# Trusts and Estates Cold-Start Interview > Use when a trusts-and-estates practice group is adopting AgentCounsel and needs to configure its practice profile by answering a structured interview covering jurisdictions, client context, escalation thresholds, output preferences, source documents, standard positions, review requirements, and prohibited assumptions. - Skill: `zgbrenner/trusts-and-estates-cold-start-interview` (Agent Skill) - Install (CLI): `npx skillmds@latest add zgbrenner/trusts-and-estates-cold-start-interview` - Raw SKILL.md: https://api.skillmd.com/api/skills/zgbrenner/trusts-and-estates-cold-start-interview/raw - Safety review: pending - Works with: Claude Code, Claude.ai, OpenAI Codex - Category: Coding & Dev Tools - Author: zgbrenner (https://skillmd.com/u/zgbrenner) - Updated: 2026-09-17 - Page: https://skillmd.com/skills/zgbrenner/trusts-and-estates-cold-start-interview --- # Trusts and Estates Cold-Start Interview ## Purpose Conduct a structured, staged interview with a trusts-and-estates practice group — led by a supervising attorney or authorized designee — to gather the information required to populate `practice-profiles/trusts-estates.md`. The skill walks through all eight profile fields in sequence, records every answer, and assembles a filled draft of the profile for the practice group's review and approval. It produces draft legal work product for attorney review — not legal advice and not a final configuration. ## Use When - A team is adopting AgentCounsel and needs to configure `practice-profiles/trusts-estates.md` for the first time. - A trusts-and-estates practice group is being onboarded to the library and no current profile exists. - The library is being stood up for the first time and the trusts-and-estates area is included in scope. - A practice group wishes to revisit or rebuild its profile from scratch rather than make incremental updates. ## Required Inputs - A knowledgeable person from the trusts-and-estates practice group — a supervising attorney or an authorized designee — who can answer questions about the group's jurisdiction, positions, escalation rules, and review requirements. - Any existing playbooks, templates, source-of-truth documents, or standard-form documents the group already uses, so they can be referenced or cited in the profile. ## Do Not Use When - The group is actively working a live trusts-and-estates matter. This skill configures the library; it does not support an open matter. - A `practice-profiles/trusts-estates.md` already exists and is current. In that case this is a refresh, not a cold start — though the skill may still be used to rebuild the profile deliberately. - No authorized person is available to answer. Do not complete the interview with guessed or inferred answers; record all gaps as `[CONFIRM: ...]` placeholders. - The purpose is to handle a specific trusts-and-estates matter (use the appropriate matter-level skill for that task). ## Legal Safety Rules - Produce draft legal work product for attorney review. This is not legal advice. - Never guess or infer an answer to any interview question. If the interviewee cannot answer a question, record `[CONFIRM: answer required from practice group]` and move on. - The filled profile is a draft. It must be reviewed and explicitly approved by the supervising attorney or practice group before it governs any AgentCounsel work product. - Do not invent standard positions, clause preferences, escalation thresholds, or review rules. Record only what the interviewee provides. - Do not include client-specific facts, client names, matter identifiers, or privileged details in the profile. The profile is a reusable group-level configuration, not a matter record. - Do not state or imply that any threshold, position, or rule in the profile satisfies a legal requirement under any jurisdiction. Jurisdiction-specific legal obligations are for the attorney to verify. - Flag every item the interviewee defers or leaves open with a visible `[CONFIRM: ...]` placeholder so the reviewer can see exactly what is unresolved. ## Workflow **Stage 1 — Jurisdictions** Ask the interviewee: - In which states or countries does the group regularly handle estate-planning and trust-administration matters? - Are there situs questions the group routinely encounters — trust situs, real-property situs, multi-state property, foreign-property holdings? - Does the group regularly handle non-resident-alien beneficiaries, international beneficiaries, or international estate-tax exposures? - Are there jurisdictions the group treats as out of scope (e.g., specialized offshore jurisdictions), requiring specialist counsel? - Does the group maintain jurisdiction-by-jurisdiction reference materials on estate, inheritance, GST, and gift-tax regimes? Record answers. Mark any unanswered item `[CONFIRM: jurisdiction not yet specified]`. **Stage 2 — Client and Team Context** Ask the interviewee: - What types of trusts-and-estates matters does the group handle most frequently — estate planning, trust administration, probate, contested matters, charitable structures? - Are clients primarily ultra-high-net-worth, high-net-worth, general estate-planning, family offices, or institutional fiduciaries? - How is the team structured — partners, associates, paralegals, trust officers, fiduciary administrators? - How does the group coordinate with corporate fiduciaries, tax advisors, accountants, and investment advisors? - Are there client categories — multi-generational families, blended families, special-needs beneficiaries, business-owning families — that require special handling? Record answers. Mark any unanswered item `[CONFIRM: client/team context not yet specified]`. **Stage 3 — Escalation Thresholds** Ask the interviewee: - Which matters automatically require escalation — contested matters, capacity questions, undue-influence concerns, tax-driven structures, charitable-structure design, international situs? - Are there asset-value thresholds (total estate value, single-trust value, gift-tax-exposure value) that trigger escalation? - When does a fiduciary-conflict question — including a question about the group's own duties — require immediate review? - Which trust-administration events (significant distribution, modification, decanting, termination) require attorney review regardless of size? - Who is the designated escalation contact for trusts-and-estates matters, and what is the expected turnaround? Record