Living Trusts for Everyone: Why a Will Is Not the Way to Avoid Probate, Protect Heirs, and Settle Estates (Second Edition)
Living Trusts for Everyone: Why a Will Is Not the Way to Avoid Probate, Protect Heirs, and Settle Estates (Second Edition) book cover

Living Trusts for Everyone: Why a Will Is Not the Way to Avoid Probate, Protect Heirs, and Settle Estates (Second Edition)

Paperback – March 21, 2017

Price
$13.29
Format
Paperback
Pages
192
Publisher
Allworth
Publication Date
ISBN-13
978-1621535676
Dimensions
5.5 x 0.5 x 8.25 inches
Weight
7.2 ounces

Description

Review “Sharp makes a reasoned and strong case for the use of trusts as a complete alternative for wills. For roughly the cost of a lunch, Living Trusts for Everyone can . . . equip the average American with enough thoughtful questions to ensure that his or her lawyer is doing all that s/he can to protect that person’s assets. For that alone, it belongs on your reading list.” —Logan Lo, New York Journal of Books “If you want to know a good deal about estate planning and trusts but don’t want a four-hundred-page boring book to read, I highly, highly recommend getting this one. It’s short, to-the-point, and very informative.” — Free Money , Finance.com “Ronald Sharp explains trusts in clear and easy-to-understand language, including one truth most lawyers don’t want to admit: a trust is often better than a will and less costly!” —Lonnie Mclane, Estate & Tax Consultants, LLC About the Author Ronald Farrington Sharp is an attorney who concentrated on family law and divorce for the first half of his career before gradually shifting the focus of his practice to the areas of trusts, estate planning, and probate. The firm he established in 1975 works closely on a referral basis with a variety of professionals in developing a comprehensive estate plan package. Sharp has personally prepared more than three thousand trusts and estate plans, and he is also the author of Winning the Divorce War (Allworth Press). He is married, has three adult children and one grandchild, and divides his time between Michigan and Florida.

Features & Highlights

  • Readers say it best: "Very informative." "Saved me a lot of money and headaches!" "Recommend it for everyone who has to plan estates for their elderly parents"
  • Living Trusts for Everyone
  • is the best resource for setting up a living trust. Explaining in specific terms what benefits a trust will have, Ronald Farrington Sharp gives the tools necessary to set up a loved one’s trust with no lawyers and no expense.Wills benefit lawyers. Trusts benefit the clients. Too often lawyers sell wills to clients only to sit back and wait to sell their probate services to their clients’ heirs. Ronald Farrington Sharp describes the best way to handle modern estate planning and details the many advantages trusts have over wills in not only eliminating probate but in also protecting your assets for your heirs. Sharp explains why legal services are not needed to do the clerical work in settling a trust after death. This updated edition includes new information on an array of subjects, including:
  • Elimination of the federal estate tax for most estates due to increased exemption amounts
  • Elimination of the federal estate tax for most estates due to increased exemption amounts
  • Online assets
  • Online assets
  • The use of passwords, usernames, and websites
  • The use of passwords, usernames, and websites
  • Keeping trustees honest and the process of removing trustees for malfeasance
  • Keeping trustees honest and the process of removing trustees for malfeasance
  • Forms for simplifying the planning process
  • Forms for simplifying the planning process
  • Strategies to lower attorneys’ fees
  • Strategies to lower attorneys’ fees
  • With no legal jargon, just step-by-step instructions and sample form letters,
  • Living Trusts for Everyone
  • takes the mystery out of the process of setting up a trust.

Customer Reviews

Rating Breakdown

★★★★★
60%
(461)
★★★★
25%
(192)
★★★
15%
(115)
★★
7%
(54)
-7%
(-53)

Most Helpful Reviews

✓ Verified Purchase

Excellent book! I intend to give one to all of my Trust clients!

