Yes. The trust does not restrict your rights to borrow on assets in any way. For example, you may take out a home equity line of credit on your home held in your living trust.

Having a living trust does not affect your ability to buy and sell assets. The only change necessary is that, when you buy a titled asset (e.g. a car, home, boat), title should be in your name as trustee instead of in your personal name. Assets titled in the name of the trust then are considered a trust asset and will be distributed according to the terms of your trust. If you do not want an asset any longer, you are free to sell it or give it …

The trustee manages the trust but, typically, you will be the trustee. You also may name you and your spouse as co-trustees, or a trusted family member or friend as trustee. Thus, you do not need to give up management or control of your assets. The assets and income of the trust are used for your personal benefit, and for the personal benefit of anyone else you name as beneficiaries.
Appointing a successor trustee is essential if you are the first trustee and the trust will …

Once a written living trust agreement is executed, you transfer your assets from your individual name to your name as trustee of your living trust. For example, instead of your property being held in the name of “Jane Doe,” it now will be held as “Jane Doe, Trustee of the Jane Doe Living Trust.”
You will transfer your bank and investment accounts, certificates of deposit, real estate, investments, etc. into your living trust. To transfer real estate (e.g., your home) to the trust, a deed must be …

Revocable living trusts, sometimes called “living trusts,” have become a popular alternative to a will as a way to pass property to your beneficiaries when you die. If all your assets are placed in the trust, your estate will not need to go through probate to distribute those assets. Instead, they will pass under the terms of the trust you have created. Like a will, the trust is revocable, so you can change or end it at any time.
These trusts are established by a …

A lifetime gift is not treated as an advancement unless proven by a writing, contemporaneous with the gift, signed by the donor evidencing his intention was that the gift be treated as an advancement or the person receiving the gift acknowledged that such was the intention. The mere fact of a lifetime gift or even oral statement that an advancement was intended will not automatically create an advancement.

Yes. The adopted child’s share comes out of the other sibling’s share (this only works if the child was adopted after the will was executed).

The gift to former spouse is not valid.

Under New York law, a child born after the execution of a parent’s last Will is entitled to a portion of the estate as long as the child is neither provided for nor mentioned in the Will. This child is referred to as a pretermitted child.

In New York, the Simultaneous Death Act provides that where a married couple dies simultaneously, half of the marital estate is distributed as if the husband survived and half as if wife survived. However, if a Will was executed and a provision addresses this instance where a couple dies simultaneously, then the Will determines how each estate is distributed. For example, a husband may write into his will the following provision: “I give my entire estate to my spouse, provided she survives me by 30 days or 60 days. If …