A signed trust that holds no assets controls nothing. The trust only protects what has been legally transferred into it. Retitling means changing the ownership on record for each asset — replacing your name with the trust’s name on the deed, the account, or the title. Until that is done, the asset is outside the trust. When you die with assets outside the trust, those assets go through probate regardless of what the trust document says.
This post covers which assets belong inside the trust, which ones stay outside it by design, and what happens to anything left in limbo.
Real Estate in Georgia
To put Georgia real property inside the trust, a new deed must be recorded transferring ownership from your name to the trust’s name. A deed is a legal document recorded with the county clerk’s office. Once recorded, the trust’s name appears as the new owner in the county’s public records. The change is legally effective from the date of recording.
This applies to your primary residence, rental properties, vacant land, and vacation homes in Georgia. Each property requires its own deed.
If the deed transfer is never done, the property stays in your name. When you die, it enters probate. The court controls it during the proceeding. Your surviving spouse or children cannot sell it, refinance it, or legally transfer it without court authorization. The mortgage continues running. The property taxes continue running. No one can act on the property until the court says they can.
Bank Accounts and Brokerage Accounts
Individual checking, savings, and investment accounts are retitled into the trust by contacting the bank or brokerage and requesting a change of account ownership to the trust. Most banks have a process for this. The account number typically stays the same. Your access stays the same. The trust is now the owner on record.
An alternative is adding a payable-on-death (TOD) designation naming the trust as beneficiary. The account then passes to the trust outside of probate at your death. But a TOD designation does not give the trust control during incapacity — if you become incapacitated and cannot manage the account, the trust cannot step in unless the account is fully retitled.
Retitling is more complete than a TOD designation because it covers both death and incapacity.
LLC Interests and Business Interests
If you own a membership interest in an LLC, transferring that interest to the trust requires a formal assignment document. The operating agreement must permit the transfer — some operating agreements require the consent of other members before a membership interest can be assigned to anyone, including a trust.
If the LLC interest is not inside the trust when you die, the membership interest goes through probate. No one has legal authority to act as a member during that proceeding. The business — its contracts, its payroll, its lease obligations — has no authorized owner.
Employees show up to work. Vendors call about invoices. The landlord needs the rent. No one with legal authority can answer them. Operations deteriorate. The business loses value while the estate works through the court. By the time the proceeding ends, the business may be worth far less than it was the day you died.
What Stays Outside the Trust
IRAs and 401(k)s. Retirement accounts cannot be retitled into a revocable living trust without triggering an immediate taxable distribution. The full account value would be treated as income in the year of the transfer. These pass to named beneficiaries by beneficiary designation — not through the trust and not through the will. The default: name individual beneficiaries on the retirement account form and keep those designations current. The trust can be named as beneficiary in specific situations — typically when a beneficiary is a minor or has special needs — but that requires careful drafting to avoid unintended tax consequences.
Life insurance. The policy benefit passes to named beneficiaries outside of probate. The trust can be named as beneficiary if you want the insurance proceeds managed by the trust rather than paid directly — this is common when the beneficiary is a minor child who cannot legally manage a large sum. Outside of that, individual beneficiary designations work fine.
Vehicles. Georgia vehicle titles are not typically retitled into trusts. The process triggers a notarized title transfer that creates friction with registration, insurance, and normal vehicle sales. Most estate planning attorneys leave vehicles outside the trust and rely on Georgia’s small estate affidavit process to handle them at death.
Health Savings Accounts and 529 Plans. HSAs cannot be transferred to a trust — they are individual accounts by design. 529 Plans have their own beneficiary and successor owner structure. Both pass outside probate through their own mechanisms and do not need to be inside the trust.
The Trap — The Unfunded Trust
Our firm has reviewed trusts that were signed and stored in a filing cabinet for years while the real estate and bank accounts stayed in the owners’ names. When the owner died, everything they owned went through probate anyway. The trust document existed on paper. It controlled nothing because nothing had been transferred into it.
This is not rare. It is common. Online services and some attorneys provide the trust document without a structured funding process. The client receives a document, files it away, and assumes the work is done. The assets never move. The trust never takes ownership. At death, the estate goes to court as if no trust existed at all.
A trust that is not funded is a plan that does not work.
The Outcome
When the real estate is deeded in, the bank accounts are retitled, and the LLC interests are assigned — the trust controls the estate. At death, the successor trustee steps in. No asset goes to court. Every account is accessible. Every property can be managed or sold. The business has an authorized owner on day one.
That is what a funded revocable living trust actually does. The document creates the structure. The funding makes it real.
Understanding how to avoid probate in Georgia comes down to one question: are the assets inside the trust or outside it? To review your asset list and confirm what belongs where, schedule a Family Protection Audit with The Hive Law.