A Special Needs Trust in New York — known in the statute as a Supplemental Needs Trust (SNT) — is an irrevocable trust authorized by EPTL § 7-1.12 that holds assets for the benefit of a person with a disability without disqualifying that person from means-tested public benefits such as Medicaid and Supplemental Security Income (SSI). Because eligibility for these
The key difference between a trust and a will in New York is what happens after you sign. A will is a private set of instructions that has no legal force until you die — and then it must be filed and validated in the Surrogate’s Court through a public process called probate. A trust, by contrast, is a living
If you want to keep control of your assets, avoid probate, and plan for incapacity while staying able to change your mind, you need a revocable living trust. If your priority is reducing the New York estate tax, protecting assets from creditors, or qualifying for Medicaid long-term care, you need an irrevocable trust — and you must accept that you
An irrevocable trust can be one of the most effective tools for protecting assets from long-term care costs in New York, but only when it is drafted and funded with disciplined attention to the Medicaid 5-year look-back. In short: when you transfer assets into a properly structured irrevocable trust, those assets are generally removed from your countable estate for institutional
To fund a trust in New York, you must legally transfer ownership of your assets out of your individual name and into the name of the trust — by retitling deeds, bank and brokerage accounts, business interests, and certain other property to the trustee. Signing a trust document under New York’s Estates, Powers and Trusts Law (EPTL) Article 7 creates
Yes. A properly drafted and properly funded revocable living trust avoids probate in New York for the assets it holds. When you transfer ownership of an asset into your trust during your lifetime, that asset is no longer titled in your individual name at death. Because the Surrogate’s Court only has jurisdiction over property that passes under a will, assets
A Q&A guide to New York trusts for immigrant, mixed-status, and non-citizen families: probate, QDOTs, the estate-tax cliff, and when to call an immigration lawyer.