Trust & Will Review – Estate Planning Made Easy

Trust and Will in the digital age offers an online, efficient, no-frills way to provide your family with estate planning peace-of-mind. Those looking for straightforward, low-cost entry into estate planning and/or legal guardians, especially new families and Boomers with no prior preparation.

Pros & Cons

The digital revolution has taken firm hold of every sector and service imaginable.  One industry undergoing digital transformation is estate planning, an unpleasant but necessary service.

Briefly, estate planning is the legal management and disposal of a person’s estate — their assets, or net worth — at the end of life.   

Trust & Will is looking to modernize estate planning, making it far easier to find, create, and purchase a legally valid estate planning package — all without an estate planning attorney or any legal knowledge.

To this end, the company offers three estate planning products: Wills, trusts, and legal guardians. For those new to estate planning, a will is a document that determines who inherits assets after death.

A trust, on the other hand is a legal vehicle that distributes assets before, at, or after death. The last product, a legal guardian, appoints a person to care for children in the event of a parent’s early death.

For many people, estate planning is not top-of-mind. In a recent study, AARP reported that only 4 in 10 Americans have some form of estate planning.

While 60% of the population lacks estate planning, one generation is especially unprepared: Millennials. The report continues, stating that 78% of people ages 18 to 36 have not prepared themselves should something terrible happen.

Trust & Will is offering a stress-free, low-cost solution to help families get started with estate planning. Most importantly, the company does not offer legal advice or independent financial advice, and should not be used for those with more complex estate planning needs.

What is Trust & Will?

Trust & Will is an online service for creating, purchasing, and updating wills, trusts, and legal guardianship. The company targets first-time buyers who want to save time and money by purchasing online. 

Trust & Will makes clear that they are not an experienced legal team operating a law firm nor do they offer legal advice — the company simply provides information and affordable estate planning documents.

Still in its second year, the company has grown quickly. Early on, Trust & Will partnered with Haven Life to offer a will service as part of Haven Life’s extras.

The company also took the 1% Pledge, joining notable firms like Yelp and Salesforce, who have offered one percent of equity to charities. 

Although not the first entrant into the online legal document space, the company is targeting first-time buyers and younger families with less complex estates. 

Company Background

San Diego-based Trust & Will grew out of millennial co-founder Cody Barbo’s experience starting a family.

As Cody explains during an episode of Entrepreneur magazine’s Elevator Pitch, he couldn’t find estate planning that would grow with him “during these early stages of life”.

To this end, Cody and his two other co-founders — Brian Lamb and Daniel Goldstein — hatched a plan to offer digital estate planning.

The team formed the idea just weeks before attending Quick Pitch, a San Diego event aimed to jump-start local startups.

They took third place and founded the company shortly thereafter, in October of 2017. Not too long after the team was invited to the prestigious Techstars Anywhere accelerator, graduating in 2018.

Though still a small financial technology company, the firm has continued to hit important milestones. In January 2019 the company raised $1.5 million in seed funding from five early-stage venture capital funds.

Also in January 2019, the company delivered the first end-to-end digital will to a Nevada police officer.

The company continues to grow, offering online estate planning nationwide to two primary audiences: 25 - 45-year-old parents and Boomers.

Marketplace Competition

Trust & Will competes against a variety of direct and indirect competitors, generally those focused on providing estate planning products or services to customers. There are two types of competitors: Direct and indirect. 

Direct competitors offer online services that let you build and buy all the documents you need to plan for the event of your death.

Some of these services come with the option of including legal advice. Indirect competitors offer services in relation to estate planning, such as offline software, legal advice, or estate planning guides. Often, these indirect competitors are a dedicated estate planning lawyer.

Trust & Will Features

How Does Trust & Will Work?

Trust & Will is an online provider of legally valid estate planning documents, including wills, trusts, and legal guardians.

The system was created for customers who don’t have estate planning documents, who are intimidated by planning and need guidance, or those with reasonably simple estates that want to save money.

