Trusts

Imagine a Secure Future for Your Family and Your Assets, Protected by a Well-Crafted Trust.

Protect Your Assets from Creditors & Lawsuits: Safeguard your hard-earned wealth.
Avoid Costly & Public Probate: Ensure a private and efficient transfer of assets.
Provide for Loved Ones with Flexibility: Control how and when beneficiaries receive assets.
Minimize Estate Taxes: Strategically plan to reduce tax burdens on your legacy.
Plan for Incapacity: Ensure your assets are managed according to your wishes if you become unable to do so.

Are You Thinking About the Best Way to Secure Your Future and Your Family’s?

You might be wondering if a will is enough, or if a trust offers greater protection and control. You might be concerned about the probate process, estate taxes, or ensuring your loved ones are provided for according to your specific wishes.

At Burrey Law Group, Inc., we understand these important considerations. Creating a trust is a powerful tool for achieving these goals, and our experienced trust attorneys are here to guide you through every step.

Your Trusted Partner in Creating a Tailored Trust.

Our knowledgeable California trust lawyers go beyond simply explaining what a trust is. We take the time to understand your unique financial situation, family dynamics, and long-term objectives to create a trust program that truly serves your needs.

Here’s how we guide you through the process:

Understanding Your Goals: We’ll listen carefully to your objectives for asset protection, beneficiary support, tax planning, and more.
Explaining Your Trust Options: We’ll clearly explain the different types of trusts available (e.g., revocable, irrevocable, special needs trusts) and help you determine which best suits your needs.
Expertly Crafting Your Trust Documents: Our experienced attorneys will ensure your trust is legally sound, enforceable, and accurately reflects your wishes.
Guiding You Through the Funding Process: We’ll explain how to properly transfer assets into your trust to maximize its benefits.
Providing Ongoing Support: We’re here to answer your questions and provide guidance throughout the life of your trust.

Protect Your Legacy with a Trust: Schedule Your Free Consultation

Secure Your Future with Confidence.

Creating a trust doesn’t have to be complicated. Our experienced attorneys will guide you through the process with clarity and expertise, ensuring you feel confident in your decisions and secure in the knowledge that you’ve taken proactive steps to protect what matters most.

Take control of your future and protect your loved ones. Explore your trust options today.

Click Here to Schedule Your Free Trust Consultation

Benefits of Creating a Trust

Establishing a trust can provide you and your family with significant estate planning, tax and financial benefits including:

You can put conditions on how your assets are distributed following your death.

You can distribute assets following your death without the cost and delay of probating a will.

You can reduce estate and gift tax liabilities.

You can realize immediate tax benefits from deferred charitable donations.

You can protect your assets from creditors and other legal liabilities.

You can make sure a family member remains eligible for government benefits and services.

The benefits of creating a trust vary with the specific type of trust. One of our experienced attorneys can help you understand the benefits that come with each specific kind of trust instrument and assist you in determining what types of trusts might best accomplish your estate planning goals.

Common Types of Trusts

Examples of the types of trusts that can be created include:

Living trusts – Also known as revocable trusts, living trusts are trusts that the grantor or trust-maker may change or revoke during his or her lifetime.

Marital trusts – A trust established by one spouse that allows the surviving spouse to avoid paying estate taxes during his or her lifetime.

AB trusts – A joint trust created by a married couple, which is divided into two upon the death of one of the spouses and defers federal estate taxes until the death of the surviving spouse.

Charitable trusts – A trust that benefits a particular charity or charities, or that is intended to generally benefit the public through charitable endeavors. These trusts are used to lower estate or gift tax liabilities since even deferred trust contributions may be immediately recognized by charities for tax purposes.

Special needs trusts – Allows for money or other assets (such as an inheritance) received by a special needs person to not adversely affect the person’s eligibility for receipt of government or other benefits. The beneficiary cannot control the amount or frequency of distributions or revoke the trust.

Spendthrift trusts – A trust established for a beneficiary, which does not allow the beneficiary to sell or pledge the trust’s assets, thereby protecting those assets from the beneficiary’s creditors until the trust corpus is distributed out of the trust.

Tax bypass trusts – A trust that allows a spouse to leave money to the other spouse and limit the amount of federal estate tax payable upon the death of the other spouse, thereby potentially saving the spouses’ children or other heirs significant federal tax liabilities.

