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When planning for the differently-abled, the use of Supplemental Needs Trusts as part of your estate planning will ensure that you have provided protections for those with special needs and disabilities. When considering your estate planning it is important to consider any beneficiaries who may have special needs or disabilities.

Many families (erroneously) disinherit a disabled child, believing that this is in the child’s best interest and instead leave assets to other family members so that they can care for the disabled individual. Even with the best of intentions, circumstances may arise in their lives that could directly affect their ability to provide for a disabled family member.

Question: Why would I need to put my house into an irrevocable trust?

For many clients the idea of creating and funding an Irrevocable Trust with an end goal of protecting assets should the need for long term care arise raises questions and concerns about the potential tax implications.

My mother has a Medicaid Asset Protection Trust and her house has been owned by this trust for 6 years. She purchased the house in 1980 for $30,000. It’s now worth $400,000. What will be the tax consequences if she sells the house while she is alive? What if we sell it after her death?

Question: I have created a Medicaid Qualifying Irrevocable Trust and I am attempting to transfer my home to my trust. The bank which holds my mortgage has advised that they do not allow transfers to Irrevocable Trusts. Can they prevent me from protecting my house? What can they do?

Question: My spouse and I do not have any children of our own, but we have two dogs who we care for and treat as our children. We want to make sure they are taken care of should a time come when we no longer are able to and when we pass away. Is there any kind of estate planning we can do to make sure our dogs are cared for?

One of the most misunderstood planning strategies is that Retirement funds, such as 401(k)s, 403(b)s, traditional individual retirement accounts (IRAs) and Roth IRAs should not name a trust as designated beneficiary. My clients are often advised to name individuals and not trusts, even minor or disabled beneficiaries.

My wife and I recently executed a Revocable Trust and re-titled our home and some bank accounts into the name of the trust, thinking that we had taken the first steps toward protecting our assets should one or both of us need Nursing Home care in the future. I just heard from a friend of mine that a Revocable Trust does not protect my assets and that what I should have considered was an Irrevocable Medicaid Trust, could you explain the difference?

The typical Medicaid trust is a grantor trust for income and estate tax purposes. The grantor trust rules came about after high earners tried to lower their income tax consequence by scattering their income to various trusts over which they maintained control.