I am an estate planning attorney in the Tampa, FL area and discovered this book about one month ago. I have been reading thru it myself, and, not only have I gotten great personal value from this book, but I also intend to give this book to my trust clients after I create their trust. It has an excellent section on "what to do with the trust once its creator (grantor/settlor) passes away." Great product for attorneys, financial advisors, folks looking to create an estate plan, and trustees and/or beneficiaries/family following the death of someone who had a trust in their estate plan. Thanks, Judd Bean [Judd Bean Law - Riverview, FL]
63 people found this helpful
✓ Verified Purchase

Best "How To" Book on Living Trusts

The best "how to" books on revocable trusts that I have found so far, as it gives you "pros and cons" of having a Living Trust, especially if your concern and objective is to avoid costs of probate and manage disposition of your accumulated estate. Well written, easy to read and lays out " what you can do" and "should not do", in developing a Living Trust, as well as procedures for executing the trust when the time comes for execution by the trustee(s). Full of valuable insights on why the Living Trust is a living document, that most any average family or individual should have available to implement a legal/financial structured document throughout their life times. This book enables everyone to have an orderly resolution of accumulated life time assets, leading to final end of life disposition problems, which most families and individuals will eventually encounter. No one takes a u-haul trailer to their cemetery!
55 people found this helpful
✓ Verified Purchase

A complete waste.

Do not waste your time and money on this book. I am not an attorney, yet I was evidently expecting more detailed information to learn about trusts. This book is so basic that it is does not even mention or make a reference to the Uniform Probate Code and the Uniform Trust Code, and where to find them for the more savvy client to learn more about about trusts.
37 people found this helpful
✓ Verified Purchase

Excellent advice!

I'm certainly learning a lot from this book and highly recommend it. I never knew there was such a difference between a Will and a Living Trust, and how more beneficial a Living Trust can be!
22 people found this helpful
✓ Verified Purchase

Excellent preparation before seeing a lawyer

Living Trusts For Everyone, Ronald Farrington Sharp
Why a Will is not the way to avoid probate, protect heirs, and settle estates.
This book will not qualify you to be your own lawyer and write your trust documents without a lawyer. It will tell you why almost everyone should have a trust, not just a will and some things you might want to include in your trust. It will help you with some of the legal language of trusts. Maybe most importantly, it has a lot of guidance for trustees who have to manage the trust and disburse assets when you are no longer able to. It has some information on estate taxes and how a trust should be written to minimize those taxes, but maybe not enough. It explains Qualified Terminal Interest Property but does not explain Credit Shelter Trusts. The author gets repetitive in telling you that some lawyers like to write just a will, because they can make a lot of money when the time comes to probate the estate. A trust, if fully funded, avoids probate and saves a lot of lawyer fees. It is an easy, quick read and I recommend reading it before you see a lawyer about creating a trust or will.
13 people found this helpful
✓ Verified Purchase

Buy this one

If you are only going to buy just one book on preparing your estate plan, buy this one. I have read several and this one is the easiest to understand. It has lots of great information on a wide variety of situations. A lot of other books have lots of information but this book is written in a way that is very natural to read and retain.
12 people found this helpful
✓ Verified Purchase

Quick, Efficient Read

Not being a lawyer or finance professional, I think this book is a great launching point of becoming better aware of what you don't know. When you hire someone to help with planning your estate, you'll visit them forearmed with some of the right questions and expectations. Incidentally, the chapter pertaining to guardianship, living wills, powers of attorney, and related documents was a great refresher for me in behavioral health.
10 people found this helpful
✓ Verified Purchase

Encyclopedia presentation on Trust! Bravo

I read this book twice before I set up my Revocable Trust and then I bought the book for my beneficiaries so they know what to do with the Trust in the future.
I hope the author reads this review so I can thank him personally for a job WELL DONE!
7 people found this helpful
✓ Verified Purchase

ALL ENCOMPASSING TEXT

THIS BOOK IS THE BEST BOOK ON TRUSTS I HAVE EVER SEEN. IT TELLS EVERYTHING FROM A TO Z. IT EXCEEDED MY HIGHEST EXPECTATIONS.
6 people found this helpful
✓ Verified Purchase

Well written and information packed

This is packed with information. The author writes clear English with little, if any, legalese. Much to my surprise I found it a pleasure to read despite my limited interest in legal subjects. He certainly does not hold back observations about some lawyers' personal financial advantages in their recommendations to clients about trusts versus wills.
5 people found this helpful