Is Your Business Ownership Properly Aligned with Your Trust?

When you took the time to create your estate plan, you made a powerful decision to protect your loved ones and the legacy you’ve worked so hard to build. But if you own a business, one critical detail can determine whether that plan actually works the way you intended: how your business ownership is titled and aligned with your trust.

Why Alignment Matters

Think of your trust like a wagon that carries everything you own safely to the next generation. If your business interests aren’t in the wagon—whether through proper titling, assignments, or entity structure—then they can get left behind. That often means:

• Costly court involvement through probate or conservatorship proceedings.
  
• Delays and disruptions in business operations during a critical time.
  
• Loss of tax advantages or protections you may have carefully structured.
  
• Family conflict or confusion about decision-making authority.
  

In other words, even the best trust can’t control assets it doesn’t own or isn’t properly linked to.

Common Gaps We See

Many business owners believe their trust “automatically” includes their company because they listed it in a schedule or mentioned it in their plan. Unfortunately, that’s not enough. Some of the most common oversights include:

• LLC or corporate interests still held in your personal name rather than transferred to the trust.
  
• Outdated operating agreements or bylaws that don’t reference the trust or successor trustees.
  
• Buy-sell agreements that haven’t been reviewed in years and may conflict with your current estate plan.
  
• New businesses or entities formed after the trust that were never properly transferred or assigned.
  

These gaps can create major headaches for your successors—and sometimes result in ownership being frozen at the worst possible time.

How Proper Alignment Protects You

When your business ownership is properly aligned with your trust, several important things happen:

• Your successor trustee can step in seamlessly, ensuring business continuity.
  
• Your ownership interests avoid probate, saving your family time and money.
  
• Your tax planning strategies stay intact, especially for family-owned entities.
  
• Your overall estate plan reflects your current reality, not a snapshot from years ago.
  

Take a Moment to Check

If it’s been more than a year since you reviewed your plan—or if you’ve formed, purchased, or restructured a business since your trust was created—this is the perfect time to revisit how everything is titled. A small administrative update now can prevent a world of trouble later.

Schedule Your Business WellCheck Today

Our Business WellCheck is designed to help owners like you identify gaps, risks, and opportunities—so your estate plan and business strategy work hand in hand. Schedule Your Business WellCheck today!