The document is rarely the problem. Most online trust templates produce a legally valid California trust, and I am not going to pretend otherwise to justify my fee.
The problem is that the software cannot record your deed, and a trust that does not hold your house does not avoid probate on your house.
The failure mode, in order of frequency
- The deed was never prepared, or was prepared and never recorded. This is the overwhelming majority of what I see.
- The deed was recorded but names the trust incorrectly, so the vesting does not match the trust document.
- Bank and brokerage accounts were never retitled, because nobody told the client a certification of trust exists.
- Retirement accounts were retitled into the trust, which can trigger an immediate taxable distribution.
- Witnessing on the pour-over will was done wrong, which quietly invalidates the backup document.
California specifics a generic template misses
The Preliminary Change of Ownership Report, which has to accompany a recorded deed and which claims the exclusion from reassessment. File it wrong and you may hear from the assessor.
Proposition 19, which now limits the parent-child exclusion to a family home or family farm, requires the child to occupy it as a principal residence, caps the exclusion at current taxable value plus $1,000,000 adjusted biennially, and imposes a filing deadline of three years from transfer or before transfer to a third party, whichever comes first. No national template accounts for that.
Community property characterization, which affects the basis step-up for a surviving spouse and which a fill-in form does not ask about with any care.
Check yours in ten minutes
Pull your grant deed from the LA County Registrar-Recorder and read the grantee line. If it says your name without the words 'as Trustee' and the trust's name and date, your house is not in your trust, whatever the binder says.
Where online forms are genuinely fine
A simple will for a renter with no children. A HIPAA authorization. A basic health care directive, though California's statutory form is free from the Attorney General's office and does the same job.
If that is your situation, do not pay me $1,200 to do what a $99 form does adequately. I would rather you spend the money on something you need.
“I've cleaned up maybe a dozen of these after a death. Every single time the family had the binder, the tabs, the whole presentation. And every single time the house was still titled to a person who had died.”
Delia Vasquez-HartThe repair path
If you are alive, this is easy and cheap. We review the document, prepare and record the deed, give you a certification of trust for the banks, and fix the witnessing if needed. Often a few hundred dollars.
If the person has died, the tool is a petition under Probate Code section 850, asking the court to confirm the asset into the trust based on evidence of intent. It works reasonably often, especially where the property is listed on the trust's schedule. It takes months and it costs real money, and it is entirely avoidable.
Questions we get asked
Is my online trust valid?
Probably yes as a document. Validity and funding are separate questions, and funding is where these fail.
Will you review a trust I made myself?
Yes. Bring it to the free consultation. If it only needs a deed recorded, we will quote that and not try to sell you a replacement.
Do I need to redo everything?
Usually not. A restatement keeps the original trust name and date so your existing funding survives, which is far less disruptive than starting over.
What about the pour-over will that came with it?
Check the witnessing. Two witnesses present at the same time, watching you sign, and ideally none of them inheriting under the document. That is where self-signed wills fall apart.
Pull the grant deed first. If the grantee line names you as trustee of your trust by name and date, your online trust is probably doing its job and you can stop reading. If it does not, call (310) 555-0219 and we will price the deed work.