The power of lifetime gifting in conjunction with an A B trust.

Alright, your attorney has just handed you an A B trust and now you are set, right?

I want to briefly bring to your attention the tax advantages of giving a large lifetime gift. Just because you will have an plan in place that allows you to take advantage of the unified credit,  this does not mean that you have to wait until death to do so. The real advantage to gifting before you die is two fold. First, you will be able to watch your loved ones enjoy the gift. Second, the income generated from the gift will not be included in your gross estate (with some exceptions that depending on how long you live after making the gift). The latter benefit to you can be quite substantial. For example, a 1 million dollar gift growing at 10% a year for 20 year could shelter a staggering amount of $6,727,499.95 by keeping it out of the gross estate.