Most of us don’t understand what a trust is or what it does. In this bite-sized Tuesday Triage episode, Jill breaks it down in plain language: what a revocable trust is, what it can and can’t do, and how to know whether it’s the right tool for your situation.
What Jill Discusses:
Resources & Links
Connect with Jill:
The Death Readiness Podcast
Episode: 19
Title: Why You Need (or Don’t Need) a Trust
Host: Jill Mastroianni (Solo)
Published: July 15, 2025
Jill Mastroianni: (0:00)
Has someone ever told you, “You need a trust”?
Maybe your parents have a trust.
Maybe you’ve heard the term tossed around and assumed trusts are only for the ultra-wealthy.
But what is a trust, really?
What does it actually do—and what doesn’t it do?
In this episode, I’m breaking it down in plain terms:
✔ When a trust makes sense
✔ Who can benefit from a trust
✔ And how to decide if one fits your situation
(00:27) Welcome to the Death Readiness Podcast. This is not your dad’s estate planning podcast. I’m Jill Mastroianni, former estate attorney, current realist, and your guide to wills, trusts, probate and the conversations no one wants to have. If your Google search history includes, “Do I need a trust?” “What exactly is probate?” and “Am I supposed to do something with mom’s Will?” you’re in the right place.
When someone starts talking about something you think you should understand—but don’t—it’s tempting to just nod along and pretend.
We all do it.
In my first year practicing law, I worked with Harlan Dodson—one of the most generous teachers I’ve ever had.
From the beginning, Harlan made it clear that we were on the same team.
One day, on the way to a client meeting, he said, “We need to get copies of all their Schedule K-1s.”
I had no idea what a Schedule K-1 was.
Then he looked at me and asked, “Do you know what that is?”
I wanted to say yes. I wanted to nod in affirmation. But I didn’t.
And without skipping a beat, he explained exactly what a Schedule K-1 was and why it mattered.
That moment stayed with me, not just because I learned something new, but because it reminded me how powerful it is to admit what you don’t know and get clarity.
So if you’re listening today and don’t quite understand what a trust is—or if you’ve nodded along in the past, pretending to get it, stick around.
(01:58) In this episode, I’m going to help you understand a common type of trust from the ground up just like Harlan helped me understand Schedule K-1s.
Today, I’m answering a question from a listener named Lauren.
Lauren is a working mom with three kids, living in California. And like so many people, she’s been told by everyone—friends, family, even her neighbor’s uncle—that she needs a trust.
Lauren’s problem is that she doesn’t really understand what a trust is or why she would need one.
She asked if I could walk her through it—what a trust really is and what it actually does.
There are plenty of people who feel qualified to say, “You need a trust.”
But often, they can’t explain why.
A trust isn’t inherently good or bad, or for the wealthy or for the poor.
It’s a tool. Like a hammer. A hammer is a great tool if you have a nail.
But it’s not much help if you’re trying to turn a screw.
(02:52) Trusts work well in the right situation. And, trusts are a deep topic so I’m going to speak in general terms today with the understanding that there might be exceptions to some of these general rules.
Let’s start with the basic definition of a trust.
A trust is a legal arrangement where one person—the trustee—holds and manages assets for the benefit of others, known as beneficiaries.
This arrangement is laid out in a trust agreement, which acts like a contract between the person who created the trust—called the grantor or settlor—and the trustee.
The agreement spells out who gets what, when they get it, and under what conditions.
Today, we’re going to talk about one kind of trust – a revocable trust, which is a trust that can be revoked, or changed.
We’re going to talk about a revocable trust today because it is the most common type of trust, and because it’s the type of trust that Lauren from California is asking about, even though she might not have realized it.
(03:52) I’m going to start by telling you what revocable trusts, trusts that can be revoked, do not do:
There are other types of trusts that do that, but that’s a topic for another day.
Next, let’s talk 2 reasons why someone might use a revocable trust—and who might benefit from having one.
Then we’ll talk about what a revocable trust actually looks like.
Reason #1 for using a revocable trust: You want to make it easier to manage your assets—now, and in the future.
A revocable trust allows you to place all your assets in one central spot, so it’s easier to keep track of what you own. And if you ever need help managing things—whether from an adult child, a trusted friend, or a professional—it can make that process much smoother.
This isn’t just for people with huge estates. You might have modest assets but still need help managing them, maybe because of age, illness, or cognitive change. A revocable trust can offer a simple, clear structure for that support.
(05:04) Reason #2 for using a revocable trust: You want to avoid probate.
Avoiding probate is the most common reason people create revocable trusts.
Probate is the court-supervised process for distributing your probate assets after you die. It doesn’t apply to everything you own—only to what’s in your individual name without a beneficiary or payable-on-death designation.
For example, let’s say I have a bank account in my name. If I fill out a “payable-on-death” form and name a beneficiary, that account bypasses probate and goes directly to the person I named. But if I don’t fill out that form, the account becomes a probate asset—it will be distributed according to my Will, if I have one.
If you want a deeper dive into probate—and what counts as a probate vs. a non-probate asset—you can check out my short video at deathreadiness.com/will.
Whether avoiding probate matters depends a lot on your state of residence. In some places, probate is expensive and time-consuming. In others, it’s not a big deal.
