Trusts: The Key to Effective Estate Planning

Coming up on this edition of Judica County Radio, your host, Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer managing partners, Whitaker and Hamer law firm right here in North Carolina.

We are going to get into the Mandela effect rabbit hole. We're going to talk Disney and also trust are important and customizable. We'll look at some popular trust clauses. It's all coming up next on Judica County Radio. Welcome in, Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer, your managing partners, Whitaker and Hamer law firm right here in North Carolina. They're practicing attorneys here.

They've got offices located in Raleigh, Garner, Cleveland, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay, Varina, Gastonia, and in Morehead City. I'm Morgan Patrick. Each and every week it's always about legalese. We talk it, we walk it, we give you an opportunity for a complimentary consult with Whitaker and Hamer. We'll tell you more about that as we move through the show.

And before we dive in guys, as we always do, we ask how the week was. Josh, let's start with you. I remember seeing the movie where Sinbad was a genie. No, man. I mean, I know of the movie, but I didn't. I never sat through it, so I never watched it.

Okay. So somebody asked me that question and I was like, yeah, I remember that movie. I was like, I don't think I saw it, but like I remember the ads and Sinbad was huge and he was in everything there. It was Shaq.

It was Shaq. Yeah. Did you Google it there, Joseph? I just, I'm, I'm very familiar with the Mandela effect, man.

I've, uh, you know, I've, I've heard this theory before and the, the, the one for me that gets me is the Bernstein Bears, man. That's the one. Hold on. I don't know that one yet. Save that one. Save that one. You don't know that one. That's I don't know that one yet, but save it.

Save it for just a second. So I was convinced. I still kind of am. I don't, I'm just convinced there was a movie where Sinbad was a genie, but yeah, there was a, the interview. The internet says that never existed. There was a movie that everybody remembers where Shaq was a genie.

Yep. But no, I don't remember it, but yeah, we know it was a thing and the internet confirmed it. There is no, according to the internet, there was no ever movie where Sinbad played a genie, but if you just lead with that and you ask people, do you remember that movie where Sinbad was a genie? Like everybody remembers it. Maybe it was, maybe he was dressed as a genie in one of the shows?

Never. Then that's the thing they said, and I can clearly vividly remember it. I was like reading online. People were like remembering the plot and how it was different from the Shaq movie where he was a genie, but the internet says Sinbad was never a genie in anything. It was not a commercial, not a sitcom, not a movie. Didn't exist. Blew my mind, Morgan.

Yeah. So I'm looking at it right now, Josh, and it says there's a common misconception about a movie called Shazam starring Sinbad as a genie, but it does not actually exist. Many people confuse this with the 1996 film Kazam, which Joe is referencing, which features Shaquille O'Neal as a genie. One of the great actors of our generation. And rappers, don't forget that. He was a rapper and an actor. That's all he did, right? He rapped and he acted. That's what I know him from.

He's a large man. He could have had a sports career, I don't understand. Somebody steered him wrong.

He could have really done well. I've never heard the Bernstein Bears thing. Tell me about that one. Are you familiar with the Bernstein Bears?

Or is that before your time? How do you spell it? Spell their name. Is it Stein?

S-T-E-I-N? Bernstein Bears? That's how I remembered it. Apparently it's always been Stein. Bernstein Bears.

That's what it's always been. And that's the one that really got me initially going down the Mandela effect rabbit hole. I can see Sinbad in a genie costume. You just have weird dreams, man. I think that just says a lot about your dreams that you have.

But someone told me that. I was like preposterous. And then I started reading it and then I got into the Reddit chat where people were like, I know I watched this movie. It was a tough time for me. My parents were getting divorced. It was about divorce and kids and really adding to it.

Maybe the internet is just playing a trick on us. I think what that tells you is divorce is hard on kids. It is.

Absolutely. When they start making stuff up. The mind of a child do some strange things. That's really what it boils down to. And then Joseph, I haven't talked to you since you got back. You were down in Florida so you were doing Disney and I haven't talked to you since then. Yep. That's the thing that happened to me.

That's the thing that I did. I went down there. My daughter had a cheer competition.

Disney is Disney. They're well versed in crowd management and handling crowds. I'll tell you, they don't know how to handle these cheer crowds, man. It was a logistical nightmare. You can't even imagine how much of a logistical nightmare it was to get in and out of ESPN wide world of sports. Joe, besides yourself, were there any unruly cheer dads there?

No, man. It's funny. There's this thing with cheer. There's these cheer dads.

I'm assuming these are the dads that really wanted to have sons that would play sports and they would have been super into them. But they get all dressed up. They dress up like the most hardcore fan going to an NFL game. Like hair, makeup, like a Raiders fan that's got season tickets for life that's super decked out. There's a lot of dads that do that. And they go and they cheer. But they're supporting their daughters. That's awesome. Yeah, I support my daughter and I love my daughter so much, but I don't think my daughter wants that from me, man.

I don't think that's what she's looking for if I'm being completely honest with you. We still haven't. We never made it down to Disney at this point in my life.

I don't know. Never? Have you never made it ever in your life? Your boys don't want to go? No, no. I convinced my first child that it was a ripoff and he taught the other kids that it was a ripoff. How do you feel about your parents not loving you? I've worked through it.

