Life is different for everyone. As a Californian trust attorney I work in San Francisco, Alameda County, Contra Costa County and Sacramento County. Therefore I know many different families, all being in different situations, no lifestyle alike.

A living trusts can be neatly drafted to nearly everyone’s life situation. The legal reason for this flexibility is its origin. Trusts stem from the legal concept of contractual freedom. That allows the trust lawyer to consider many variants. If a trust attorney drafts a deed of trust, he must therefore regard the whole life of the grantor and of his family to find a suitable trust for the family.

Not only financial planning needs to be done, but also the grantor has to think intensively about his very own life. The grantor has to determine whom he wants to inherit the family estate and if there is any other persons to take care of. The structure of the trust depends on those circumstances. In some instances it could even be advisable to have more than one living trust. Often additional measures – such as drafting a last will or granting a power of attorney – are required to get your estate planning done. Also the different kinds of the grantor’s property have to be considered. If somebody owns a house in joint tenancy for example, the surviving joint tenant will receive sole property upon the death of the other party, no matter what the trust document is saying.

As there is no standard living trust and no standard last will, there is no standard deed of trust for every live situation.