How to Fund Your Revocable Living Trust in Florida
Funding means moving your assets into your trust's name or naming the trust as beneficiary. An unfunded trust does not avoid probate: anything still in your individual name at death usually passes through your pour-over will and the Florida probate court.
Signing your trust is only half the job. The probate protection comes from what happens next: retitling your assets. The process is simple, but it has to be done.
Asset by asset
- Bank and credit union accounts: Visit each institution with a certificate of trust. The bank retitles the account to you as trustee and prints new signature cards. Accounts you want to keep in your own name can name the trust as the pay-on-death beneficiary instead.
- Brokerage accounts: Most firms have a short trust account form. Your investments move over without being sold.
- Your home and other Florida real estate: We prepare and record a deed to you as trustee. Florida lets you keep your homestead exemption when your home is held in your revocable trust (§ 196.041(2)).
- Property in another state: Deed it to the trust too. This is how you avoid a second probate (ancillary administration) in that state.
- IRAs, 401(k)s and annuities: Do not retitle these. Update the beneficiary form instead; whether to name the trust depends on your goals and tax situation.
- Life insurance: Name the trust as beneficiary when you want the trustee to manage proceeds, especially for minors.
- Vehicles, boats and personal property: Handled through an assignment or other simple options we discuss with you.
Keep it funded
When you open a new account or buy real estate, title it in the name of your trust. We recommend a quick review every few years and after any move, refinance or inheritance.
We help with every step
Our trust clients receive funding instructions, sample letters and a funding checklist, and we record the deed for your home. If you already have a trust and aren't sure it's funded, we can review it with you. Learn more about revocable living trusts in Florida.
Talk with a Florida estate planning lawyer
Trusted Elder Law & Asset Protection helps families in Pensacola, Escambia, Santa Rosa, Okaloosa and Walton counties plan ahead. Call 850-607-2222 or schedule a free Peace of Mind Strategy Session.
This article is general information about Florida law, not legal advice for your situation.