As long as you process that. Joe, when were you there? Were you there for May 4th? Yeah, I was there for May 4th. Hollywood Studios is the Star Wars park and it was at capacity.

So skipped out on that. Hit up Epcot instead. Epcot's a fun place if you're an adult. It is. It's a very, very fun place if you're an adult that likes to recreationally drink on occasion.

In different countries. Yeah, there's a lot for you to do there. So enjoyed that. That was fun. It was a good time overall, man.

It's a lot of energy. I think we walked like, I think it was 20,000 steps on average that we walked every day. So, you know, that's a pretty healthy day of walking. The kids wear out by the end of it, especially if you get there early and leave late, which you're paying a lot of money, man.

So what else are you going to do? You got to suffer for the good of a good time. But it's a good, good time. A good time.

Can't complain too much. I tell you, the place I really like to go when I'm down that way is the Universal Water Park Volcano Bay. Now, that's a that's a good time, man. That place. They got it figured out there. That's a highly recommend that if you if you decide to love your kids, Josh, and actually enrich their lives with valuable experiences.

I would that's one I'd recommend for you for sure. I just want to jump in and say water parks had been ruined for me by the movie Grown Ups when it was whatever the comedian's name was the big guy. Kevin.

Kevin. Yeah, he goes he goes to the bathroom in the main pool and, and the dye comes out and they're all doing it. Yeah, that doesn't that's not a real thing, man. I don't know.

I can't tell you how I know it's not a real thing. But, uh, you know, I've told my kids that we got a pool. I tell them that all the time. You pee.

It's gonna it's gonna definitely show up on you. So, Joe, yeah, you don't you don't think they do the the dye in the pool at the water parks anymore? I don't think they do, man. I don't think that they do. I don't think they've got the technology.

Yeah, I don't think as a society, I don't we have the technology for that. I don't. Yeah. Look, if you if you're going to any public pool, somebody's peeing. Yeah, it's like 40% pee, man. That's what I heard.

That's the data that I heard. You know, you just have to know that going in and especially if there are kids in there, man. The kids ain't getting out to pee. My kids are. My kids are, you know, but, uh, the other kids, the Whitaker children, Whitaker children might be doing both numbers in the pool. I don't know. They're probably disgruntled from never going on a trip to Disney.

They're housebroken. We're going to teach dad a lesson by pooping in this pool. All right. All right. So we're going to do we're going to talk legal stuff. So we're going to talk about as we often do. We like to focus a lot of times on estate planning, and we do it for two reasons. One to give you information to, you know, hopefully we'll we'll talk about something that gets you motivated.

If it's something you need to you need to do, we'll help you find the motivation to do it. And so me and Joseph will talk a lot about trust, about revocable living trust, about how to make trust the centerpiece of your estate plan and what it can do for you. And we want to go in and look at, you know, one of the things that we tell people is, you know, we can make this trust or just such a great legal tool. We can customize a trust to make it do what you want it to do.

Right. So it's it's it's not like it's a template written in stone. We can make changes to it. We can make it do a ton of things. So I thought we would on this show, I thought we would take a look at some popular trust clauses. All right. These are these are ways that we customize a revocable living trust, any trust really to be to be part of your estate plans.

I've picked three to kind of talk about today. But these are some things that you can do to your trust to make it customizable. I like to think of trust is like when you're playing like NBA 2K and you make your own player. If you want your player to be seven foot seven, 380 pounds, you can do that. That's your choice.

That's the only thing you do, though. I make them as tall. They're super, super tall, super fat, maxed out stats, or they're extremely small, comically small.

There's no in between, man. I wonder if anybody's in there like making like a six foot three basketball player when they customize psychopaths. Seven, seven, 380, ten on threes. That's 100% on threes.

You're going to have a you're going to have a you're looking at Shaq in the movie, because they have a literal genie. All right. Well, we are play games. We are going to dial it in on trust when we return. You're locked into Judica County radio. And I'm guessing that our complimentary consults are going to be in and around trust today. Eight hundred six five nine one one eight six. Call the number and get lined up for a complimentary consult on trust. Eight hundred six five nine one one eight six.

That's eight hundred six five nine eleven eighty six. Again, we'll dive in with Judica County radio when we return. Welcome back to Judica County radio. Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer are your hosts at the managing partners at Whitaker and Hamer law firm. They're practicing attorneys here in North Carolina.

They have placed offices for your convenience in Raleigh, Garner, Cleveland, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay, Varina, Gastonia and in Morehead City. I'm Morgan Patrick. My pleasure to go back and forth with the attorneys, sometimes referee. We also offer up complimentary consults. And this week we are talking trust. So that will be the consult.

It is complimentary. Eight hundred six five nine one one eight six. Call the number. Leave your contact information. An attorney with Whitaker and Hamer will be in touch to line up that complimentary consult.

Got any questions about a trust and we will get into the different kinds, different clauses here in a second. But eight hundred six five nine one one eight six. Josh, take it away. Morgan, I want you to give that number. Give that number one more time for me. Eight hundred six five nine one one eight six. So, yes, call us.

