Special Needs Trust

In general, trust structures are intended to provide a legal way to title and hold assets to be used to support one or more beneficiaries. Special needs trusts are similar and are used to benefit someone who has physical or mental disabilities.

A special needs trust is a trust tailored to a person with special needs that is designed to manage assets for that person's benefit while not compromising access to important government benefits. There are three main types of special needs trusts: the first-party trust, the third-party trust, and the pooled trust.

Failure to set up a special needs trust might affect them, even if not as much as another person who receives, say, SSI and Medicaid. Even someone receiving Medicare will have some effect from having a higher income.

Special needs trusts pay for comforts and luxuries -- "special needs" -- that could not be paid for by public assistance funds. This means that if money from the trust is used for food or shelter costs on a regular basis or distributed directly to the beneficiary, such payments will count as income to the beneficiary.

A special needs trust lets parents, other family members and other interested parties contribute funds for the benefit of a disabled person, while also enabling him or her to still receive means-tested benefits such as Medicaid and Security Supplemental Income (SSI).

Special needs trusts are beneficial for those who have permanent special needs or disabilities, those who currently qualify for governmental benefits, those who have special needs but may not qualify for governmental benefits later, and those who cannot manage finances on their own.

Special Needs Trusts are typically irrevocable, which means that they cannot be revoked and can only be amended in very limited circumstances, if at all. These trusts are usually in place for the lifetime of the Beneficiary, and over such a long time, various circumstances invariably change.

The child cannot accumulate more than $2,000 in assets or risk losing important and life-sustaining public assistance benefits. For that reason, a special needs trust must to be set up carefully and by an experienced special needs planning attorney. Regardless, once you set up the trust, it must be funded.