Yes, we're fans: a newly purchased home is exactly the trigger to get your estate documents in order, and a living trust does things a will alone cannot. At minimum, most people want a will and a healthcare directive. A trust adds a smoother handoff of the home outside probate and a stepped-up cost basis for your heirs. The options run along a spectrum: - A transfer-on-death deed, where your state allows it, works the same way as a payable-on-death bank account: the named person has no rights while you're alive and automatically becomes owner, outside probate, when you pass. - Small-estate thresholds. Some states have raised the home-value threshold under which a property skips probate entirely. - A full living trust sits at the complete end and layers in the tax and control benefits. Two honest cautions, because this is legal and tax territory and we are not your attorney. Costs vary widely by state and complexity, from a straightforward single-property setup to a far pricier multi-property estate, so get a quote from a trust attorney. And real tax stakes hide in the details; how jointly held property is titled before it goes into the trust can meaningfully change what a surviving spouse owes. That is exactly why the right attorney who asks the right questions is worth more than the cheapest one. Sit down with an estate or trust attorney who knows your state.