Estate Planning & Trust Administration Services

Trust administration ensures your trust is properly funded, maintained, and aligned with your estate plan. It involves reviewing trust documents, confirming asset titling matches trust terms, coordinating beneficiary designations, and ensuring distributions occur as intended. Sentinel works with you and your estate attorney to administer trusts that minimize tax exposure, avoid probate, and honor your wishes with precision and care.

Yes. Estate planning isn't just for the wealthy—it's for anyone who wants to control how their assets are distributed, avoid probate delays, and protect their loved ones. Even modest estates benefit from proper titling, updated beneficiary designations, and coordinated strategies to minimize taxes and legal costs. We help you structure what you have so it reaches the right people efficiently.

A will directs how your assets are distributed after death, but it goes through probate—a public, often lengthy court process. A trust, by contrast, allows assets to transfer privately and immediately to beneficiaries, avoiding probate. Trusts also offer greater control, tax efficiency, and protection from creditors or divorce. We review both to ensure your plan is complete and aligned.

We organize your assets across taxable, tax-deferred, and tax-free accounts, review beneficiary designations, and coordinate with estate attorneys to structure trusts and gifting strategies that reduce tax liability. Techniques like annual exclusion gifts, Qualified Charitable Distributions, and Roth conversions are modeled to fit your goals. Our objective is to preserve more of your wealth for your heirs and causes you care about.

Absolutely. We've supported 20+ families with special needs over 25 years, coordinating with attorneys and care planners to design trusts and financial structures that protect government benefits while ensuring lifelong support. Our plans address guardianship, ongoing care costs, and asset protection so your loved one is cared for with dignity and security.

Review your estate plan every 3-5 years or after major life events—marriage, divorce, births, deaths, significant asset changes, or moves to a new state. Tax laws and family dynamics shift, and your plan must stay current. We monitor your plan continuously and alert you when updates are needed to keep it aligned with your intentions.

Yes. We collaborate closely with estate attorneys to ensure your legal documents, asset titling, and financial strategies are fully coordinated. While we handle the financial and structural planning, your attorney drafts the legal instruments. This partnership ensures nothing falls through the cracks and your estate plan works as a cohesive whole.

Without a plan, state intestacy laws decide who inherits your assets—often not as you'd wish. Your estate goes through probate, which is public, costly, and time-consuming. Heirs may face unnecessary taxes, legal disputes, and delays. An estate plan puts you in control, ensuring your wishes are honored and your loved ones are protected from avoidable stress and expense.