I get some version of this question almost every week from clients sitting across the table from me: “Mike, should I just add my daughter to the deed, or do I actually need a trust?” It’s a fair question, and the honest answer is that it depends on what you own, who you want to protect, and what kind of headache you’re trying to avoid for your family later. There’s no one-size answer, and anyone who tells you otherwise probably hasn’t looked at your specific situation.
I’ve been practicing estate law in Columbus long enough to see both approaches work well, and both fail badly when used incorrectly. Michael D. Christensen Law Offices, LLC works with Franklin County homeowners on exactly this decision, and I want to walk through it the way I would with someone sitting in my office.
Should I Put My Columbus Home in a Trust or Transfer It With a Deed?
For most Columbus homeowners, a revocable living trust is the more reliable option if you own real estate, have a blended family, own a business, or want a plan that still works if you become incapacitated before you die. A transfer-on-death deed can be a reasonable, low-cost option if your situation is simple: one owner, one property, one or two beneficiaries, no expectation of disputes, and no concern about what happens if you become unable to manage your affairs while still alive.
The trade-off comes down to control and flexibility. A deed is a single transaction. Once it’s recorded, your options for changing course are limited, and if your family situation changes — a beneficiary dies before you, a relationship sours, you remarry — the deed doesn’t adjust on its own. A trust is a structure you can amend as your life changes, and it can hold more than just your house. It can also manage what happens to that house if you’re alive but unable to make decisions, something a deed does nothing to address. In my experience, people who choose a deed because it seems simpler often haven’t thought through what happens if they need long-term care, get remarried, or want to change beneficiaries down the road. I’m not saying a deed is wrong for everyone. I’m saying it’s a narrower tool, and you should know that going in.
Can I Use a Transfer-on-Death Deed in Ohio Instead of a Trust?
Yes. Ohio law allows a transfer-on-death (TOD) deed under R.C. 5302.22, and it’s a tool I use regularly for clients with straightforward situations. You sign and record the deed while you’re alive, naming a beneficiary who receives the property automatically at your death, without going through probate. You keep full ownership and control while you’re living — you can sell the property, refinance it, or revoke the TOD designation at any point before you die.
Where I see people run into trouble is when they name multiple beneficiaries without thinking through what happens if one of them dies first, or if the beneficiaries can’t agree on what to do with an inherited house they now co-own. A TOD deed doesn’t include instructions for resolving disagreements between beneficiaries. It just transfers ownership. If your kids get along and the property is easy to divide (or sell and split proceeds), that’s usually fine. If there’s any history of tension in the family, or if one child lives in the house and the others don’t, a TOD deed can set up a fight that a trust could have prevented with clearer terms.
One more limitation: a TOD deed only covers the specific property named in it. If you own a second property, a rental, or a vacation place, you need a separate deed for each one. A trust can hold all of it under one document, which is part of why I steer clients with multiple properties toward a trust instead. For general background on how Ohio property transfers work, the Cornell Law School Legal Information Institute has helpful explanations of deed types and property law concepts if you want to read further.
Can an Ohio Revocable Living Trust Protect My Assets From Nursing Home Costs?
I’ll be direct about this because I think it matters: a revocable living trust does not shield your home or other assets from nursing home costs or Medicaid spend-down requirements. Because you retain full control over a revocable trust — you can amend it, revoke it, or pull assets back out at any time — the law treats those assets as still belonging to you for purposes of eligibility calculations. If asset protection from long-term care costs is your primary goal, that requires a different kind of planning entirely, often involving irrevocable trusts and lead time before care is needed, and it comes with its own set of trade-offs and restrictions.
What a revocable trust does well is different: it avoids probate, it lets you name someone to step in and manage your affairs if you become incapacitated, and it keeps your financial matters private instead of becoming part of the public probate record. Those are real, valuable benefits. I just don’t want a client coming in thinking a basic revocable trust is going to protect the house from a nursing home bill, because that’s not what this tool does. If long-term care costs are a serious concern for your family, that’s a conversation worth having early, and it’s one we have often at Michael D. Christensen Law Offices, LLC. The NIH and Mayo Clinic both publish useful information on long-term care planning and costs if you want context on what you might be planning for.
What Happens to My Ohio Home if I Die Without a Trust or Beneficiary Designation?
If your home doesn’t have a TOD deed, isn’t titled in joint survivorship, and isn’t held in a trust, it becomes a probate asset. That means it passes through the Franklin County Probate Court process, and the court oversees how the property is eventually distributed, whether under your will or, if you have no will, under Ohio’s intestacy statute.
Here’s something I want to clear up because I hear it misstated constantly: having a will does not mean your house skips probate. A will simply tells the probate court how you want your probate assets distributed. It’s the trust, the TOD deed, or joint ownership that actually avoids the probate process — not the will itself. If your only planning document is a will, your home is still going through probate; the will just gives the court your instructions for how to handle it.
