Arcadia Living Trusts

Protecting People in Arcadia, Glendora and throughout San Gabriel Valley

If you need to put a plan in place to ensure the orderly distribution of your property in the event of your death, you want an experienced Living Trust lawyer to assist you throughout the process. You want an attorney with the knowledge, skill and experience to help you put together a plan that meets your goals, one who has successfully done the same for others in similar circumstances.

California Living Trust offers many advantages not available when you use a will. At the San Gabriel Valley offices of Hart, Mieras & Morris, we have decades of experience helping individuals protect their assets and estates with Living Trusts. We established our first office in Los Angeles in 1962, and senior partner Gary Morris has provided trust and estate counsel to the firm’s clients since 1972.

Because of our experience, we know that a trust’s preparation and execution involves consideration of issues other than legal concerns. You may have significant assets in the trust that need to be invested or own real estate that you want to put in the trust. You may need guidance from an insurance professional or a tax specialist. We have a team of in-house professionals to meet your needs, including investment advisors and money managers, an insurance agent, a tax professional, and a real estate broker.

Contact our office or call us at 626-445-1212 to schedule an appointment.   You may also call our toll free number, 800-LAW-5570 (800-529-5570).

Our Arcadia Living Trust Practice

Though we will prepare a will for you if requested, we recommend most of our clients consider the use of a Living Trust to transfer estate property. With a will, you may go through the probate process, a procedure that can take up to two years and cost your heirs up to eight percent of the estate’s value. With a Living Trust, you transfer property titles to the trust, so you avoid probate. In addition, a Living Trust will still allow you to exercise control over your property during your lifetime.

We will take the time to listen carefully to your concerns, as well as your goals, so that we can prepare a trust that meets your needs. We will draft all provisions of the trust, and will help you with any documentation required to transfer property into the trust. The trust that we prepare for you can help you minimize family conflict and keep all estate matters private. With the right trust, you can potentially avoid capital gains taxes at the death of your spouse and retain your federal estate tax exemption.

Many of our clients use Living Trusts to meet family members’ special needs, including:

  • support or educational needs of children or grandchildren
  • financial needs of elderly parents
  • medical, therapy or long term care needs

In addition to Living Trusts, we also provide other estate planning services, including:

  • the preparation of wills, powers of attorney and health care directives
  • the preparation of other types of trusts, including irrevocable life insurance trusts (ILITs), grantor annuity trusts (GRATs), qualified personal residence trusts (QPRTs), charitable lead trusts (CLTs), and charitable remainder trusts (CRTs)
  • tax planning for estate distribution