today for a free consultation with a lawyer who will help you plan for your future.

What Is a Trust?

A trust is an arrangement in which you transfer your assets to a third party – a trustee – to hold on behalf of your beneficiaries. At that point, the trustee is responsible for managing the assets in the trust based on your instructions in the trust document.

When you pass away, the trustee will make sure the trust assets are transferred to your beneficiaries. This process typically goes smoothly because trust assets don’t have to go through probate, which means the beneficiaries can receive the assets you leave them rather quickly.

The ability to avoid probate is just one advantage of including a trust in an estate plan. Another reason trusts are popular is their ability to protect assets from creditors and possible legal action, as well as to reduce tax liability when it comes to income tax and inheritance tax, depending on the type of trust. If you’re interested in learning more about trusts, such as which type is the most tax efficient and offers significant asset protection, contact our Lehi law office for legal advice from caring lawyers.

Should You Make a Revocable or Irrevocable Trust?

If you and your Utah trust attorneys decide that a trust would be a wise addition to your estate plan, your next step is determining if it should be a revocable or irrevocable trust. This will depend on your goals for your trust, as each type offers different advantages when it comes to important objectives like charitable giving, business succession planning, tax reduction, and protection of trust property.

A revocable trust is the most popular option, as this type of trust lets you appoint yourself as the trustee who manages the assets. As the trustee, you can make changes to the trust at any time, adding or removing assets and even revoking the trust altogether. This gives you control over your assets during your lifetime, as well as the knowledge that your trust property can avoid probate and be directly distributed to your beneficiaries when you pass away.

If you create an irrevocable trust, you may not be able to name yourself the trustee, and you won’t have the option to change or revoke the trust. Instead, you must assign the trustee role to someone who will agree to carry out the trustee’s fiduciary duties. If set up correctly, a major advantage of this type of trust is that you legally don’t have control of the assets, which means creditors can’t seize them, and the court can’t award them to someone else if you’re facing a lawsuit.

Experienced trust attorneys can review the advantages of each type of trust with you and determine which one best meets your estate planning goals. They can also help you choose a trustee capable of carrying out important fiduciary duties and ensure the type of trust you make will best protect assets that include your home, bank accounts, family business, investments, and more. If you’re looking for legal professionals with extensive experience with trust law, call our Lehi law office today to learn more about trust creation, trust administration, succession planning, and other trust and estate planning services.

What Are Some Common Types of Trusts You Can Make?

As you work closely with professional advisors on your trust and estate planning needs, you’ll learn about the types of trusts you can create. Your Utah trust attorney will provide guidance on this decision based on your reasoning for wanting a trust as part of your estate plan. Whether your objective is to protect your family business, reduce the inheritance tax, or make charitable giving easier, our skilled trust attorneys will walk you through the entire process with your best interests in mind.

Some of the specialty trusts you can choose from include:

• Testamentary trust, which you can create through your last will and only takes effect after you pass away
• Charitable trust, which lets you leave a specific amount of money to your charity of choice and the rest to your family members
• Special needs trust, which safeguards money for a special needs family member without affecting their eligibility for needs-based government programs
• Spendthrift trust, which lets you restrict access to the assets you leave your loved ones to protect them from creditors or impulsive spending
• Irrevocable life insurance trust, which keeps the value of your life insurance policy out of the estate to reduce or avoid estate and income tax

If you’re interested in these or other specialty trusts, contact our law office for legal advice from trust attorneys who would be happy to help you plan for your family’s future. We’ve spent years providing legal assistance to Utah residents with questions about trust and estate planning, trust and tax law, trust management, trust disputes, and other issues. Call us today to get the answers you need from knowledgeable trust attorneys.

How Can Lehi Trust Attorneys Assist You?

When you need trust and estate planning services, you can count on the legal team at Trusted Estate Planning Attorneys to provide the guidance you seek. Our lawyers have years of experience helping clients across Utah with a wide range of trust and estate issues, always keeping their best interests in mind as we provide trust administration services, advise trustees on their fiduciary duties, assist with tax planning for the future, and more.

Whether you need to add a trust to your estate plan, learn how to protect your investments, resolve trust disputes, or request other legal services, we’re happy to help. Call 385-993-3523 today to speak with a trust and estate planning attorney.