If you searched “trust and will,” you’re likely trying to figure out whether you need one, the other, or both. Short answer: a trust and a will are not competing choices — they perform different jobs. A will alone can leave gaps that a trust fills, and a trust alone still needs a will behind it, which is why many complete estate plans include both. Whether that applies to your situation depends on your specific assets, family, and goals, and is a question for your estate planning attorney rather than a general rule.

A will directs how your probate assets are distributed after death and names a guardian for minor children; it takes effect only at death and generally goes through probate court. A trust is a legal arrangement that can hold and manage assets during life and after death, on terms you set — and assets properly retitled into certain trusts can pass to beneficiaries without probate.

Which combination fits depends on your assets, family, and goals — see why estate planning matters for how these pieces fit into a broader plan, and talk specifics through with your estate planning attorney.

What Is a Trust?

A trust is a three-party arrangement: a grantor (you) transfers assets to a trustee, who manages them for one or more beneficiaries under written terms. It can be revocable (changeable) or irrevocable (generally not), and can take effect immediately (a living trust) or only at death (a testamentary trust, created inside a will). What a given trust accomplishes — probate avoidance, tax positioning, creditor protection, or timing control — depends on its type and how it’s funded.

Trust and Will: What Is the Difference?

A will only controls assets titled in your name alone at death, and works through the probate court. Florida’s probate process for a straightforward estate typically takes about five to six months from filing to closing, with a final accounting due within twelve months of receiving Letters of Administration, per the Florida Bar’s consumer guidance on probate [1]. Compensation can be set by the will, by agreement, by a statutory calculation presumed reasonable if unchallenged, or by the court [1].

A revocable living trust instead holds legal title to whatever assets you retitle into it while you’re alive. Because the trust — not you individually — owns those assets, they generally bypass probate at death and can be managed without interruption if you become incapacitated. You keep full control as trustee while able to serve, and can amend or revoke it anytime. That flexibility is also why a revocable trust, alone, doesn’t reduce estate taxes or shield assets from your own creditors.

Types of Trusts: Comparing the Major Structures

Beyond the basic revocable living trust, specialized structures serve narrower purposes. The table below is an overview — the practical consequences of each depend on drafting details your attorney controls.

Several of these structures — ILITs, SLATs, dynasty trusts — exist mainly to manage federal estate and gift tax exposure, which applies only above a set threshold: $15,000,000 per person for decedents who die in 2026, with the generation-skipping transfer exemption set at the same level [10][11]. Below that, these structures are usually solving for something other than federal estate tax, such as control or creditor protection.

A grantor trust is a tax classification, not a standalone type: under Internal Revenue Code Sections 671–679, income is taxed on the grantor’s personal return whenever certain powers are retained [2]. Many revocable trusts are grantor trusts by default; some irrevocable ones, like SLATs, are deliberately designed that way.

An ILIT keeps life insurance proceeds out of the taxable estate. Proceeds are includible if the decedent retained “incidents of ownership” — the power to change the beneficiary, borrow against, or cancel the policy — at death, under Internal Revenue Code Section 2042 [3]. Giving those powers up through an irrevocable trust, done correctly and often well before death, can keep proceeds outside the estate.

A QTIP trust lets a surviving spouse receive income for life while the grantor still controls who ultimately receives principal — often children from a prior marriage — and qualifies for the marital deduction through an irrevocable election that defers, rather than eliminates, estate tax [4].

A charitable remainder trust pays income to named beneficiaries with the remainder to charity; a charitable lead trust runs the reverse order. Both trade some family access for a charitable benefit, built around Internal Revenue Code Section 664 [5], and are often discussed alongside broader charitable giving strategies.

A special needs trust holds assets for a beneficiary with a disability without disqualifying them from Medicaid or SSI. A first-party version must be established before age 65, with a Medicaid payback provision required under federal law [6].