Trust & Will Costs

• Guardians - $39 for parents to create legal guardian for children (+$10 to add a spouse)
• Trusts - $399+ (+$100 to add a spouse)
• Wills - $69 (+$60 to add a spouse)

Each of the three products can be created and purchased online in less than one hour, even in less than 15 minutes for a straight-forward document like declaring a legal guardian for one’s children.

Below is a description of each product that Trust & Will offers.

Wills

A will (or testament) is a legal document that states how a person’s assets will be distributed after death and who will oversee (execute) the will.

A will is used to ensure that certain assets are left to the right people after a person’s passing. There are many types of wills, and for more information, it is best to consult attorney advice and a more comprehensive review of a will (because it is complicated!) 

Trust & Will offers a will product that can be purchased online. The price, as of this writing, is $69 for one person, and an extra $60 for a spouse.

Trust & Will has created state-specific wills, vetted by a team of legal experts. This means that no matter what your state requirements are, you can get a will that meets the legal requirements of the state for the price. 

The will covers your final wishes for your dependents, your possessions, any assets, and your final arrangements.

You can also declare who will become guardians of your dependent children and pets. A will can probably be completed in under 30 minutes for most people. It contains a few important documents, including:

• Last Will and Testament
• Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) authorization
• Living Will

Trusts

A trust is usually created to distribute assets to a certain person or group on or around the time of death.

The assets are held with a third party that manages the assets on behalf of the owner of the assets, making sure that the assets are distributed per the owner’s requests.

Trusts have many benefits, including avoiding taxes or prolonged legal battles over assets, while deciding the terms of an inheritance.

There are many different types of trusts. For more information, seek out a more comprehensive review on trusts and check with legal advisors.

Trust & Will’s most expensive product is the trust, which costs $399 for one person and an additional $100 for a spouse.

The increased price is most likely due to the more complex nature of the trust. The trust is also state-specific and is guaranteed to meet the legal requirements of any US state. 

Trusts are used to make sure that assets are divided up properly, avoiding probate court. The trust will take longer to complete, and on average should take one to two hours.

A trust comes with the following documents:

• Revocable Living Trust
• Schedule of Assets
• Pour Over Will
• Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) authorization
• Living Will

Guardians

For families with dependents, nominating a guardian is a crucial step in ensuring minor children are taken care of in the event of a tragedy.

These guardianship documents will specify who will become legal guardians of the children in the case of death. Trust & Will has again created a system that will build a state-specific document, meaning all you have to do is follow the system’s lead. 

Guardians is the cheapest product, costing $39 for one adult, with a $10 fee to add a spouse.

Trust & Will markets this for those families considering estate planning, but not ready to work on either a will or an estate. This is a single document that should take less than 15 minutes to create. 

For all three products, Trust & Will offers one year of free updates. Any update after the first year will cost extra.

What Are the Benefits of Each Product?

Will & Trust has created a helpful checklist for first-time buyers. While it can be challenging and a little scary to navigate estate planning, Trust & Will goes out of the way to make it easy and hassle-free.

Below are the benefits of each product.

What Exactly Do I Get With Each Product?

How to Get Started with Will & Trust

The signup process for Trust & Will is a breeze. In just a few steps, you can select and create a legal, state-specific estate plan.

Most estate plans can be created in about an hour or so. Follow along as we dive into the five steps to get started on Trust & Will.

Should You Do Your Estate Planning with Will & Trust?

Trust & Will has created a simple, hassle-free system that lets customers create, purchase, and maintain important estate planning documents.

The experience is 100% online, which means you can take your time, talk with friends and family, and buy when you are ready.

For the millions of Americans without any form of estate planning, this can be an easy, cost-effective way to get some sort of document in place to protect loved ones.

While few want to consider what might happen after death, estate planning is well worth the peace of mind, knowing that your loved ones will be cared for. 

If you’ve resisted creating an estate plan, then Trust & Will might be the right product for you. No more worrying about attorney support or complicated legal requirements — even state-by-state estate planning requirements.

The Trust & Will team keeps digital copies of your documents for updating while offering you both digital and physical copies at no charge.

This is great, knowing that you have access to the documents any time you need, including a paper backup. 

All in all, Trust & Will offers good products at a reasonable price. They have made it easy for anyone to get a basic estate plan.