Grantor-retained Income Trust (grit)

Definition of "Grantor-retained income trust (grit)"

Irrevocable trust into which the grantor places assets and retains the income from or the use of these assets for a stipulated period of time. At the termination of this time period, the principal (assets) of the trust is transferred to the grantor's non charitable beneficiary. The non charitable beneficiary may include individual (s) such as a grandchild, niece, nephew, son, or daughter. Should the grantor survive the stipulated period of time, he or she will incur substantial savings in estate and gift taxes. In order for these savings in taxes to occur, the following requirements must be met by the grantor:

  1. income to the grantor must be the sole result of the income generated by assets held in the trust.
  2. any income generated by the assets held in the trust can be paid only to the grantor of the trust.
  3. neither the grantor nor the spouse of the grantor can act as a trustee of the trust.
  4. any income retained by the grantor must be for a period of time not to exceed 10 years.
Should the grantor die before the stipulated period of time the trust expires, the value of the assets of the trust are included in the grantor's estate for FEDERAL ESTATE TAX purposes, even though the assets are not physically transferred to the estate of the grantor.

image of a real estate dictionary page

Have a question or comment?

We're here to help.

*** Your email address will remain confidential.
 

 

Popular Insurance Terms

Reinstatement of an insurance policy or bond to its original face amount (face of policy) after the payment by the insurer of a loss. The purpose of this type of coverage is to indemnify ...

Coverage against loss as the result of a burglary. Found as part of the commercial package policy that has generally replaced the special multiperil insurance (smp) policy and the ...

Sum provided by a disability income insurance that pays a multiple of the monthly indemnity to cover the costs associated with a retraining course attended by the insured wage earner when ...

Market in which buyers dominate trading and force financial asset prices up. ...

Social insurance that provides benefits to temporarily disabled workers in a few states. Five states require employers to pay cash benefits if workers are disabled. They are Rhode Island, ...

Association of life insurance companies focusing on legislation and public relations that may affect the life insurance business on federal, state, and local levels. Membership is composed ...

Method of calculating the life insurance policy's cash surrender value (CSV) not contingent upon the calculation of the policy's reserve such that the CSV will approximate the asset share ...

Trust under which the beneficiary (cannot be a charitable beneficiary) receives a fixed percentage (not less than 5% of the trust's annual value) of the net fair market value of the trust ...

New pension-accounting rule created by the Financial Accounting Standards Board. The objective of this rule is to clarify pension accounting so that investors, employers, and employees will ...

Popular Insurance Questions