Path 01
The trust and asset mix have not been reviewed in years
Current property, beneficiaries, protection goals, and embedded gain need an annual map.
Likely discussion: A/B trust review within Portfolio Planning
Prepare this pathServices
Portfolio Planning
A/B & Family Trust Review
Revisit your family trust (what attorneys call an A/B trust) with 4 plain questions about protection, income tax, control, and your advisors.
Meet Jamie PopeWatch Jamie on this topicFounder-led guidance, ready when you are.- Best fit
- Married owners, families, trustees, CPAs, and estate attorneys nationwide
- Planning window
- Before trust amendment, asset repositioning, sale, incapacity, or a first-death event
- Typical output
- Protection-versus-basis map and trust-review question list
Start with the decision context
What changed since the A/B or family trust was signed?
Start with the asset, family, or advisor event that makes a modern protection-versus-basis review useful.
These paths prepare a conversation. They do not provide tax, legal, valuation, or eligibility conclusions.
Path 02
A sale, amendment, or retitling event is near
Asset-by-asset basis, control, and protection trade-offs need comparison.
Likely discussion: Trust review with transaction and basis planning
Prepare this pathPath 03
The attorney and CPA need the questions organized
Order-of-death, transfer, trustee, beneficiary, and tax roles need a shared file.
Likely discussion: Advisor Collaboration before document changes
Prepare this pathIn plain English
A/B & Family Trust Review
If you already have an A/B trust, most people call it a family trust or a living trust, it deserves a fresh read. The law changed. The family changed. The trust did not. We revisit it with 4 plain questions.
1. Does it protect the family's assets, during both spouses' lifetimes and after they are gone?
2. When the first spouse dies and the survivor later sells, the building, the farm, the portfolio, how much income tax will be owed on the gain? This is where people confuse the estate tax with income tax. Almost no one owes estate tax anymore. Everyone who sells at a gain owes income tax, unless the trust was built to erase it. The job is reducing the income tax paid when the surviving spouse sells an asset after the first spouse dies.
3. Does it let you direct your assets in the most loving and tax-efficient way today, on purpose, on paper, instead of leaving it to the chances of fate after you die?
4. And we work with your existing advisors, attorney, CPA, wealth manager, if you choose to. If you do not have them, we help you find the right ones.
A trust drafted 15 years ago answered the questions of 15 years ago. Ask it the 4 questions above. If it goes quiet on any one of them, it is time for the review.
Case study
The family owed no estate tax, and still had a serious problem. The buildings sat in the owner's individual name, so every one of them was headed through probate: public, slow, and expensive, in every state where a property sat. The fix was not exotic, titling, trusts, and beneficiary alignment done while the owner was alive. Estate tax was never the threat. The courthouse was.
Read the probate problem case studyDecision fit
Use this lane when an existing A/B or family trust needs a modern asset-by-asset review of family protection, basis, control, first-death timing, and advisor responsibilities.
JPOPE frames the service around the property decision first, then packages the technical findings for the owner, CPA, advisor, or deal team that needs to act on them. The aim is simple: identify the minimum tax legally owed, preserve every supportable opportunity, and turn the first review into a clear next step before the window closes.
The family signed the trust years ago, the estate-tax landscape changed, and the document has not been compared with today's assets and ownership structure.
Appreciated real estate and family-protection goals may point to different treatment for different assets rather than one all-or-nothing trust answer.
The attorney and CPA need the order-of-death, one-year transfer, later-basis, trustee, and beneficiary questions organized before the document is amended.
Protection and basis model
Give every asset a job before the trust changes.
The bypass share may protect family direction while a different asset needs basis flexibility. JPOPE makes that tension visible asset by asset so the attorney and CPA can evaluate the same facts.
Document review remains with counsel. JPOPE organizes the economics, timing, ownership, and advisor questions; the estate attorney drafts and interprets the trust.
Protection and basis balance
Separate what should lock from what should stay flexible.
Protection job
Control, beneficiaries, liabilities and remarriage
Basis job
Estate inclusion, embedded gain and first-death timing
Advisor output
Asset map, open questions and implementation owners
Every asset receives a job before the document changes.
Protection and basis review
Decide which assets need a family lock, which need basis flexibility, and where timing changes the outcome.
An older A/B or bypass-trust plan may still serve an important family-protection purpose even when the estate is below the current federal filing threshold. The same structure can create basis, timing, control, remarriage, creditor, and second-death trade-offs that deserve a fresh review. JPOPE inventories the appreciated real estate, current trust language, ownership and estate-inclusion facts, and the order-of-death and one-year transfer risks so the estate attorney and CPA can separate protection-priority assets from basis-priority assets. JPOPE does not draft or amend the trust.
- Planning lens
- Protection versus basis
- Timing watch
- First death and 1-year rule
- Output
- Trust and asset coordination map
What Jamie checks
Use this lane when an existing A/B or family trust needs a modern asset-by-asset review of family protection, basis, control, first-death timing, and advisor responsibilities.
Taxpayer context
Married owners, families, trustees, CPAs, and estate attorneys nationwide
Who owns, advises, or acts on the planning answer.
Record support
Source file and documents
The first records that support the position.
Timing window
Before trust amendment, asset repositioning, sale, incapacity, or a first-death event
When the facts still leave room for a better answer.