We'll set you up a free consult to talk about trust, talk about estate planning, but also call that number. If you saw that movie where Sinbad was a genie, I won't I won't verbal confirmation if you and what the plot was. If you saw the movie where Sinbad was a genie. All right. Yep. You do that, you get free console. All right. So we're you know, what we're going to focus today on is what a trust can can do for your estate plan and the control, the features.

You know, some of the features, what you can have it have it do. And one of the things that you can have it do because right when you when you create a trust, you're taking everything kind of out of the you know, we talk about avoiding probate with a trust. You know, you can have a will a will has to get probated downtown. We talk about how that's a public record and how your executor will have to report to a clerk and do all these different things. And when you instead focus your estate plan on a trust and not a will, this trust is is private. This trust is operated by a trustee. According to the rules and the parameters that you set in place, they do not report to a clerk.

It is not a public record. And so, again, we harp on that. But that's why I trust there's all other kinds of important reasons to have a trust.

But that is kind of like for me, a top level, a top level thing to do. And so when you create this trust, the trustee is going to is going to run it according to these rules and these clauses you put, you know, in a trust. And so the first thing I wanted to talk about, you know, if you probate a will and one of your heirs or your spouse or your kids, you know, if somebody isn't happy with what they have, you know, wills can be contested.

All right. There's all kinds of different reasons why wills can be contested. I know you've seen that, Joseph.

Yes, I have seen it. And I mean, the most common reason is just general dysfunction within a family. You know, you get individuals that don't get along and they don't agree. You throw money in the mix. You throw money in the mix. Yeah.

Yeah. One thing I can say. Money, money doesn't help siblings who don't get along. You know, that's not something that really if you already don't get along, that isn't going to bring you together. It's not going to be some unifying thing, especially if you're fighting over pieces of the pie. So if you're at the centerpiece of your estate plan is just a will that has to get probated and then your executor, your assets can be used to defend challenges to the will.

And that's a whole different topic for a whole different day. But when you when you instead create a trust, you can have what I what I call is probably got different names in different places and whatever I call it a no contest clause. And so a no contest clause. And I know you've seen those, too, Joseph.

Yep. And the reason you see him is for exactly the reason that we just touched on, the fact that there are situations where individuals are going to fight, you know, and they're not going to agree. And one of the main one of the primary things that that most folks that come in for a state plan and want to do is they want to they want to make sure that they don't want the fighting. They're doing all of this to avoid that exact situation. And so they'll they'll include a clause which essentially says you're not going to contest this.

You know, you're going to accept what this is. And if you do contest it, then there's going to be penalties. You know, you could potentially forfeit anything that you you may be entitled to receive. And you could be footing the bill for any kind of legal fees that are required to litigate the matter as well.

Yeah, this is a and they're not they're not 100 percent foolproof, but usually that's going to dissuade all but the most serious. Challenges, you know, you can if if, you know, nothing's 100 percent, but that does make a beneficiary really think about what they have to lose by challenging the provisions of a trust, the the authenticity of a trust. You know, the beneficiary, if they're if they're getting, you know, 50,000, but their other brothers and sisters are getting 200,000 and they want to they want to find a way to challenge, then, yeah, you can put legal fees on them. If they lose the challenge, you can strip them of their actual inheritance. You can really use that to make a beneficiary think twice before trying to contest a trust. And that's a little harder to do in a will because there's some there's some statutes and things there. So, again, the trust gives you way more control over how your estate will be handled than a will. It gives you can give a lot of power to your trustee.

And then you can take some power away from beneficiaries and heirs who might just be ready to challenge it because they think they're entitled to more. Or, you know, and like you said, you know, I've always been very lucky. My immediate family gets along.

Well, I know the same is probably for you guys, but there are families out there. It only takes one. Oh, you're getting you're getting along now.

You're getting along right now. When you're when your great uncle Wilbur, the billionaire dies, that's when it's all going to fall apart for the Whitaker family. Wilbur Whitaker.

The oil baron. I'll be I'll be happy to meet him one day when he when he shows up. But he was an extra in that Sinbad Genie movie. Yeah, he probably was. He's sitting on that Sinbad money. And then he he's the one who erased it from history just to mess with you.

Somebody did do that. It's probably like Sinbad's in on the joke. You know, I don't know that Sinbad has the political power to do that.

I mean, I should be able to make that for us. What's your favorite Sinbad movie? That's that's the real question here or favorite? I don't know.

Sadly, I can't name any. His best role is easily jingle all the way. He was the crazed postman and he killed. He knocked it out of the park. I can't believe he didn't win an Oscar for that movie. I still remember Sinbad from the stand up, but different world. That's where, you know, Sinbad was on different world when he was big. That's when he was super big. He did a lot of long time ago, man. He did the first kid. You remember that one?

He was like the Secret Service guy. You remember that one? Wow. You grew up in a different time, man. Talk about a rabbit hole.

Man, we just went down there. That Sinbad. Hey, look, man, if you're anywhere close to my age, you know both of the movies that I just referred to. Very popular with Sinbad fans. I know Sinbad had some health problems, but I wish he'd make a comeback, man. I'd pay to see some Sinbad.

Yeah. I'm sure you could pay him money right now. Maybe 200 bucks get a cameo all day long. I wonder if he'd do something for the firm. We can get him to do an advertisement for the firm or the show. The official law firm of Sinbad. I like that, actually. I'm going to stop all the work I'm doing and spin off.

