Oregon living trusts & estate documents

Living trust law in Oregon

A revocable living trust holds your home, accounts, and other property during your life, you stay in full control as trustee and can change or revoke it any time, then passes it to your beneficiaries without probate when you're gone. In Oregon, trusts are governed by the Oregon Uniform Trust Code, ORS Chapter 130.

Avoiding probate in Oregon

Probate in Oregon is governed by the ORS Chapters 111 to 118 and handled by the Circuit Court's Probate Department. Probate proceeds in circuit court.

Oregon's simple estate procedure is available when the estate has not more than $75,000 in personal property (other than manufactured homes) and not more than $200,000 in real property and manufactured homes, at fair market value without reduction for liens or debts (ORS 114.510). Assets held in a funded living trust pass to your beneficiaries without probate, whatever the size of the estate. Many Oregon homeowners set one up for that reason. Oregon also authorizes a transfer-on-death deed (Or. Rev. Stat. § 93.948 et seq.) to pass real estate outside probate. A living trust does the same for every asset, not just real estate.

In Oregon, creditors generally have 4 months after the published notice to interested persons to file claims against the estate (ORS 115.005), one reason court probate takes time that a funded trust avoids.

Estate and inheritance tax in Oregon

Oregon levies its own estate tax on top of the federal one, and at a much lower exemption: Oregon has an estate tax with a $1 million exclusion. The separate federal estate tax reaches only estates above $15 million per person (2026, adjusted yearly), so most families never owe it.

Protecting a surviving spouse in Oregon

A surviving spouse in Oregon who is left out of the will can instead claim an elective share scaled to the length of the marriage, up to 33% of the augmented estate under Or. Rev. Stat. § 114.605, a protection the will itself cannot override.

Oregon also has the court, on petition, make necessary and reasonable provision from the estate for the support of the spouse and dependent children of the decedent, or any of them (Or. Rev. Stat. § 114.015). Subject to the limitations of § 114.065, the support the court orders has priority over claims and expenses of administration and is not charged against the distributive share of the person receiving it (§ 114.075). The spouse and dependent children who were living in the decedent's principal dwelling at the death may continue to occupy it until one year after the death (or, if the decedent held a leasehold or other interest less than a fee, until the earlier end of that interest), the dwelling remaining exempt from execution to the extent it was exempt when the decedent was living and subject to the rights of anyone holding a security interest in it (§ 114.005).

Signing your Oregon documents

1. Sign the living trust. Executed and acknowledged before a notary.
2. Sign the will. Two witnesses; notarized self-proving affidavit included (standalone and pour-over wills).
3. Sign the power of attorney. Sign your Durable Power of Attorney before a Notary Public.
4. Sign the health care documents. Sign and date section 5 of your Oregon Advance Directive for Health Care either in the presence of two adult witnesses, who then complete part B of section 6, or before a Notary Public, who completes part A. You do not need both. A witness may not be your health care representative or alternate, and may not be your attending physician or attending health care provider.
5. Follow your package instructions. Your package includes page-by-page signing instructions written for Oregon. Follow those as the authoritative guide.

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