Advisor output
CPA-ready output
The format needed for CPA, owner, or advisor review.
Review signal
Existing A/B, bypass, credit-shelter, marital, and revocable-trust provisions, including what becomes irrevocable at the first death.
Review signal
Current basis, depreciation history, fair market value, ownership, estate inclusion, and the assets with the most embedded gain or recapture exposure.
Review signal
Family-protection goals involving a later marriage, beneficiary direction, business liabilities, creditor exposure, trustee standards, and distribution terms.
Review signal
Order-of-death assumptions, the Section 1014(e) one-year gift-back limitation, and whether late asset repositioning could fail to produce the expected result.
Review signal
The potential loss of a later basis adjustment for assets held outside the surviving spouse's taxable estate, subject to attorney and CPA analysis.
Review signal
A coordinated list of questions for estate counsel and the CPA, including portability, estate-tax, state-law, appraisal, titling, and implementation responsibilities.
Owner questions
- What job was the A/B trust originally designed to do, and does that job still match the family's facts and priorities?
- Which assets need protection from later liabilities or redirection, and which assets need more basis flexibility?
- How would the current title and trust terms affect basis if either spouse dies first?
- Were any appreciated assets transferred within one year in a way that requires Section 1014(e) review?
- Does portability or today's federal estate-tax threshold change the role of the bypass share without eliminating its family-protection purpose?
- Can the attorney and CPA see one asset-by-asset map of protection, control, basis, and timing before the document is changed?
Ready to test the fit?
Bring this planning lane into a focused first review.
A complete file is not required. Start with the property decision, the date controlling it, and the records already available.
Direct answers
What owners and advisors usually need to know first.
Use these answers to decide whether the timing, records, and advisory handoff point to a deeper planning conversation.
When should A/B & Family Trust Review be reviewed?
Review A/B & Family Trust Review before trust amendment, asset repositioning, sale, incapacity, or a first-death event. The family signed the trust years ago, the estate-tax landscape changed, and the document has not been compared with today's assets and ownership structure.
What information should be organized first?
Start with Existing A/B, bypass, credit-shelter, marital, and revocable-trust provisions, including what becomes irrevocable at the first death; Current basis, depreciation history, fair market value, ownership, estate inclusion, and the assets with the most embedded gain or recapture exposure. JPOPE uses those facts to decide whether the position is documented, time-sensitive, and ready for CPA review.
What does JPOPE typically deliver?
The usual output is protection-versus-basis map and trust-review question list, packaged so ownership and the advisory team can understand the tax value, supporting evidence, and next action.
Defined advisor role: JPOPE organizes the CRE-specific facts, analysis, and support file. The owner's CPA, attorney, engineer, appraiser, or other responsible professional remains in the review and implementation path when their judgment is required.
Trust review videoRevisit Protection, Control, and Basis TogetherPlay service video
Existing trust review
Protection versus basis
Advisor action list
Video follow-through
Turn the primer into a cleaner advisor conversation.
Use the video to frame what records, timing, and output should be ready before deeper analysis starts.
- Planning lane
- Portfolio Planning
- Review handoff
- CPA-ready next step
Service signal
Video context plus planning data for this lane.
Jamie connects ownership structure and estate planning to the practical owner questions: who controls the asset, how the family stays protected, and what the advisory team must test.
Recurring value
85%
Annual planning compounds when the portfolio view stays current.
Entity complexity
83%
Ownership, basis, liability, estate, and advisor roles often need a shared map.
Owner clarity
89%
The work should prioritize what to do next, not just what changed.
Portfolio Planning
- Planning window
- Before trust amendment, asset repositioning, sale, incapacity, or a first-death event
- Output
- Protection-versus-basis map and trust-review question list
What you will learn
- Existing trust review
- Protection versus basis
- Advisor action list
How the work moves
A clear path from discovery to advisor-ready action.
The sequence keeps the owner question, technical review, and CPA handoff connected so the page reads as a path rather than separate service claims.
Step 1
Discover
Clarify the property, ownership, transaction, and timing facts behind the tax value.
Step 2
Analyze
Review records for deductions, credits, valuation issues, basis, and planning impact.
Step 3
Strategize
Develop protection-versus-basis map and trust-review question list with the context needed by the CPA and advisor team.
Step 4
Support
Help the next conversation move cleanly with the CPA, advisor, broker, or ownership team.
Related resources
Keep the next conversation moving.
Start hereGuideIncome Tax Planning
Tax-Efficient Real Estate Investment Structures
A structure-planning guide for owners reviewing entity, basis, income, liability, estate, and advisor coordination before acquisition or reinvestment.
View resource
Applied proofCase StudyEstate Planning
Estate Planning Case Study: The Concentrated Asset Bet
A basis and estate planning case study on why concentrated low-basis assets should be reviewed before family timing controls the outcome.
View resource
Applied proofCase StudyEstate Planning
Estate Planning Case Study: The Probate Problem
An estate planning case study on why owners can still have a serious planning problem even when estate tax is not the immediate issue.
View resourceStart with fit
Bring the property facts. JPOPE will map the right next step.
A short fit review can confirm whether this service area is the right starting point or whether another planning lane should come first.