Yeah, that's all we're going to focus on from here on out. I'm going to focus on getting Sinbad to say some kind words. Hi, this is Sinbad. It takes more than a genie to get your law in order. I might have been a genie. I might not have been a genie.

Hard to say. That did blow my mind. You were at Disney having fun. I was in my chair watching baseball. Thinking about Sinbad.

Just searching the internet as fast as I could to find someone who agreed with me. I was thinking not about... I haven't thought about Sinbad in probably 10 years until you said Sinbad. Maybe that's what's going wrong with your life, man. Maybe that's why you... Not enough Sinbad?

You're not thinking about Sinbad. Yeah, I could see that being a problem. I could see that. Alright, so that was the no contest clause. We can dial that in for you.

That's something you can think about in your trust. I would say the no contest clause though is the least important of all the clauses we'll discuss today. So up next, I know we're coming against a break. Up next we're going to talk about a spin thrift clause. Ooh. That's the best I can use it. That's the TCTs right now, man. A little cliffhanger. I hope these people survive this commercial. Yes.

Alright, so we'll take a short break. Judica County Radio, your hosts are Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer, managing partners. Whitaker and Hamer law firm, practicing attorneys here in North Carolina. And we are offering up complimentary consults in and around trust.

If you've got any questions, grab one of these consults. 800-659-1186. Leave your contact information and an attorney with Whitaker and Hamer will be in touch to line that up for you.

800-659-1186. More on trust when we return on Judica County Radio. Judica County Radio, hosted by Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer, managing partners. Whitaker and Hamer law firm right here in North Carolina. That's where they practice law.

They have offices located, Raleigh, Garner, Cleveland, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay Varina, Gastonia and in Morehead City. I'm Morgan Patrick and we go back and forth on different topics each and every week. Always legal. Sometimes it gets personal. We have a lot of fun on the show too. But this is serious stuff.

We're talking about trust and clauses. We talked about no contest clause and now, Josh, we go to spin thrift clause. Yeah, again, we try to have a theme for most of our shows to kind of keep me and Joseph on track. And it's Sinbad. It's Sinbad today. It will be Sinbad. That's all we'll talk about for the rest of our lives. Now that I remember Sinbad exists, man.

I'm very passionate about it. Next week, we'll do a synopsis of season one of Different World. Focused on, I can't remember what Sinbad is.

From a legal context. Yes, of course. How can you make your trust more like the show Different World? I watched that too long. It wasn't too long ago.

It's been a couple of years. Right now, me and my wife are working our way through Coach, which is a fantastic show. Sinbad is a good show. Sinbad is not in it, unfortunately.

I got no desire to hear that. That's Fred T. Nelson, right? Fred T. Nelson. Craig. I don't know who this Fred T. Nelson is. Alright, Craig T. Nelson. I was close. The Poltergeist was on in the hotel at Disney.

That's another Craig T. Nelson jam. Wow. Alright, so we're talking about trust. I was reviewing, I had some clients in who had their will done.

This happens a lot. Clients had gotten a will done and powers of attorneys 15 years ago. At the time, they owned their house. They just had a kid. That's why everybody who's on the fence about it, that's a real motivator to get it done. You have the first kid.

You got to think about guardians. You got to think about what happens to your assets if something, God forbid, happens to both of you at the same time. That's a real motivator to get a lot of people in to do their first estate plan. These folks have had a couple more kids. They had investment property. They obviously had more assets. 15 years had gone by.

I was kind of looking at it. 15 years doesn't seem like that long ago. I don't think trusts were quite as popular 15 years ago as they kind of are now. I was trying to think of some of the reasons maybe why. I thought about COVID and how a lot of the courthouses got harder to get into during COVID.

If someone passed away and you needed to probate a will, you had to do it by mail. A lot of clerks' offices got behind. It's a lot more difficult to get into the courthouse in some counties now. I was just thinking about how often we recommend trust to people now versus attorneys 20, 25 years ago.

Well, yeah, man. It's a very good solution. That would be an interesting case study as to the why of that. There's a lot of misconceptions. We've touched on those in past programs. A lot of folks think that you really need to have a very robust or fancy type of situation to warrant having a trust. There's benefit for everybody. It's not really a cost prohibitive thing at the right place.

This being the right place, obviously. Do they still have the J.G. Wentworth commercials?

Is that still a thing that happens? Call J.G. Wentworth 877-CASH-NOW at commercial. Well, you didn't have to give them a free ad on that one. They've got the best ad campaign in the history of anything, man. You've got to sing it, though.

You've got to sing the opera voice. Come on, now. So that's still a thing that happens. Yeah, it is, man.

It is. A company like J.G. Wentworth is never going away, man.

You strike gold like that. So J.G. Wentworth, they might do more things. But one of the things that they do is a lot of times if you're the beneficiary of a trust, whether it's through a will or sometimes if you get hurt when you're a kid, you'll have a personal injury settlement and the court will set it up in a trust because you're not old enough to get the money. So there's all these things that J.G. Wentworth will say you've got a million dollars in trust.

J.G. Wentworth will pay you for your benefit in that trust. You will assign your interest in the trust to them for a discount. They'll make money off of you. But you get your money now.

