Trust are used for a wide variety of reasons.  Depending your objectives, a trust may or may not be in your best interest.

At its core, a trust separates the legal interest from the beneficial interest in property.  In other words, if you own a “thing”, whether it is real property or personal property, as the owner you can separate your legal interest and the beneficial interest in the “thing” by placing it in a trust.  You transfer the legal ownership of the property to the trust.  The trust agreement spells out what is done with that property.  It also outlines who is to benefit from that property.  As a result, the trust holds the legal title to the property while the person who stands to benefit from the trust holds the beneficial interest to the property.

By transferring property into a trust, you now longer own the property, the trust does.  When setting up the trust and trust agreement you can specify what is to be done with the property, but you do not hold the legal title to the property once it is transferred to the trust.

Trust are commonly used in estate planning for numerous reasons.  One very common reason is to maximize tax benefits.  Another common use for trust is to ensure your children and/or spouse is cared for in the event of your death or incapacity.

Strickland & Associates can assist you in deciding whether a trust will acheive your objectives.