Countersignature Affidavit of Death Made Easy

Digisign affidavit of death

hi everybody our names ikan here today I wanted to take a minute and talk to you about how you actually administer a trust when a loved one passes this is a very important step in the administration or estate planning process that a lot of people actually overlook so a lot of people think that once they create the trust then they transfer all of their assets to it they're done and there's nothing else left for them to do for the most part this is true because the person that has passed away has nothing more to do after death however the person that they've appointed as trustee to take over after they are gone must follow through with the deceased person's wishes so the loved one that has passed away has outlined exactly what he wants done and how he wants it done and has appointed a trusted person to take care of everyone everything for him and this person we call the trustee so the trustee has to then step up and fulfill his duties as outlined in the document and so what does a trustee need to do well there's a million and one things first of all that the trustee needs to do so we're gonna keep this very short and give you an outline of how the actual trust administration process rolls out so following the death of a loved one the trustee will normally start the initial phase and we call this phase the collecting of information and gathering and organizing things the trustee will gather all of the loved ones paperwork estate planning documents bills invoices any information that comes by mail or by email the trustee will gather in one place and organize and try to make sense of it during this initial phase the trustee will order death certificates and notify Social Security of the death and do things that I anyone would have to do at that time along with information gathering the second phase is an important one because this is where the attorney will come in the trustee normally hires an attorney to help them during this administration process so if you were worrying oh my gosh I don't have any single person in my life that is knowledgeable enough for me to point as trustee to do this difficult job don't worry because most people don't the fact of the matter remains that as long as your trustees and organized individual and responsible that's the those are the only two skill sets they should have if they have anything additional financial expertise legal expertise perfect if not don't worry about it because the trustee is able to bring on these professionals to help guide him through this administration process so the trustee will hire an attorney such as myself and I will come into the picture and help the trustee administer the trust at that point so during that second stage after he's collected all the information we will do all of the miscellaneous things that the law requires for examples we will give notice to all the beneficiaries as required by the probate code we will provide the court with the original will will lodge it with the court so we'll do various miscellaneous things that were required to do within a certain time frame will assist the trustee with all of this process and organization and whatnot during that second stage and the second stage I like to call the planning stage where we take care of all the things we know we have to do such as notice and lodging of the will and other things like that and we also plan for how we're gonna make the person's wishes come to life so we will review the document know what he wanted done and then map out a plan of action so this is planning stage once we've mapped out this plan we will move on to what I the final stage what I like to call you know divvying things up and actually closing things down and finishing things up stage or the distribution stage where people actually get their inheritance and during this process we will actually execute the plan that we've created together that we put together that's in the best interest of everyone so for example if you're this is just a hypothetical example so let's say somebody has passed and he wants everything divided among his two children and he's appointed his best friend as trustee because the guy's a responsible person and he's organism organized enough to handle it his friend pretty much has no knowledge of the law we'll come into my office present me with the legal documents for his friend that passed away and we will sit down together and we will move through the steps of the requirements of the probate code we will get to the point at which distribution is to happen and we will see that the person that passed away wanted everything distributed equally to his children so that's what we will do a lot of times the plan of action will require different things such as keeping it in trust for let's say a minor child a lot of times it will require property be sold and money distributed instead so it just depends on what the person's wishes are so the attorneys job the trustees job at that point is to make sure the loved one that has passed away make sure that his final wishes are done 100% and our executed 100% so that's what's called administering the trust doing what the trust has detailed for us to do essentially what the loved one wished would be done after he has passed away so this is the overall trust administration process it could be very simple or it could be very complicated depending on with a loved one has delineated in his documents and depending on the various assets and the types of assets so it all depends on the time frame for it also varies but the point to remember here is you're not in a courtroom and you're not subject to the court timeline and calendars so with that said the trustee can move things along as fast as he wants or as slow as he needs to for certain tax benefits for examples so that's key to remember is that the trustee controls the time frame on this and also everything remains private so there are no public records of this trust it doesn't need to be filed anywhere it doesn't need to be lodged it doesn't need to be recorded anywhere so everything that is done with respect to the trustee and the beneficiaries in the attorney is private information and locked up no one can actually be nosy and dig into the records and find out what's going on so that's the other beauty of it it's a privately handled affair and it can go as fast or as slow as needed for the beneficiaries and the beneficiary can also you know tap into the inheritance early on if there's an exigent circumstance and they need the money so there's everything will be in the control of the trustee but this is generally how the trust is administered once somebody has passed then they had created a living trust and that's what is called the trust administration of an estate you administer the loved ones trust so that's pretty much it for now there's more details on it but we don't want to go into the details because we don't have enough time so if there are things that you want to talk about that a specific to your situation where things that you want to hear about a little bit more in detail feel free to give me a call or feel free to email me or contact and contact me any way that you want my information is always available to you guys and if you want to read a more detailed article about this topic feel free to click on the link below and if you would like this video I would really appreciate it and feel free to share it with your friends and family that may be interested in it and that might learn something from it as well bye