Yeah, you'll get some money now. They'll make more on the deal over time. But that's kind of their business model. I'm not saying anything good or bad about it.

That's just what it is. And sometimes when you set up a trust, you don't want your beneficiaries to be able to do that. Maybe you've got a son or daughter who doesn't make good financial decisions.

And when you're gone, you don't want to leave them a lump sum. You want the trustee to manage it and you want to make it so they can't call J.G. Wentworth and get bought out of their trust. So a spendthrift clause can do a lot of things. But one of the things it can do is prevent a beneficiary from assigning their interest in a trust. And J.G. Wentworth, they do a lot of different things, too.

I'm not bashing them. That's a legitimate business and they help people out that need their help. But if you don't want that to happen, if you're setting up a trust and you don't want a beneficiary to be able to be bought out, or you don't want them to be able to assign their interest to pay off a debt, a spendthrift clause prevents that. It does not allow a beneficiary to be bought out to to assign their trust voluntarily or involuntarily. And so you can you give the power to the trustee to kind of forfeit their benefit, hold it in a different way. You give the trustee power so that that does not happen.

So we can protect, you know, families. Every family has the people that are really good with money and make wise investments. And then you've got the other people in the family who don't care as much about money and kind of spend it when they get it. Or you might have someone who's just in a situation where, you know, they're in a bad situation and you don't want that money to to fuel that bad situation. And so, you know, that's that's kind of where I see spendthrift clauses come in a lot. So you're you're basically limiting what your beneficiary can get out of the trust for certain things, I guess.

Yeah. And the other context you hear spendthrift referred to is is the context of protection from creditors, you know. And so it was a long time where you'd refer to a spendthrift trust and that spendthrift calls specifically for the purpose of keeping it out of the reach of creditors.

But, you know, the fact that your trust is a separate entity in and of itself is is is a fantastic protection in and of itself. So, you know, I keep thinking about Sinbad, man. I keep coming back to it.

And I got a pitch for you, man. A movie Sinbad plays J.G. Wentworth. It's the story.

It's the J.G. Wentworth story starring Sinbad starring Sinbad. We got to get more roles for Sinbad, man. We got to get. He should make the Genie movie that everybody already thinks they've seen again.

Yeah, yeah, that's true. And call it part two. Do it as a sequel. Really mess with people. Yeah, exactly.

And there's all this back story that you never get and you just have to fill in the blanks. I like that idea, man. We got to we got to get in his ear, man. We got to figure out who where his management is. You still have his cell number.

You still have that handy. Look, we got to. What would the fan club. I mean, we've got a budget on this show, guys. We have a budget.

Let's get him as a guest. There's no better usage of our money to bring Sinbad on. Look, man, so many people have gotten rich just like tossing these ideas out. We're just doing it for free, man. We're just tossing these ideas out for free. An idea machine. That should be your estate plan.

Just listen to our show and take our free ideas and. Definitely include a clause that your kids have to watch every Sinbad movie and or get a Sinbad tattoo before they can get their inheritance. I like that a lot, actually. I think that's a very viable strategy for well-rounded kids. That's your standard Sinbad clause.

Yep, your standard. Exactly. That's what we're covering our next segment.

Ways that you can work Sinbad into your trust. We're talking, you know, the spendthrift is meant to keep your beneficiaries inheritance from going to people you don't want it to go to. That's what a spendthrift clause does.

But there's also different ways to limit how much your beneficiaries are going to get. And I think a good example of that is a five by five clause. And so in our in our next segment, I know we're we're up against the break, but in our next segment, five by five clause.

All right. Judica County radio, we're going to roll on the five by five clause in and around trust is what we'll discuss next. We want to remind you there are complementary consults available in and around the trust.

If you've got some questions, grab one of these consults. Eight hundred six five nine one one eight six. That's eight hundred six five nine eleven eighty six. Leave your contact information and an attorney with Whitaker and Hamer will be in touch and they will line up that complementary consult again on trust.

Eight hundred six five nine one one eight six. Judica County radio is going to roll on on the other side again, five by five clause in and around trust. That's coming up next right here on Judica County radio. Welcome back in to Judica County radio. Your hosts are Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer. They're the managing partners at Whitaker and Hamer law firm practicing attorneys here in North Carolina.

They've placed offices convenient for you and Raleigh, Garner, Cleveland, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay, Varina, Gastonia and in Morehead City. I'm Morgan Patrick. We go back and forth on different legal topics and we are talking about trust. And we've talked about so far no contest clause, the spin thrift clause.

And we are about to get to the five by five clause. Want to remind you the consults that are available and they are complementary are in and around the trust. So if you have questions about that, you can grab one of these consults. It's no charge.

You're not agreeing to become a client. This is an opportunity for you to get more information. Eight hundred six five nine one one eight six, a complementary consult on trust. Eight hundred six five nine one one eight six.

Josh. And I should say, you know, again, we're focusing on trust. We're focusing on how you can customize them to achieve your estate planning goals.

This isn't some kind of cookie cutter template you you you have to use. These are customizable entities that we kind of produce as part of your estate plan. And so we've talked about some some popular clauses, not an exhaustive list, just to give you some things to think about. And so one of the things that people often talk about, Joseph, is when they come in, is they you know, they're kind of thinking you're thinking short term and long term. So you're thinking about, hey, what if something happens to me and my spouse before the kids 18, before my heirs are 18? And so you're thinking about like a disbursement strategy. If you live a good long life and you live till into your 80s and all your heirs are older, you may not be as concerned. But when you're thinking about your beneficiaries as young people could be grandchildren, could be children.

