EdLoweLaw OP t1_jd4pf3u wrote on March 21, 2023 at 8:34 PM

Reply to comment by virtualchoirboy in IAMA Connecticut estate planning and trusts attorney. AMA about estate planning in our great state! by EdLoweLaw

Perfect question! Trust planning can certainly help us minimize probate as much as possible, but never all of it. In Connecticut, regardless of whether or not you even have a taxable estate, you always have to file an Estate Tax Return with the probate court. Revocable trust planning can’t remove that tax requirement.

What trust planning can do is help us avoid a full probate process. To do that, we would want to have certain assets owned by your living trust (like real estate) and other assets have proper beneficiary designations (like IRAs) so that nothing is in your name alone when you die. If you have nothing in your name alone at death, there are no assets to probate and thus only the estate tax return needs to be sorted. If you have a little more than nothing, but less than $40,000 in your name alone at death, you can even get away with an abbreviated probate process instead of a full probate (which can be handy for those pesky cars everyone forgets about).

If probate avoidance is a goal, you need to make sure all the assets are touched so they don’t need to be probated. If you own real estate in Connecticut, it means you’ll want to consider trust planning to have the property avoid the probate process. Best to have an attorney review ALL your assets to make sure everything is working together to meet all of your estate planning goals.

virtualchoirboy t1_jd4rlrg wrote on March 21, 2023 at 8:47 PM

Thank you. This clarifies what my mom went through. Fortunately, seeing her go through that has prepared us somewhat. All accounts and/or property are jointly owned to mitigate our current exposure. We may have more accounts than normal because of some things my mom went through though.

For example, credit card where dad was the primary and mom was the joint was cancelled on his passing. Mom was allowed to apply and get credit for account history so account age remained the same but her credit limit was cut in half despite her income being relatively unchanged (larger estate, comfortably living off of interest). You can have joint accounts, just make sure that each partner has accounts where their name is the primary to prevent unnecessary disruption.

Thanks again for the trust info though. We have a meeting scheduled with my mom's attorney later this year (after tax time) to get things set up and this will help me understand what he's likely to propose.