my trust attorney retired

[swellmel]

What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? California

I have an inter-vivos (living) trust. My attorney has retired.
1. do i need to hire an attorney for any reason to keep up with law changer or anything like that?

2. Can I make minor simple bequest changes to the will pasrt of the trust without the expense of hiring an attornet to do it? thanks

 

[tranquility]

Much like asking a barber if you need a haircut, most attorneys feel a yearly review of trusts is prudent. The law does change. But, it probably has more to do with the complexity of the trust and how little things matter, that it does with wholescale differences in the law.

As to the will changes, most attorneys will rewrite a will than add codicils. It is not that adding things is wrong, it is just that such things can really mess up the issues if there is a problem. If you are actually talking about the trust changes, same thing but more so. While writing casually here in a question is not the same as writing carefully in an official document, note your questions are filled with errors and #2 makes it difficult to know if you are talking about your will or your trust. Such imprecision could cause huge problems and if it wasn't just a cell phone text fat thumb error(s), you really should not consider doing the research and taking the care needed to successfully make the changes.

 

[FlyingRon]

1. do i need to hire an attorney for any reason to keep up with law changer or anything like that?

It might be advisable. The trust itself isn't likely to be an issue, but if other estate rules change you may wish to revisit how you've got things allocated/controlled by the trust.

2. Can I make minor simple bequest changes to the will pasrt of the trust without the expense of hiring an attornet to do it? thanks

Possibly, in fact, you didn't need the lawyer to create the trust to begin with. But if you are not sure what you are doing it's probably advisable.


What I would do is ask your retiring counsel if he has a recommendation for a new attorney. Once you have a relationship with the new attorney, you can get things changed without fuss and periodically review things.