I've asked in another thread about saving (short term), what do you do in your Will when you're no longer around? Seems a Trust Account is the best way? Any negatives?
On another note, do you stipulate an age they get access? What age have you gone with in the end?
Do I create this, and then stipulate the trust as a beneficiary for things like Life Policy?
Recently had a will done with an attorney. There is a difference between a testamentary trust and an Intervivos Trust (the one that really wealthy people use to protect their assets - think trust fund babies).
The impression I got from the attorney is that the second is nice to have in some circumstances, but that there is some admin related to it (needs financials to be done, audit, annual meetings etc).
Whereas a testamentary trust gets created upon your death, You nominate beneficiaries, usually your kids and trustees, someone to take care of the trust in your absence until the kids are old enough to get access.
In our case, our will is setup that if either of the spouses dies, the other gets the estate. If both die at the same time, testamentary trust gets created dividing estate equally between kids. They can only access their portion at age 25. My father-in-law and one of my wife's uncles are the trustees.
They can access the trust to take care of the kids school fees, university fees, annual allowance for food and clothing etc. - we trust that they would not abuse the trust for own gain. (there have been instances where trustees extract exorbitant amounts to "care" for the kids and use that to buy cars etc - but attorney can intercede to a degree - part of the reason why will with attorney is better than will with bank).
Hope this helps.
BTW - there is a free will week in October when a lot of attorneys do will's for free. We got a free will that way - attorney got some work from us two years later when we used him for transfer of property.
