Joseph and Ann Sullivan had been to an attorney who recommended that they use a grantor retained annuity trust to reduce their estate in order to pass a valuable piece of income-producing commercial real estate to their daughter, Becka. They were hesitant about the attorney’s plan because, if they died during the term of the trust, the trust would terminate. The property would be back in their estates and they would not accomplish their goal. In addition, they would not be able to include generation-skipping provisions in the trust with a grantor retained annuity trust, so the property would be subject to another layer of tax in Becka’s estate.
The grantor retained annuity trust would not address their concerns. A better solution was available through the use of an intentionally defective grantor irrevocable trust. Not only would this trust allow them to transfer any future appreciation to their daughter (effectively freezing the value of the real estate in their estate), but also the plan would take effect immediately. As a result, they would have a way to substantially leverage their generation-skipping exemption and the trust would provide an opportunity for additional significant planning benefits.
One of the primary goals of any good estate plan is to reduce your exposure to taxes while leveraging your gift, estate and generation-skipping tax exemptions.
Grantor retained annuity trusts (GRATs) hold assets and pay income to you as the grantor for a specified term. At the end of the term, the assets pass to your children or selected beneficiaries. Because you retain a right to income from the GRAT, as long as the assets’ growth exceeds the income payment, you are able to leverage your giving ability by discounting the value of the gift assets—thereby reducing any taxes due on the gift.
Another type of grantor trust that provides an opportunity for leveraging and receiving tax benefits, while keeping the trust property out of your estate, is the intentionally defective grantor irrevocable trust (IDGIT).
As part of the Internal Revenue Code since 1954, grantor trust rules stipulate that, if a trust document contains certain provisions, the trust’s income will be taxed to the trust’s creator—the grantor—rather than to the trust itself. Congress devised the rules thinking no sensible taxpayer would want to pay a trust’s tax bill, especially because individual tax rates at that time were higher than trust tax rates and the grantor cannot be a beneficiary of a grantor trust. But now, income tax rates are much lower than they were in 1954 and, thus, for someone focused more on estate taxes, a grantor trust, an IDGIT, can substantially increase the wealth passed to heirs.
IDGIT Basics
An IDGIT is simply a type of irrevocable trust drafted to trigger the grantor trust rules and force the grantor, rather than the trust, to pay income tax on trust income. That’s the “intentionally defective” part. Assets are moved into and become owned by the trust. The positive result is that those assets, and their future appreciation, are outside the grantor’s taxable estate. Paying the income tax on the trust’s annual earnings further reduces the grantor’s estate while netting another benefit: 100 percent of the earnings can accumulate inside the IDGIT, to the advantage of the trust beneficiaries, who are typically the grantor’s children.
Because the IRS requires that the grantor pay the trust’s tax, that payment is a legal obligation, not a gift, so no gift tax applies. In effect, value is shifted to the trust beneficiaries at the grantor’s income tax rate. This is preferable to having the IDGIT or its beneficiaries pay the income tax while leaving value in the grantor’s estate that would later be subject to estate tax.
Drafting the trust to be defective (so that it triggers the grantor trust rules) is a simple matter for a knowledgeable attorney. One way to do this is to provide that trust principal or income may be distributed to the grantor’s spouse. This arrangement has no estate or gift tax significance, but it automatically makes the trust a grantor trust.
Another way to accomplish this is to specify that the grantor retains the power to reacquire the trust corpus by substituting other property of equivalent value or by giving someone other than the grantor or current beneficiary of the trust the power to expand the class of beneficiaries. Such power is sometimes given to the grantor’s accountant or attorney and, even though the power may never be exercised, the grantor trust rules are triggered.
A good attorney will also provide an element of control by making it possible to “turn off” the grantor trust status, in case paying tax for the IDGIT becomes a financial burden for the grantor. This can sometimes be accomplished by giving a power holder (such as the accountant or attorney in the previous example), the right to renounce the power.
Selling Assets to an IDGIT
A grantor can transfer assets into an IDGIT by either gift or sale. Making a gift consumes the grantor’s various exemptions, but, if the grantor sells an asset to the IDGIT, there is no gift and therefore no gift tax. Furthermore, there is no recognition of gain and, thus, no capital gains tax when assets are sold to an IDGIT. For tax purposes, selling an asset to an IDGIT is the same as selling an asset to oneself: no tax.
If you have highly appreciated assets you would like to remove from your estate, you could possibly avoid all capital gains taxes as well as gift taxes by selling the assets to an IDGIT that you create. To leverage the transaction, the IDGIT could pay for the assets in the form of an installment note, payable over several years. The Internal Revenue Code allows you to charge a relatively low rate of interest on the installment note. This is a decided advantage, as it enables an IDGIT that is earning a market rate of return to invest the cash flow in excess of the low-interest note payments so that it can accumulate and grow and eventually be used to pay back the note principal. Also, because of the grantor trust rules, you do not have to recognize the interest on the note. So, there is no tax deduction for the trust and there is no taxable income for you, the grantor, for interest payments on the note from the trust. However, you are still liable for taxes on the income earned by the IDGIT, including any income earned by property sold to the trust.
