How to Set up a Bank Account for a Trust
Depending on the size of your estate, setting up a trust can be preferable to writing a will, according to the financial planning website The Motley Fool. Unlike wills, there are no probate proceedings associated with trusts, which allows your beneficiaries to avoid legal delays in accessing your estate and allows the division of your estate to remain confidential. Trusts are also easier to change than wills and are active immediately, so you can adapt your trust over the course of your life as necessary while avoiding the legal hassles associated with changing a will. You will need a bank account for your trust, which you can set up at your bank.
Other People Are Reading
Instructions
-
-
1
Set up a legal trust. Consult a lawyer with experience in trust planning to help you complete the legal paperwork for the trust. The bank will need to see your legal trust documents before it will set up the account. Among other things, these documents will detail who is the administrator of the trust and who is the beneficiary. The person establishing the trust has free rein to determine the rules of the trust, such as when, or if, the beneficiary needs the administrator's permission to withdraw money, as well as any other stipulations, such as restrictions on how the money can be spent or a specific age at which the beneficiary gains access to the trust.
-
2
Call your bank. Specific procedures for setting up a bank account for a trust differ from bank to bank. Make an appointment with an adviser to set up the account and find out what documentation your bank requires. At a minimum, you will need your legal trust documents and photo identification. If you plan to use another bank account to transfer funds directly into the trust account, you will need that account information, and the signer on that account must be present to make the transfer.
-
-
3
Complete the paperwork. When you attend your appointment at your bank, you will be given the appropriate paperwork to set up your trust bank account. Once you provide your bank with the paperwork and documentation, your account will be set up and ready to use. This is when you will decide who can make deposits and withdrawals from the trust, who will receive the account statements and who can sign checks on the trust account. These decisions should be made in accordance with the legal trust document. For instance, if the rules of the trust dictate that only the administrator can make withdrawals, then the administrator would be the only authorized signer on the account.
-
1