You're trying to think about what you want to leave for them. And when people start thinking about that, they'll think about a number or they'll think about an asset. And then they also may think about, well, I don't want legally if you're under 18, you can't you can't take that stuff. It has to be put into a trust for you.

But even younger people, you know, 18, 25, 18 to 30. You may not want them getting this lump sum, this big asset, you know, at one time. You might want to keep that in trust for for someone to manage. And Joseph, I know you see people, you know, in your in your consults and in your practice, you see this come up a lot. Yeah, it's a big it's a big selling point of trust, right?

It's the folks don't want to see their younger kids who haven't had a lot of life experience potentially blow through all the wealth that they've accumulated in their life. So one of the beautiful things about a trust and one of the main selling points that we we talk to folks about is the fact that you've got great discretion in how you distribute. You can you can be as specific or as broad as you'd like to be. You can have a trustee that makes all of those decisions. If you feel good about somebody making those decisions on your behalf, you can give them some broad parameters.

Say, hey, I want you to distribute for the health, education and and just general support of this individual. Or you can go in and just have tier distributions where certain dates have certain distribution points. You really there's no limit to the ways that you can structure it. And that's the the beauty and the flexibility of the trust. And, you know, we will talk about, you know, supporting your beneficiaries under 18, health, education, hims, health, education, maintenance support.

So you'll hear that a lot. You're kind of given the trustee broad discretion and then kind of after 18. You're supposed to give the trustee some advice, too, because you could just have the trustee dump whatever assets are left on to an 18 year old. But like Joseph said, a lot of people you can have the most mature, reasonable, well-intentioned 18 year old.

But dumping a chunk of a chunk of cash on a on an 18 year old is still a risky proposition, no matter how responsible they are. And so some people will put in the age barriers, right? Well, I want them to get this much at 18, this much at 21, this much at 25, maybe the whole thing at 30. Or maybe there's enough assets in there where you want it to even go past. I assume most people are as reasonable as they're going to get around 30. That's my that's an assumption that I've made.

Maybe don't you don't grow up a whole lot after that, you know. But some people. So one of the clauses that we see some people like is a five by five clause. And the five by five clause is just kind of shorthand, but basically saying every year after a certain age can be 18. But the beneficiary can get five thousand dollars or five percent of the trust corpus or principle, if you will. Right. And so it'll be at the benefit trustee doesn't get involved. The beneficiary gets to pick. You can get five thousand dollars. In addition to whatever the trustees are already commanded to do for maintenance and support and things like that, or you can take five percent of the trust assets. Right. So five thousand dollars or if there's a you know, if there's a million dollars in the trust, five percent of that million dollars.

Was that 50? My math's not good. Well, that's why you get a trustee that has a calculator.

That's usually what we recommend. A trustee who's not an idiot. You know, that's the whole reason it has a calculator. A trustee who's not an idiot that has a calculator or knows someone with a calculator. And so that gives the beneficiary some control over what they're going to get.

And they could, you know, and they're definitely going to get something every year. And and, you know, because you don't you do want the money to get to your beneficiaries, you just want to control how much and when. And so the five by five clause is one way where you're you're already providing for their health, maintenance, education, support, but to the extent that there's enough in there, they can they can they can kind of get that. So really gives you a lot of, you know, I keep saying control gives you a lot of control. That's because it does give you a lot of control. That's a it's an accurate statement. And that's exactly what it does. And yeah. Yeah. You're right to say that. And that's the beauty of a trust man.

I keep referring the trust, much like Sinbad's comedic versatility, is the most versatile tool in your estate planning handbook. We tie it all together full circle. Who had the who had the this might have been before your time, Joseph. Who what pop singer had the control album?

Was that Janet Jackson who did control? Yeah, that's that's before my time. That sounds right. Yeah. I'm not going to look it up.

I'm just going to assume that's correct. Yeah, I don't know, man. I focus on Sinbad. Sorry, I didn't mean to make a secondary pop culture reference, man. That's not something that I can do. So, yeah, we got to keep it limited focus.

I'm very much like a squirrel. So, you know. All right. So that that's all I got to say about a five by five clause. But again, just as a bigger conversation piece, you really do have control and discretion on when beneficiaries get things, how much of the things your assets they can they can get. And so, again, just another way you can customize your trust to do what it is you thinks best for the for your for your heirs. Judica County Radio, we have complimentary consults in and around trust. If you've got any questions, you can grab one of these consults and do it right now by calling 800-659-1186. That's 800-659-1186.

Leave your contact information. And an attorney with Whitaker and Hamer will be in touch to line up that complimentary consult on trust. And a quick reminder, Judica County Radio is powered by Whitaker and Hamer Law Firm. Your hosts, Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer. They are the managing partners. They're also practicing attorneys here in North Carolina.