(06:19) Here are 4 situations where avoiding probate might make a lot of sense:
(08:08) If you live in California, like Lauren who provided today’s question does, avoiding probate can save your family a lot of money.
California law sets the fees that both the executor or personal representative of your estate and the attorney for your estate can charge. And those fees are based on the gross value of your probate estate—not just what’s left after debts or mortgages are paid off.
Let’s say that Lauren dies owning a home in California that’s worth $1 million. She also has a $700,000 mortgage on the property.
Even though Lauren dies owing $700,000 on her $1M home, California probate law values that home at $1 million for purposes of calculating the fee owed to the executor and the executor’s attorney.
Now, here’s how those probate fees are calculated in California:
That adds up to $23,000 in fees for just the executor.
And, the attorney for the executor is entitled to $23,000 as well.
That’s $46,000 in statutory fees for an estate worth only $300,000.
A properly drafted and funded revocable trust might very well be worth the effort for California residents.
(09:43) But, a trust isn’t the only way to avoid probate. If you want to learn more about probate and probate assets, and how to change an asset from a probate asset to a non-probate asset, check out my short video at deathreadiness.com/will.
Now let’s talk about what a trust looks like.
A client recently brought me two documents she thought were her father-in-law’s trust.
One was an SS-4. That’s the form you fill out to get a tax ID number for a trust, kind of like the trust’s social security number.
The other was a Schedule K-1, which reports how much income each beneficiary gets from the trust.
She was confused and that confusion is completely understandable.
Both documents had the name of her father-in-law’s trust on them, so it made sense that she thought either one might be the trust.
(10:36) Unless you’ve created a trust yourself, as the grantor, or managed one, as the trustee, you’d probably never see an actual trust document or know what it looks like.
A trust is a written agreement between the grantor (the person creating it) and the trustee (the person managing it) for the benefit of a person referred to as the beneficiary.
In a revocable trust, the grantor, trustee, and beneficiary are often the same person, that is, until that person dies or becomes incapacitated.
For example, if Lauren created a revocable trust:
At Lauren’s death, her revocable trust would become irrevocable, generally meaning that it can no longer be revoked or changed, and the successor trustee Lauren named in the trust agreement would take over.
The successor trustee would distribute the assets to the beneficiaries Lauren named in the trust agreement. Those beneficiaries would likely be Lauren’s children.
(11:49) Next, let’s talk about funding a revocable trust and what exactly that means.
Simply creating a trust isn’t enough to avoid probate. You actually have to fund the trust.
Funding a trust means that you transfer ownership of your property from yourself, as an individual, to yourself as trustee of your trust.
For example, in order to fund my trust with my bank account, I would change the owner of my bank account from Jill Mastroianni to Jill Mastroianni, Trustee of the Jill Mastroianni Revocable Trust.
Many estate planning attorneys will create the trust agreement for you and then hand you a checklist of the steps you need to take to fund it.
You might walk away with a beautiful binder that includes your trust agreement and a nice summary of its terms.
But if you don’t actually transfer your assets into the trust, it’s just a pretty binder.
You haven’t avoided probate.
And even if you’re in the small percentage of people who do fund their trust properly, life still happens after that.
(12:53) For example, I might accidentally open a bank account in my individual name, Jill Mastroianni, rather than as Jill Mastroianni, Trustee of the Jill Mastroianni Revocable Trust.
Or I might sell my house and buy a new one, and forget that the deed for my new house should name Jill Mastroianni, Trustee of the Jill Mastroianni Revocable Trust instead of just Jill Mastroianni, as the owner.
Both the house and the bank account would become probate assets and derail my probate avoidance plan.
The bottom line is that revocable trusts are powerful tools when used in the right way in the right situations.
But creating a trust just because someone told you to – without understanding what it actually does – isn’t the answer.
Avoiding probate might be worth it for you, or it might not matter much at all, depending on where you live and your individual circumstances.
And remember, a trust isn’t the only way to avoid probate. To learn more about using beneficiary designations and payable on death transfers to avoid probate, visit deathreadiness.com/will
(14:02) Thanks for joining me for today’s Tuesday Triage, and thank you to Lauren for reaching out with such a great question.
If you found this episode helpful, I’d love for you to share it with someone you think could benefit from it.
If you have a question you’d like me to answer on a future Tuesday Triage episode, whether related to today’s episode or something totally different, send me an email at jill@deathreadiness.com or visit deathreadiness.com/TuesdayTriage. I’d love to hear from you.
Next week, I’ll be talking about a different kind of trust—specifically, the kind people say will protect your parents’ house if they ever need nursing home care. You know, the kind that’s supposed to prevent the government from taking all of your parents’ money. Before you take any irreversible steps, make sure to tune in.
(15:00) This is Death Readiness, real, messy and yours to own. I’m Jill Mastroianni and I’m here to help you sort through it, especially when you don’t know where to start.
Hi, I'm April, Jill's daughter. Thanks for listening to The Death Readiness Podcast.
While my mom is an attorney, she’s not your attorney.
The Death Readiness Podcast is for educational and entertainment purposes only.
It does not provide legal advice.
For legal guidance tailored to your unique situation, consult with a licensed attorney in your state.
To learn more about the services my mom offers, visit DeathReadiness.com.