Asset protection trusts – These trusts are intended to protect assets from the claims of future creditors. The trust is often established for a term of years, and the grantor is not designated as a beneficiary, but can usually recover the assets at the end of the trust term.

Qualified Terminable Interest Property Trusts (QTIPs) – A QTIP trust is considered a more restrictive form of a marital or AB trust, as surviving spouses have more limited access to the trust assets since they have restrictions on the disposition and withdrawal of trust principal and cannot directly dispose of trust assets following their death.

Qualified Personal Resident Trusts (QPERTs) – A type of irrevocable trust that allows a person to remove their primary residence from their estate to reduce gift taxes when transferring that asset to beneficiaries.

Generation-skipping trusts – Allows a grantor to pass assets to their grandchildren and permits their children to avoid having to pay estate taxes on those assets despite the fact that the children may be entitled to distribution of income generated by the trust’s assets.

Testamentary trusts – These trusts are created by the grantor’s will, with assets allocated to the trust according to the terms of the will.

Irrevocable life insurance trusts – Allows grantors to exclude life insurance proceeds from their estate and their surviving spouse’s estate for federal estate tax purposes.

FAQs About Trusts

Burrey Law Group, Inc., have responded to many questions from our clients about trust issues, including the following:

Revocable trusts (sometimes called living trusts or revocable living trusts) and irrevocable trusts have one major difference – in a revocable trust, the grantor (the person who sets up the trust) may change the terms of the trust at any time. The grantor can add or remove beneficiaries, add or remove trustees, and change the stipulations as to how the assets in the trust are managed or distributed.

In an irrevocable trust, a grantor may not change the terms. An irrevocable trust can shield assets from creditors and estate taxes. In a revocable trust, because a grantor may still affect the assets, those assets are not shielded from the grantor’s creditors and are subject to state and federal estate taxes upon the grantor’s death.

As the name implies, when choosing a trustee, you should select someone you trust. You might also look for a trustee who is financially literate and who has at least a basic familiarity with investing. If you select a family member or friend to serve as a trustee, you will want someone who can view your personal or family situation objectively. The need for financial literacy and neutrality sometimes leads grantors to designate an attorney or professional trustee as their trustee.

If you have a living or revocable trust, certain significant life events may prompt you to make changes to your trust. Those events include marriage, divorce, birth or adoption of a child (or grandchild/great-grandchild), death of a beneficiary of your trust, acquiring new property you wish to add to your trust, or moving to a new jurisdiction with different trust or estate laws. You may also want to change your trust if you need to add or substitute trustees, if you need to withdraw property from the trust, or if you want to change the way the trust’s assets are managed.

How Our Orinda Trust Attorneys Can Help You

If you are considering a trust for yourself or your family, you need experienced legal assistance to help you make sure that your trust is properly established and legally valid, that your assets are protected, and that your objectives and goals are being met.

At Burrey Law Group, Inc., our knowledgeable Orinda trust lawyers can:

Help you determine what type of trust will best serve your needs and goals.

Draft the trust documents and help you through the execution process to ensure the validity and enforceability of your trust.

Assist you with transferring assets into your trust.

Modify living or revocable trusts when you need to make changes or experience major life events that require such changes.

Schedule an initial consultation with one of our trust lawyers in Orinda today by calling (925) 317-3467or by contacting us on our website.

Monday	9:00 am - 5:00 pm
Tuesday	9:00 am - 5:00 pm
Wednesday	9:00 am - 5:00 pm
Thursday	9:00 am - 5:00 pm
Friday	9:00 am - 5:00 pm

Monday	9:00 am - 5:00 pm
Tuesday	9:00 am - 5:00 pm
Wednesday	9:00 am - 5:00 pm
Thursday	9:00 am - 5:00 pm
Friday	9:00 am - 5:00 pm

Secure Your Assets & Protect Your Loved Ones with a California Trust: Expert Guidance.

Imagine a Secure Future for Your Family and Your Assets, Protected by a Well-Crafted Trust.

Benefits of Creating a Trust

Common Types of Trusts

FAQs About Trusts

How Our Orinda Trust Attorneys Can Help You