A trust might include provisions you intend to last for many years. But it’s also not a “set it and forget it” component of your estate plan. Regular reviews can help you adjust your plans with an irrevocable trust.

An annual review of your estate plan is strongly recommended to ensure that your estate plan stays in line with what you intended to accomplish. In these circumstances hiring an attorney can help you to cover these broad bases and ensure that you have the appropriate protections going forward.

Likewise, any changes in state or federal law should also prompt you to change your estate plan. If you have a revocable trust, a couple of important steps should be managed every single year. A regular review of the trust provisions is important, as well as the trust funding. One of the most common estate planning mistakes is failing to fund a revocable trust.

If you created your trust to establish a process for asset management and to avoid probate, bear in mind that a revocable trust only controls those assets that have been placed in its name, either upon transfer at death or during your lifetime. This means that you need to clarify that all of the assets you have put in the trust are still titled that way or that those recently transferred into the trust have been retitled. If you have acquired new assets since the initial funding of the trust, confirm that they are titled in the trust’s name. For more information, set aside time to speak with a dedicated estate planning lawyer in California.  

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