There are many different kinds of trusts. I assume you are talking about a revocable trust.
I think you are bringing up something that a lot of people need to think through — people who might need to adjust their trust’s language to write in a lineup of successor trustees to cover what happens if all your people are gone. And don’t forget that a successor trustee who is still living can resign as trustee if they can’t or don’t want to be in that position.
I was recently involved in a discussion of this exact topic. A financial person happened to be there and he said that while many banks have trust departments, he has seen banks bill and bill and bill, even when they were not doing anything.
Lawyers are going to bill, too, of course, but his opinion was that a trusted lawyer (oxymoron not intended — there really are some
) would be a better choice because they would bill when they do something.
If your trust is a directive to disperse assets right away with no ongoing management, a lawyer could be your best bet.
You really, really, really need to sit down with a lawyer who writes a lot of trusts or who might even specialize in elder law, and go through your trust, line by line, and figure this out……..
A lawyer who knows trusts will tell you if you have accounts where adding beneficiaries and/or transfer-on-death would be more efficient than running everything through a trust. (I think if you use those things, you could put the trust in as the last-in-line beneficiary so the trustee could then take over — but get legal advice to be sure about that.)
Although it might not be fun, it is plainly practical to sit down and work a trust through to “worst case scenario” — what happens if no heirs are left? What charities would you want to receive your assets then?
Read your trust carefully. Maybe make a copy to make notes on for questions or changes. Organize all those questions and then — go see a lawyer and get this done.
Boomer