You've worked hard, acquired assets and hopefully continue to do so
Perhaps you own a property or properties? Investments, savings and or personal belongings?
But what about third-party threats and ensuring that everything you acquire during your life is safeguarded for you and your loved ones?
No matter how vast or modest most of us have assets we wish to protect and hopefully pass on to our nearest and dearest.
A trust is a way of getting an asset or assets from one party to another, often with a set of guidelines to the trustees (those who control the trust) on how the assets within the trust should be used and when and how the ultimate beneficiaries receive those assets.
We use trusts to achieve our clients' objectives in many different ways but with the general view of protection of assets earmarked for preferred beneficiaries against some or all of the following threats:
We use trusts to achieve our clients' objectives in many different ways but with the general view of protection of assets earmarked for preferred beneficiaries against some or all of the following threats:
- Divorce
- Remarriage
- Inheritance Tax
- Addiction Problems
- Excessive Spending
- Claims on the Estate
- Loss of State Benefit
- Creditors / Bankruptcy
- Long Term Care Costs
- Sideways disinheritance
There is no off the shelf Trust, everyone has different circumstances and requirements. We draft bespoke Trusts when needed in conjunction with your Will to ensure that hard earned assets are ring fenced We strongly encourage you to take the time to now make provisions and protect both you and your beneficiaries from these potential threats.
Book Your Appointment Now
Example situations where a Trust may be required
A client may have £300K to leave equally to their 2 children. Their youngest is level headed however his elder brother has drink and gambling addiction issues that he is trying to overcome.
The problem here would be that whilst our clients have no issue leaving £150K to their youngest son, they are concerned about the effects on their eldest son in receiving £150K and the temptations that may bring.
A simple Will would give both sons £150K each; by instructing us to create a trust we could arrange that on the death of the clients, the eldest's inheritance will go into a trust (controlled perhaps by some or all of either family members, friends or a professional trustee. Their role will be to use their discretion in advancing parts of the trust fund to the eldest son perhaps as an income rather than in lump sums and could choose to pay it towards his mortgage company or landlord rather than straight into his account.
A client may want to leave money to their 3 children of which one is disabled and in these cases the parents are naturally concerned for their disabled child's welfare when they are gone - a trust could receive all monies to be used to ensure that the disabled child receives the financial support they require with the rest of the money going to the benefit of the two other children - often the trustees are instructed to invest the assets to provide an ongoing income rather than distribute lump sums but they can use their discretion as to how best use the funds - this enables them to perhaps buy disability equipment where necessary.
In 2017, Residential Nil Rate Band tax relief was introduced however to claim the full amount the deceased's estate must be below £2M. Therefore we use Trusts to help prevent a survivor's estate increasing above £2M, instead, providing them access to the funds via the Trust.
With growing life expectancy, more and more of us are reaching an age where some help is needed. Perhaps its assistance in our own home or maybe we need full-time care?
With the national average stay in a care home costing approximately £1500 per week, it's easy to understand why we are seeing more and more luxury new-build retirement and care home developments popping up across the country.
When you require care assistance, an 'assessment' is made. If you own assets in excess of £23,250 you are required to pay for your own care. I'm sure we all know a relative or heard stories of family homes being sold to pay for this care.
If you take the right steps during your lifetime it may be possible to ring-fence your home and assets from these costs.
These are just a few examples - there are lots of ways we can use trusts to ensure those closest to you are supported in the way you want - they can even be used to avoid a successful claim on your estate from someone you have excluded who may otherwise expect to inherit.