Best directions for making a trust?
- Thread starter mopar92
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GoingQuiet
Member
The best - is a relative term. To some, best means lowest cost, to others best means highest quality.
As someone who has to deal with this every day - consult an attorney in your area and have them make you a legal, valid recocable trust.
As someone who has to deal with this every day - consult an attorney in your area and have them make you a legal, valid recocable trust.
GRAPE-DRANK
Member
I hired an attorney and had them write it up. I would rather pay a little extra to make sure I am in compliance with BATFE. I think you will see a trend in the next few years where more attorneys will be setting up NFA trusts.
If you're talking about a trust as an adjunct to a will, be darn sure that you change every deed/title/beneficiary with the loan/title/bank/investment firms to reflect what you have in the trust or it and the will will be next to worthless.
I just got through a two year battle trying to execute my brother's estate. He had a good will, a loving revocable trust and, unknown to me, a letter from his lawyer telling him what he had to do to activate the trust. He was undergoing chemo at the time and either didn't read the letter or just didn't do it.
Long story short, his insurance, investment payouts were just as the beneficiaries stated at the holding companies...not as the will specified. Court sided with the way the bene's were written. Houses, three of them, all went to wife as her name was on the deeds, even though kids were to get one each.
Do your due diligence and be sure all t's are crossed and i's dotted.
I just got through a two year battle trying to execute my brother's estate. He had a good will, a loving revocable trust and, unknown to me, a letter from his lawyer telling him what he had to do to activate the trust. He was undergoing chemo at the time and either didn't read the letter or just didn't do it.
Long story short, his insurance, investment payouts were just as the beneficiaries stated at the holding companies...not as the will specified. Court sided with the way the bene's were written. Houses, three of them, all went to wife as her name was on the deeds, even though kids were to get one each.
Do your due diligence and be sure all t's are crossed and i's dotted.
Karl Hungus
Member
I know his is a long shot, but can anybody here reccomend a good lawyer to draw up a trust in Brown County Wisconsin? And by good I mean as cheap as possible while still having a completely legal trust.
I tried going the non-trust route, but it's pretty much impossible in Brown County. The Sheriff requires an home/gun safe inspection for sign-off, which I really don't mind that much I guess, but I've (so far) been waiting two months for him to come over and do said inspection. At this rate I may have the suppressor before I die of old age. Maybe. I really don't like dealing with lawyers and I really don't want to blow even more $$$ on getting a muffler for a couple rifles, but it looks like it's either the trust way or the highway.
Any suggestions would be appreciated.
edit: never mind - got a law hook-up on sniper's hide.
I tried going the non-trust route, but it's pretty much impossible in Brown County. The Sheriff requires an home/gun safe inspection for sign-off, which I really don't mind that much I guess, but I've (so far) been waiting two months for him to come over and do said inspection. At this rate I may have the suppressor before I die of old age. Maybe. I really don't like dealing with lawyers and I really don't want to blow even more $$$ on getting a muffler for a couple rifles, but it looks like it's either the trust way or the highway.
Any suggestions would be appreciated.
edit: never mind - got a law hook-up on sniper's hide.
Last edited:
Revocable living trust
There is nothing magical or mystical about a legal trust. It is simply a legal document in which you dictate what of your possessions go to who in the case of your death. In the case of NFA items you simply list each item, it's description and serial number and to who or whom (may be multiple persons)
you leave it to.
Many on-line legal services are available and also software that allows you to write one by filling in the blanks.
All must be notarized and depended on your state laws may have to be filed
with the state to be legal. (most states don't require this).
There are NO federal laws that apply to TRUSTS, trusts are sort of like wills
except they are usually for specific items other that general items like house's
or real estate and such and can be changed at any time you wish, like adding on additional items.
Enco
There is nothing magical or mystical about a legal trust. It is simply a legal document in which you dictate what of your possessions go to who in the case of your death. In the case of NFA items you simply list each item, it's description and serial number and to who or whom (may be multiple persons)
you leave it to.
Many on-line legal services are available and also software that allows you to write one by filling in the blanks.
All must be notarized and depended on your state laws may have to be filed
with the state to be legal. (most states don't require this).
There are NO federal laws that apply to TRUSTS, trusts are sort of like wills
except they are usually for specific items other that general items like house's
or real estate and such and can be changed at any time you wish, like adding on additional items.
Enco
Aaron Baker
Member
This is true, but there's still a reason that lawyers have to go to law school. If you don't form trusts every day, there's a lot of information to learn in order to do it properly. Moreover, while federal law doesn't apply to trusts, federal law does apply to NFA items, and you don't want your beneficiaries to be in trouble just because you didn't pay a few hundred dollars to have a lawyer do it right.
Now, I will admit that I am a lawyer, and that I have done a few gun trusts. (I am licensed in Kentucky, and so can only do them in Kentucky.) That may make you think that I'm just trying to protect my bottom line, but I honestly don't care if you write your own trust--I just want to see people do it correctly and not get in trouble.
Before I even graduated law school, I saw an estate go haywire because of an improperly drafted will and trust. My grandfather thought he was too smart to need a lawyer, and despite it being clear what he would have wanted done with his estate, that's not the way it ended up because he didn't draft his estate documents properly.
Add into the mix federal laws, and you could end up drafting a trust that allows you to get that SBR without paying a lawyer, but your kids end up dealing with humorless ATF agents after you die and your trust doesn't transfer the property legally.
The ATF isn't reviewing your trusts to make sure that nothing illegal will ever happen. If it's a basic, legal trust on its face, they'll approve it.
Just to give you one example, an online willmaking program will not prevent you from making yourself the grantor, the trustee AND the beneficiary. But if you do that, you haven't formed a legal trust. Then even if the ATF goes ahead and approves the tax stamp, because there's no legal trust, you're not "John Smith, trustee of the Smith Firearm Trust" in possession of a legal SBR. You're John Smith, regular guy, who doesn't personally have a tax stamp for the SBR he possesses. It's the difference between a good day at the range and a prison sentence.
I guess I just want people to understand that they're proceeding at their own risk if they form a trust without any legal advice. One trust is all you need to own as many NFA items as you want. When it costs you a $200 tax every time you want to buy a new toy, is it really that unreasonable to pay a lawyer $200 to draft you a trust the first time?
Aaron
NFA Trusts
Use the Gun Trust Lawyer.
You just cannot use a standard revocable trust. Intermingling your NFA items with standard properties can be a bad adventure.
A separate trust just for NFA items is just that. To be used just for the NFA items.
Do not use Quicken or any other trust software. NFA has been going through the trust documents with a fine tooth comb. If on the outward appearance they approve your stamp..after when they fully review the trust they can void the stamp and you are now in possession of a unregistered NFA item.
Spend the extra cost as you don't want the time.
Use the Gun Trust Lawyer.
You just cannot use a standard revocable trust. Intermingling your NFA items with standard properties can be a bad adventure.
A separate trust just for NFA items is just that. To be used just for the NFA items.
Do not use Quicken or any other trust software. NFA has been going through the trust documents with a fine tooth comb. If on the outward appearance they approve your stamp..after when they fully review the trust they can void the stamp and you are now in possession of a unregistered NFA item.
Spend the extra cost as you don't want the time.
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