Probate in Ohio isn’t necessarily the disaster people imagine, but it does take time and it is a public process. Creditors of the estate generally have six months from the date of death to present claims against the estate, under R.C. 2117.06(B) — and that clock starts at death, not when the estate is opened or notice is published, which trips people up constantly. An executor can shorten that window for a specific known creditor under R.C. 2117.07, down to thirty days after the creditor receives written notice or six months from death, whichever is earlier — but that shortened deadline only applies when the executor takes that specific step, not automatically. If a will contest is going to happen, it generally has to be filed within three months after the certificate of notice of probate is filed with the court, under R.C. 2107.76.
Smaller estates sometimes qualify for simplified handling. Release from administration under R.C. 2113.03 is available for estates valued at $35,000 or less, or up to $100,000 if the surviving spouse is entitled to the entire estate. That’s a separate and narrower process from summary release from administration under R.C. 2113.031, which has its own qualifying conditions. These shortcuts help some families, but a Columbus home alone frequently pushes an estate’s value above these thresholds once you count the property’s equity, so don’t assume your estate will automatically qualify. You can read more about probate procedure generally through Justia or FindLaw, both of which maintain accessible summaries of state probate rules.
Who Needs a Trust Attorney in Columbus, Ohio?
Not everyone needs a trust. I say that as someone whose practice includes setting them up — I’d rather tell a client honestly that a simpler tool fits their situation than sell them something they don’t need. But there are specific situations where I strongly recommend at least a consultation before deciding.
If you own real estate in more than one state, a trust usually saves your family from dealing with multiple probate proceedings in different jurisdictions. If you have a blended family — a second marriage with children from a prior relationship — a trust lets you set clear terms for who gets what and when, which reduces the odds of a dispute between a surviving spouse and stepchildren. If you own a business, rental properties, or other assets that don’t transfer cleanly through a simple deed, a trust gives you one structure to manage all of it. And if you have a family member with a disability who receives government benefits, an outright inheritance can actually disqualify them from those benefits — that situation calls for a specific type of trust drafted with that goal in mind, not a general-purpose one.
I’d also point to anyone who’s been through a divorce, anyone caring for aging parents while also planning their own estate, and anyone who simply wants privacy — probate records in Franklin County are public, and a trust keeps your financial affairs out of that record. If any of that sounds like your situation, it’s worth sitting down with an estate attorney rather than guessing. You can learn more about our team’s background and approach on our about page.
Can I Use a Trust to Pass My Columbus Business to My Children?
Yes, and this is one of the more common reasons I see business owners in Columbus come in for trust planning specifically. A trust can hold your ownership interest in a business — whether it’s an LLC, a corporation, or a partnership interest — and include instructions for how that interest transfers to your children, whether that’s an equal split, a controlling share to the child who actually works in the business, or a buyout arrangement for children who aren’t involved day-to-day.
I’ve worked with clients who run everything from small retail shops to service businesses with a dozen employees, and the same problem comes up repeatedly: they’ve spent decades building something, but they haven’t thought through what happens if they die suddenly, or if two of their kids disagree about whether to keep the business running or sell it. A trust lets you set the rules in advance, which takes that decision out of a moment of grief and conflict and puts it on paper while you’re still around to think it through clearly.
This is also where a trust starts to interact with your broader estate and succession planning — buy-sell agreements, business valuations, and sometimes life insurance funding to help one child buy out siblings without having to sell the business itself. It’s more involved than a simple deed transfer, and I’d rather walk a business owner through the options in person than try to cover every variation here. Publications like the Harvard Business Review and Forbes regularly cover family business succession challenges if you want outside perspective on how common these issues are for family-owned companies nationally.
On the tax side, current federal law sets the estate and gift tax exemption at $15 million per person for 2026, which means most Columbus families and small business owners won’t owe federal estate tax at all. Ohio has no state estate tax and no inheritance tax — Ohio’s estate tax was repealed for deaths occurring on or after January 1, 2013, and it hasn’t returned. That said, tax exemptions change with new legislation, so don’t assume today’s numbers will still apply years from now; it’s worth checking in periodically rather than assuming your plan from a decade ago still reflects current law. The American Bar Association publishes consumer-facing guides on estate and gift tax basics if you want a neutral, non-firm-specific source.
Making the Right Call for Your Situation
I know this is a lot of information, and I’ve tried to give you the real trade-offs rather than a sales pitch for one option over the other. If your situation is genuinely simple — one home, one clear beneficiary, no business, no blended family, no concern about incapacity planning — a transfer-on-death deed might be all you need, and I’ll tell you that directly if that’s what I see in your case. If there’s more complexity — property in multiple states, a business, a blended family, concerns about a family member with special needs, or just a desire to keep your affairs private and avoid probate altogether — a trust is usually going to serve your family better.
The mistake I see most often isn’t choosing the “wrong” tool. It’s not choosing anything at all, and leaving the decision to Ohio’s default intestacy rules and the probate court. That’s the outcome that costs families the most time, money, and stress.
If you’re a Columbus homeowner trying to figure out which approach fits your family, I’d rather talk it through with you directly than have you guess. Our Columbus office at 3341 W Broad St, Columbus, OH 43204, United States works with clients throughout Ohio on exactly these decisions, from simple deed transfers to full trust and business succession planning. Call us at (614) 300-5000 or contact us to schedule a consultation, and let’s figure out together what actually fits your family’s situation.