A revocable trust is a way to save your family from going through a difficult probate. Quite frankly, it saves you a headache. Probate is the legal term for how the court interacts with a will or estate.
If you don’t have a will, your property and assets must go through probate to be distributed according to Florida’s laws on intestate succession. Without a Will, this happens automatically. Basically, the courts oversee the distribution of your assets to your heirs in accordance with Florida law. In this process, your loved ones have to go to court, file multiple documents, and the judge manages the distribution. Florida makes the final call, not you or your family. If you have a Will, the court still oversees the distribution, but your Will controls instead of having to follow Florida’s preset rules of distribution. However, a Will still has to go through the same Probate process with the court.
Now, here’s where it might bother you. Probate is a public record and all of your assets are placed on an inventory filed with the court and are available to everyone. There may be a reason you were looking to avoid this situation. Now, not only are all your assets and belongings listed publicly, but there’s an added expense that comes with probate.
One last thing you might not have considered, probate slows down the process of distribution.
On the other hand, with a Revocable Trust, the Trust document determines how your assets are distributed and the cost of Trust Administration is less expense than the cost of probate. A Revocable Trust offers you the opportunity for your final wishes to be followed, your assets to remain private, the distribution to be faster and more efficient, all while saving a significant amount of money in the process. One of the things you’ll want to be aware of with a revocable trust is that you don’t completely bypass the Florida court system, but the court’s involvement is significantly reduced.
Now that you have the facts, a revocable trust might be exactly what you’re looking for. The trust document is the authority to transact business according to your terms.
