Your estate plan is more than just a legal vehicle through which you transfer assets to your loved ones after your death. The method you choose to accomplish this overarching goal communicates to your heirs and beneficiaries your values. Ensuring any estate plan reflects your goals is important, but with a dynasty trust, it is vital.
When you are creating a plan intended to benefit generations that might not yet exist, you are tasked with extending your legacy and values for years to come. The way to do this successfully is by personalizing the terms of your dynasty trust with the help of a dynasty trust attorney.
3 Dynasty Trust Terms to Customize
Every dynasty trust can be described as a long-term trust that is designed to pass on assets from one generation to the next while minimizing the effects of taxes and probate proceedings. Certain dynasty trust terms are especially crucial to tailor to your family’s needs.
Three terms of your dynasty trust that you may want to review with a dynasty trust attorney include:
1. The Assets You Include
The property and assets you choose to include in your dynasty trust communicate to others what you consider to be important.
Because a dynasty trust is designed to pass along property from one generation to the next, any tangible physical property or real property you include should be meaningful enough to you that you want your progeny to experience it as well.
Conversely, excluding certain assets from your dynasty trust communicates that these were significant to a particular person if you gifted the property directly to another. Alternatively, the exclusion of certain assets could suggest to future generations what you believe should be gifted by family versus earned by each individual.
2. The Objectives You Pursue
Next, ensure that the manner in which your dynasty trust is administered reflects your values. You and your dynasty trust attorney can get creative in how distributions are made and to what ends. For example, any sustaining distribution to a charitable group tells others that that particular organization and its goals were important to you.
Consider, too, the purpose of distributions made by the trustee under the terms of the dynasty trust. For example, if you value higher education and want your future grandchildren to pursue their education at a certain institution, your dynasty trust’s terms should allow for distributions that further those values.
3. The Trustees You Choose
Make sure that you carefully choose who will manage your dynasty trust over the coming generations, as even this decision communicates something about yourself and what you value to others.
Choosing a professional and reputable business or firm to serve as a trustee means that you take the dynasty trust’s purpose of benefiting coming generations seriously and want to see your trust last as long as possible.
Conversely, choosing an unqualified individual or firm to act as trustee can communicate a lack of foresight or commitment to providing a continuing benefit to your family.
Any distributions made by such a trustee could come across to beneficiaries as a fluke. In contrast, a distribution made by a professional and reliable firm would communicate that you were dependable, reliable, and gave thought to what you did.
Consult an Estate Planning Attorney From OC Wills & Trust Attorneys
With a skilled dynasty trust attorney’s help, you can ensure that your story as well as your assets survive to the coming generations. Get started personalizing your dynasty trust or other estate planning document by discussing your needs with an Orange County estate planning lawyer from OC Wills & Trust Attorneysys.
Contact us to schedule a consultation today.
