Know the Differences Between Living Trust and Living Will

What do you think about the terms "living trust" and "living will?" Are these terms the same, or is there any difference between them? After all, many people often get confused with living wills and living trusts. Both a living will and living trust are estate planning tools that sound much alike. They are used to handle certain life situations. 

Further, they are designed to serve two different purposes. For example, a living trust lawyer in Dallas or your area suggests you create a living trust when you need to cover three phases of your life. On the other hand, a living will only take care of you when you become incapacitated.

How does a living will work?

Are you suffering from a terminal illness? Or do you have any other serious illnesses? When you are not able to preserve your life medically or, in other words, you become incapacitated, a living will, like a living will in Texas, is designed for you.

You can also tell a living will an advance directive or a health care directive. It is a written legal document that includes your medical care wishes or preferences for the time when you are unable to make your medical decisions yourself.   

A living will in Texas or your area works as a medical directive for your caregivers and doctors to make important decisions in the following circumstances: 

• You are seriously injured
• You are in a coma or vegetative state
• You are terminally ill 

How does a living trust work?

A trustee generally controls a living trust. The trust maker plays this role when the living trust is revocable. After all, if a living trust is irrevocable, you will need to follow different rules. You can consult a living trust lawyer in Dallas or your area if you want to create one for yourself. 

When you are alive or medically well, you can create a living trust for yourself. It helps you manage your affairs in many ways. You can also take advantage of it when you are not so medically well. After you are gone from this world, your successor trustee can distribute the trust's assets among the beneficiaries mentioned in the trust documents.   

Bottom line

Living trusts are of two types: revocable and irrevocable. And there is one similarity between a revocable living trust and a living will. Both work for mental incapacitation. That's all. If you want to produce a living trust or a living will for you, contact the best will lawyer like Mike Beshara in your area.