And the offices are almost everywhere for your convenience. Raleigh, Garner, Cleveland, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay, Verina, Gastonia and in Morehead City. We've got more coming back. Final segment right here on Judica County Radio. Welcome back into Judica County Radio. Your hosts are Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer, managing partners. Whitaker and Hamer Law Firm, practicing attorneys here in the great state of North Carolina.

They've got offices located in Raleigh, Garner, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay, Verina, Gastonia and in Morehead City. And we have been talking about trust today on the program. And that's what the consults are about.

They're complimentary. If you've got a question about a trust, you can certainly take advantage of one of these complimentary consults. 800-659-1186.

That's 800-659-1186. Final segment, gentlemen. Yeah. So, you know, we spent the whole show talking about trust, how you can customize a trust as part of your estate plan to make it do what you want to do.

So definitely, you know, I hope this show is a motivator to get you to think about some different things. And if you haven't done your estate plan or if your estate plan's five years old, 10 years old, or you've got questions about funding a trust, we do talk to you about that for free. Right. So you can always sit down with us. You can get our advice on these estate planning issues and these trust issues. Me and Joe and there's other attorneys at the firm who work on estate planning. So you don't you don't have to be in the dark.

You don't have to have unanswered questions because we are happy to talk to you. And that is one of the reasons we do the show. Now, we've been talking about specific trust clauses that you can use to to make your trust do what you want to. And so I've got this I've got a couple of different clauses just to throw out there. So we've talked about clauses that protect your beneficiaries, protect your trust from being contested. You know, and one thing that comes up and a lot of families have that one that one person who needs some extra care.

Right. We talked about maybe someone who makes poor financial decisions, maybe somebody who's in a relationship with someone that maybe you don't approve of or someone who doesn't make good decisions. There's also drug use. You know, we have beneficiaries that may have special needs, drug abuse, issues with employment.

There's all kinds of things you can draft into your your trust to try to address that, you know. And so one, Joe, that I see a lot is is basically I've seen folks use kind of like an employment, use an employment requirement to get a distribution in in the trust. And so I don't know if you've seen that, but something like, you know, must be gainfully employed and kind of define what that means. It's different for every family.

What gainfully employed means. But we have had some clients who don't want their adult children not working and then getting distributions. I don't know if you run into that, Joe. Oh, I've had that conversation, man. The parents tell you that little Johnny, little Johnny spends too much time in his room playing Call of Duty. And and I don't want to fund his Call of Duty addiction and his all of the Mountain Dew code red that he's taken down every day. So I want little Johnny to be to have some form of employment.

And it's not uncommon at all. And you run into these situations where you've got parents that worry about their kids, you know, whether right or wrong. And they don't they don't want to fund they don't want to fund their kid into languishing and not flourishing. And so a lot of times when you have those concerns, you know, you'll see that employment contingency where they state, you know, my kids got to be employed to get any kind of these these distributions. And it doesn't really just end at the employment piece.

Right. Like you can you can add in whatever kind of conditions you'd like in terms of triggering events that will allow the beneficiary to get the benefit of whatever has been set aside for them. But but employment is common. It's one that I don't know that it's the most common, but it's definitely something we frequently see where folks want to make sure that their kids are working. They're not just living off of the trust and they want to make sure they're still functioning and contributing members of society.

Yeah. And so I guess the next step down for that is is is folks who are meeting with us and one of their beneficiaries has or has had a substance abuse problem. And and, you know, some people call it a lock up clause or something like that.

But, you know, if you've got a beneficiary who has had those type of problems, you can you can give the trustee the power to kind of lock down the benefits to not make any distributions unless it's for rehab or something like that. If that's something you have to, you know, so that that's something you have to think about. But I know it's a common issue that we run into.

It's very common, Josh. So trust, man, they're a good thing. They're a good tool. You can really keep pulling the strings from the grave if you want to. That's a that's a beautiful, a beautiful privilege and benefit of having a well drafted estate plan.

You can continue to pull the strings. And if you have, you know, we're these kind of all go in the same category from an attorney's perspective. These are limiting income or distributions to beneficiaries when certain things happen. And so if you have if you have a beneficiary that has special needs and can only get so much money.

Right. Or only can can get so much from the trust. You need language in there that limits or gives the trustee the power to limit those distributions so that they're not become ineligible for any other benefit.

They may be they may be do. And so, you know, gainful employment, substance abuse, special needs. Those are all examples. While they're not the same thing, they're all examples of limiting limited limiting language you can put in your trust to protect your beneficiary, because that's what you're doing in the end. You're trying to protect your beneficiary, protect the assets that you're that you're that you're leaving them. But sometimes you got to protect people from themselves.

Josh, I think that's the worst. I wish somebody would do that for me. Protect me.

Yeah. So you seem very you seem like you got a good head on your shoulders. I think if you're not OK, then none of us are OK. The I know Morgan and myself look to you as a personal role model for both. We talk about it all the time. Amen, brother.

We do our other radio show that you're not involved in. But on a on a lighter note, on a lighter note, I want to let everybody know that we went me and the family, we went and we watched Thunderbolts. Have you seen that yet? Yeah. Yeah, I've seen it. You saw it.

Yeah, I saw it, man. I was just one of the latest superhero movies this weekend. I went saw this weekend. I've got kids, man.

I love you. Watched it in Disney. I went to that.