answers. Mark any unanswered item `[CONFIRM: escalation threshold not yet specified]`. **Stage 4 — Preferred Output Style** Ask the interviewee: - Should trusts-and-estates work product default to memo format, structured intake format, trust-administration tracker format, or document drafts? - What level of detail does the practice group expect — executive summary, full reasoning, both layered? - Are there house style rules for risk ratings, contested-matter flags, or open-items lists in trusts-and-estates work product? - Does the group produce funding checklists, trust-administration calendars, or estate-administration timelines in a standard format? - Are there particular deliverable types — estate-tax memos, fiduciary accounting reviews, trustee-decision memos — for which the group has mandatory format requirements? Record answers. Mark any unanswered item `[CONFIRM: output style preference not yet specified]`. **Stage 5 — Source-of-Truth Documents** Ask the interviewee: - What is the group's authoritative estate-planning intake instrument, and where is it stored? - Is there a trust-administration playbook or calendar template, and how is it kept current? - What document governs the group's standard testamentary-document library — wills, trusts, powers, healthcare directives? - Are there sample-document libraries for non-standard structures (dynasty trusts, GRATs, ILITs, charitable trusts) the group treats as authoritative? - Does the group maintain jurisdiction-specific reference materials for estate, gift, GST, and inheritance taxes? Record answers and document names. Mark any unanswered item `[CONFIRM: source document not yet identified]`. **Stage 6 — Standard Positions and Playbooks** Ask the interviewee: - What is the group's default capacity-assessment threshold, and how does it integrate medical or other evidence? - What is the group's default revocable-trust posture — revocable trust as core estate-planning tool, or will-based planning with trusts as supplements? - What is the group's default position on powers of appointment, decanting, and trust-modification mechanisms? - What is the group's default portability election posture? - What is the group's default approach to charitable structures (private foundations, donor-advised funds, charitable trusts)? Record answers. Mark any unanswered item `[CONFIRM: standard position not yet specified]`. **Stage 7 — Attorney Review Requirements** Ask the interviewee: - At what stage does attorney review of estate-planning work product become mandatory — initial intake, draft document, signing, post-signing? - Are there work-product types for which attorney review is always required regardless of size — any will, any trust agreement, any tax election, any contested-matter filing, any fiduciary-conflict memo? - What is the designated reviewer's role — handling attorney, supervising partner, designated fiduciary attorney? - What is the expected turnaround for standard document review, and how are urgent reviews (terminal-illness drafting, deadline-driven elections) handled? - Is there a formal sign-off step before a document is finalized, an election is filed, or a trustee decision is communicated? Record answers. Mark any unanswered item `[CONFIRM: review requirement not yet specified]`. **Stage 8 — Prohibited Assumptions** Ask the interviewee: - Are there facts agents must never assume without explicit confirmation — that capacity is intact, that no undue influence applies, that an estate is non-taxable, that a trust is properly funded, that a beneficiary designation is current? - Are there trusts-and-estates risks — capacity, undue influence, fiduciary breach, fraudulent transfer, tax-driven recharacterization — where an agent must stop and escalate rather than reason through independently? - Are there matter types where agents must never proceed beyond intake without direct attorney involvement — contested matters, will contests, trust contests, fiduciary-conflict matters? - Are there prior incidents — adverse judgments, fiduciary findings, malpractice claims — that should be encoded as explicit prohibitions for agents working on trusts-and-estates matters? Record answers. Mark any unanswered item `[CONFIRM: prohibited assumption not yet specified]`. **Stage 9 — Assemble the Draft Profile** Compile all answers into a filled draft of `practice-profiles/trusts-estates.md`, populating each of the eight profile sections. For every item that was not answered, insert a visible `[CONFIRM: ...]` placeholder with enough context for the reviewer to understand what needs to be supplied. Append a list of all open placeholders so the reviewing attorney can see at a glance what remains unresolved. ## Output Format Deliver: 1. **Filled draft of `practice-profiles/trusts-estates.md`** — all eight sections populated with answers from the interview. Every unanswered item is a visible `[CONFIRM: ...]` placeholder. 2. **Open-items list** — an explicit enumeration of every placeholder inserted, with the stage and question it corresponds to, so the reviewing attorney can resolve them efficiently. Label the entire output: **Draft legal work product for attorney review. Not legal advice. This profile draft must be reviewed and approved by the supervising attorney or practice group before it is relied upon.** ## Attorney Verification Checklist - [ ] All eight profile sections have been reviewed by a supervising attorney or authorized practice-group representative. - [ ] Jurisdiction coverage — including situs and multi-state property — is accurately recorded `[verify jurisdiction]`. - [ ] Capacity-assessment threshold reflects the group's current considered posture, not a provisional one. - [ ] Tax-driven structures and elections are tied to current authority `[Verify current law]` and all related deadlines are marked `[deadline verification required]`. - [ ] Fiduciary-conflict protocols are accurately recorded and consistent with applicable professional-responsibility rules. - [ ] Confidentiality posture protects beneficiary information at the appropriate level. - [ ] No client-specific facts, matter identifiers, or privileged details appear in the profile. - [ ] All `[CONFIRM: ...]` placeholders have been resolved or explicitly accepted as pending. - [ ] The approved profile has been saved to `practice-profiles/trusts-estates.md` and its effective date recorded. - [ ] A process for periodic profile review and update has been identified.