The excess income over the note payments may be high enough to allow you to further leverage the value of the IDGIT through the purchase of insurance or some other growth vehicle. In addition, because the grantor pays the income taxes on trust income, the trust’s return is enhanced for the beneficiaries of the trust. Best of all, the payment of income taxes by the grantor is not considered a gift for transfer purposes.
To qualify for charging a low interest rate (such as the federal mid-term rate), the note will usually be written to last from three to nine years (referred to as a “mid-term” note as it is neither short-term nor long-term). Also, it should be properly documented with reasonable terms. It is a good idea to have separate representation of the grantor and the IDGIT, including actual negotiation of the terms of sale.
GRAT Versus IDGIT
In many respects, a sale of assets on an installment note to an IDGIT is similar to a gift of assets to a GRAT. In a GRAT, the present value of the annuity payments to the grantor reduces the amount of the taxable gift, but the annuity payments, if not fully consumed, return value to the grantor’s estate. In an installment-note sale to an IDGIT, principal and interest on the note are paid back to the grantor over time and this also returns value to the grantor’s estate. However, when structured properly, using the following techniques, this repayment can be a substantially reduced amount. This, in turn, leaves more for heirs.
The Seed Gift
To help support the installment note and the viability of the strategy, it is advisable for the grantor to make a small seed gift to the IDGIT. It is generally recommended that this gift be at least 10 percent of the value of the assets to be sold. The seed property is important because the trust needs to have a measure of independence from the grantor. Also, it should not appear that the income distributed from the property sold to the trust is the sole source of funds being used to service the entire note. If the seed gift is too small, the IRS may treat the sale as a gift (not a desired result).
Sale of a Discounted Asset
The benefit of the IDGIT strategy can be further enhanced if the grantor utilizes the valuation discounts that are available for certain assets including shares in a corporation, units in a limited liability company or family limited partnership interests. Nonvoting shares, limited liability company units or limited partnership interests are given or sold to an IDGIT at their value as determined by a valuation professional. Generally, the fair market value of such interests is adjusted downward from their pro rata value of the underlying assets of the business entity. This is due to valuation discounts resulting from either lack of control, lack of marketability, or both—relative to those interests. If the interests are sold to an IDGIT, the valuation adjustment reduces the principal amount of the note while increasing the effective yield to the trust from the true value of the underlying assets.
Leverage with Life Insurance
The real power of this strategy comes when the trustee of the IDGIT uses the excess income created in the IDGIT to purchase life insurance. The income earned by the IDGIT over and above the amount needed to pay the installment note can go toward life insurance premiums on the life of the grantor, a beneficiary or some other relative. The premium payments will not result in gift taxes because the premiums are paid from trust income. The amount of insurance purchased can be substantial and can significantly increase the value of the trust assets that will eventually pass to the beneficiaries.
For example, Molly and Rick Crall (ages 70 and 66, respectively) were made aware of the fact that the anticipated excess income on the assets in their IDGIT would support a premium of $125,000 ($200,000 – $75,000) without the extra cash flow achieved through discounting or $155,000 ($200,000 – $45,000) with discounting. The smaller premium amount would be sufficient to fund a second-to-die insurance policy with a death benefit of approximately $6 million and the larger a death benefit of approximately $8.5 million, on Rick and Molly Crall (based on good health ratings and current assumptions of interest, mortality and expenses). On the death of the couple, the entire death benefit plus the value of the assets in the trust, including any direct gifts, would be available for the beneficiaries and exempt from both estate and GST tax.
Even without the discounted-sale approach, if Rick and Molly died immediately after repayment of the note at the end of year nine, the IDGIT would hold assets with underlying values in excess of $7.7 million ($1,400,000 appreciation on real estate + $390,000 seed capital and appreciation on seed capital + $6,000,000 insurance), 30 times the amount originally given as seed money to the trust and upon which the GST election was based. In other words, the $7.7 million is available for multiple generations with no further gift, estate or GST taxes, and only $250,000 of Rick and Molly’s combined $10.68 million GST tax exemption (as of 2014) was used. If Rick and Molly were to use the discounted sale approach, the total value transferred is substantially higher at more than $11.2 million.
Planning Risks
The income tax consequences of the premature death of the grantor are unknown. If the grantor dies while the installment note remains unpaid, the grantor’s estate may owe income taxes on any unrecognized gain in the transferred assets. The premise is that the IDGIT is no longer a grantor (defective) trust at the time of the grantor’s death. Therefore, the grantor’s estate would be taxed on the gain attributable to the unpaid portion of the note. On the other hand, it can also be argued that the grantor’s death should not be treated as a taxable event and the tax basis in the transferred assets would be carried over to the trust or its beneficiaries in the event of a subsequent sale. Whether gain should be recognized upon a grantor’s death is an unresolved issue at this point. However, in many instances the prospect of income taxation will not be significant to the beneficiaries of the IDGIT. In any event, if the beneficiaries sell assets, they would be subject to capital gains tax.
Another possibility is that the note will be considered what is called income in respect of a decedent, in which case the recipient of the note payments is subject to income tax on the remaining payments. Thus, like a GRAT, the note term should not extend beyond the grantor’s life expectancy; if it does, adverse tax consequences may apply. It is also possible that the grantor’s death will have no adverse income tax consequences. This is an unsettled area of the law.