I watched it in Disney. Not only that, I love my kids enough to take them to Disney. But I also let them watch a movie while we were there. Unlike your family, Josh, I have I let my kids watch multiple movies here. I know you do that. My kids were going to go to the movies once a year thing.

You tell them that and then you scream at them when they say, Dad, please, we want to watch another movie. Not me, man. Well, we made it to this one. It was very good. I enjoyed it. It was good, man. It was good. They needed a Marvel needed a good another good movie, you know, to come out. So I agree, man. I give it one and a half thumbs up of out of two. I'm going to be I'm going to be I'm going to I'm going to be cranky old man after after Iron Man after. Got way back there.

No, I mean, like the original Iron Man, maybe Wonder Woman. You just get to a point where you're like, how many of these can we make? All of them. You can make so many. There's so many. I know it's a I know it's a money grab, but at the same time, it's like it's it's almost too much.

It's overkill. My kids are pumped, man. July is going to be what you get the Fantastic Four movie and you get Superman. Now, I've actually heard the Fantastic Four movie is spectacular. You know, for me, I wrote Marvel off whenever they didn't have Lou Ferrigno as the Hulk.

You know, that was the moment for me, you know, the rumor. So there's going to be if you look at the timeline, there's going to be World War Hulk movie. Right. There's going to be.

But they're supposed to include all of the Holks. Just give me give me Sinbad as a whole. You give me you give me the Sinbad Hulk. And I'm telling you, we need to have Sinbad figure out a way to get him as a special guest host one week. He'd be the most special guest host. I feel like Sinbad owes us some money. The show we did in the show doesn't need to continue after we get Sinbad on. That's the peak. That's the pinnacle. I retire.

I don't have enough money to do it, but I do it anyways. Ask him. Ask him about his trust. I'm sure Sinbad has a trust. Oh, yeah. The Sinbad trust. It's a of course, he's got some incredible clauses in there.

He's still going off of that genie movie money. Yes, I will. I still think I might put together just a short treatment of that movie and just see if I can get anything moving, you know. Yeah, you do that.

And you let us know how it goes for you. It seems like Netflix could throw me a couple of million for writing up a treatment. I told you what my other movie idea was. Does it have Sinbad in it? It could. It could.

It could be a Sinbad vehicle. I hate the movie Footloose. Can't stand it.

Really? I can't stand it. It's stupid. Is there a story behind the hate? No, it's just a stupid dumb movie that I don't like. Josh just hates dancing. It's so stupid they made it twice.

That's right. I want them to make, I've told you this guy's before. I've told this before, I'm sure. I want to make a movie where a guy who doesn't like to dance moves into a town where everybody dances and he convinces them that it's stupid. And everybody stops dancing. And instead of Footloose, it'd be Tightfoot.

Yeah, I like that. Sinbad could definitely be in that movie, man. Sinbad could be like the mayor who really likes to dance and cut a rug. Did you like Dirty Dancing? I've never seen Dirty Dancing.

I know what happens, but I haven't seen it. They dance. It's dirty. They dirtily dance.

That's basically it. A lot of mud. They hadn't showered yet. It was a dirty dance. No showering in that movie, man. I'm sure I'll go to my grave. That's another one that can be put on my tombstone. Never watch Dirty Dancing.

When you're on your death bed, man, I'm showing up with Footloose and Dirty Dancing on repeat. Okay. As we wrap this edition of Judica County Radio, Josh, in summation, let's hit all the different clauses. We were talking about trust clauses, but what we talked about today.

Oh, man, I don't know if I remember, Morgan. We talked about spin thrift clauses to protect your beneficiaries from their creditors. We talked about five or five clauses where it guarantees that your beneficiaries will get some money out of the trust in addition to the normal distributions. We talked about special needs trust. We talked about special needs trust. We talked about no contest. That's right. We talked about no contest clauses going into your trust.

And so the focus of the show was really to show you how many different and this is just the tip of the iceberg. Right. But how many how many variables we have to kind of tune this trust to make it, you know, what you what you need to make it do what you want it to do. All right. And we also have complimentary consults in and around trust.

If you've got questions about it, you can certainly grab one of these. Eight hundred six five nine one one eight six. That's eight hundred six five nine eleven eighty six. I'll leave you contact information. An attorney with Whitaker and Hamer will be in touch to book one of those complimentary consults in and around trust. Again, Judith County Radio.

Another edition is in the books. Your hosts are Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer, managing partners, Whitaker and Hamer law firm, the power behind this program. And they are practicing attorneys here in the state of North Carolina. They've got offices conveniently located for you in Raleigh, Garner, Cleveland, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay, Verina, Gastonia and in Morehead City for Josh and Joe. I'm Morgan.

We'll see on the radio next week. Judica County is hosted by attorneys licensed to practice law in North Carolina. Some of the guests appearing on this podcast may be licensed North Carolina attorneys. Discussion on this podcast is meant to be general in nature and in no way should the discussion be interpreted as legal advice. Legal advice can only be rendered once an attorney licensed in the state in which you live has the opportunity to discuss the facts of your case with you. The attorneys appearing on this podcast are speaking in generalities about the law in North Carolina and how these laws affect the average North Carolinian. If you have any questions about the content of the show, you can direct such inquiry to Joshua Whitaker at JMW at MWH Law Lawyer.