Trust Funding: Why Signing the Document Isn’t Enough

A trust only controls what’s actually inside it. Signing the agreement creates the legal shell; nothing happens until assets — real estate, brokerage accounts, business interests — are retitled into the trustee’s name, or beneficiary designations elsewhere are updated to point to it. This step, funding, is where many otherwise well-drafted trusts fail to deliver.

An asset never funded into the trust typically passes under the will’s “pour-over” provision instead, or under Florida’s intestacy rules if there’s no will — meaning probate anyway, which can undercut the point of setting the trust up in the first place. Funding isn’t one-time: accounts opened or property acquired later need to be titled correctly as they come in.

How Much Does It Cost to Set Up a Trust?

Legal fees vary by attorney, county, and complexity — a straightforward revocable trust is generally less involved to draft than an irrevocable structure requiring a corporate trustee, tax elections, or coordination with a business or insurance policy. Moran Wealth Management does not set legal fees; that conversation belongs with your estate planning attorney.

It’s reasonable to weigh that upfront cost against what it solves for. Since Florida probate for a simple estate runs roughly five to six months with its own court filings and fees, a funded trust can shift that cost and timeline to the drafting stage rather than eliminate it [1]. Whether that trade makes sense depends on the estate’s size and complexity, and on the kind of periodic review discussed in taxes, trusts, and timing.

Florida Considerations for Trusts and Wills

Homestead property carries its own constitutional protection: under Article X, Section 4 of the Florida Constitution, a homestead is generally exempt from forced sale by creditors, with limited exceptions for taxes, purchase-money or improvement obligations, and mechanics’ liens [7]. Moving a homestead into a revocable trust doesn’t automatically forfeit this protection, but how title is held matters.

Trust duration can run unusually long here. Florida’s rule against perpetuities allows trusts created on or after July 1, 2022 to last up to 1,000 years, up from 360 years for trusts created between 2001 and mid-2022 [8] — part of why Florida is a common trust “situs” choice for dynasty planning.

Moving from another state generally means having existing documents reviewed under Florida law, not assumed to transfer automatically — signing formalities and creditor-protection statutes, including the spendthrift provisions in Section 736.0502 of the Florida Trust Code, are state-specific [9].

No state income tax on individuals is separate from estate planning itself, but it affects how trust income is taxed for Florida resident beneficiaries and trustees — worth raising with your CPA when comparing situs options.

When a Trust Isn’t the Right Answer

A trust isn’t automatically the better tool. A simple estate — modest assets, no minor children, no complicated family dynamics — may be well served by a will alone, without the added cost of funding and maintaining a trust. A revocable trust provides no asset-protection benefit during your lifetime, since you retain the ability to reach the assets yourself — see limitations of a revocable trust for a closer look at what these trusts do, and do not, accomplish. And no trust eliminates the need for a will: a pour-over will still catches assets never retitled into the trust and names a guardian for minor children, which only a will can do.

Irrevocable structures raise the opposite trade-off: once assets move in and powers are given up, you generally can’t get them back or change terms unilaterally. That permanence is what makes the tax and asset-protection benefits work, but also means these structures deserve more deliberation, not less, before signing.

None of this substitutes for legal drafting. An attorney must prepare valid documents under Florida law, and a CPA’s input matters for how a structure is taxed. Moran Wealth Management coordinates with a client’s attorney and CPA on how these structures interact with the broader plan — we do not draft legal documents or provide legal or tax advice.

Where This Fits Into Your Broader Plan

A trust and a will are structural choices inside a larger estate plan — one that also touches your investment accounts, tax picture, and family goals. If your documents may no longer reflect how assets are actually titled, that’s worth raising with your attorney, and with a team that looks at how those structures interact with your portfolio, through estate planning for high-net-worth families. For business owners weighing a future sale, trust and succession questions can intersect directly with that planning, through business owner wealth management. To talk through how your estate plan fits your broader financial picture, reach out to Moran Wealth Management or call 239-920-4440.