Trusts and Wills

What this video covers

• The four essential trust roles (grantor, trustee, beneficiary, corpus) and how the Uniform Prudent Investor Act (UPIA) binds the trustee's investment discretion
• Why revocable living trusts avoid probate yet produce zero income tax or estate tax benefits, since the grantor retains full control
• Why irrevocable trusts remove assets from the grantor's taxable estate and shield assets from creditors, at the cost of surrendering all control
• The critical distinction between inter vivos (living) trusts, which bypass probate, and testamentary trusts, which are born from a will and must pass through probate
• How bypass trusts, generation-skipping trusts, grantor retained annuity trusts (GRATs), and charitable remainder trusts (CRTs) each solve a specific estate planning need
• Why dying testate (with a valid will) differs from dying intestate (without a will), and why beneficiary designations on transfer on death (TOD), pay on death (POD), retirement accounts, life insurance, and jointly held assets with survivorship rights always supersede the will
• The compressed trust tax brackets for irrevocable trusts, specifically why $16,000 of retained income triggers the 37% federal rate, and why this creates a structural push to distribute income to beneficiaries