I have a trust with a form 1 lower. I am now married and would like to add my wife to the trust. I’m curious if anyone else has done this since Colorado passed its background check law. If so, how did you proceed?
If I add her to the trust, does she need to have a background check performed? Do we both need a background check each time I transfer a new lower into the trust?
I do not know the answer to your BGC question. To add a trustee to the trust you should be able to restate the trust if it is a revocable trust. The trust language may also have a method for adding an additional trustee.
Thank you for your thoughts. I do have a draft addendum to the trust that came when I originally had it drawn up. That addendum contains the language for adding my wife to the trust. Since it was inked prior to the laws in Colorado, it doesn’t have language or guidance on this situation. I just don’t know how or if the Colorado BGC law applies.
When I had an issue like this, I asked the attorney that drew up my trust.
Ask yours, as every state differs.
Thanks, that is why I wondered if anyone else in Colorado had run into this. Ultimately, I will do just that - ask the lawyer.
Also here in Colorado. When my wife was added, we did not do a BCG and was told by our attorney not necessary. The trust is the owner of the said NFA items or whatever it may be. While you are not selling the item to her, the trust is still retaining ownership of the items. This is what I was told and passing that information on. I was also told that if I felt at all uncomfortable about adding her without going through a BCG process, that you could do one yourself online through CBI for 7 bucks and print the results and keep it with the documents.
After buying many many NFA items after my wife was added on the trust, she has never filled out a single paper or form 4473 at pickup of the items. She is a co-trustee, but when I pick up the item, I’m acting on behalf of the trust. This is the information that I was told and what we have done. Take that as you will, but a phone call to your lawyer is never a bad thing.
Double…
I recently set up a trust here in Colorado through US Law Shield and they got me in touch with a local lawyer here in Colorado to work out details and answer questions.
I had the same question as you and and the lawyer advised me that background checks were needed in this situation now.
So…we created the trust, I ordered the lower that I intend to SBR, and the lower was shipped to my local FFL.
My better half and I went to the local FFL with copy of trust in hand.
He ran background checks on both of us.
He then did the transfer of the lower to the trust and also kept a copy of the trust for his records.
I submitted the eform and now I am doing the wait for my SBR approval.
To the best of my knowledge, there isn’t really a record of the background checks for both of us in the transfer paperwork the FFL does.
So I have a copy of the receipt where we paid for both back ground checks (that has that same date as the FFL transfer) and I keep that with my trust paper work.
Is this all overkill? Better safe than sorry I figure.
The cost of an additional background check was worth it for my peace of mind.
Hope that helps!
You did what!??
I think you over complicated the process of adding a SBR lower to your trust. You can just go to the FFL and pick up the lower as an individual. No trust, extra people, etc. No need for everyone to go to the FFL to file 4473’s to pick up a stripped non NFA lower. So when you did your lower on the trust, after approval, making it into a NFA item, you are going to take off the pistol lower from your Schedule A and then add the lower again as a SBR??? Until the lower is approved, its not a NFA item. I have never heard of anyone going to buy a stripped lower that’s not a NFA item with trust in hand and do multiple backgrounds. Im confused about the thought process…
OP is in a little different situation as he already has a approved Form 1 on his trust, adding another person to it.
Ok, that’s good stuff from both of you. That is the type of experience that I was hoping to bring out. I hadn’t thought about the online BGC, but I like that option.
I agree that it is a little more than what was necessary for buying a lower, but I don’t fault him. Like he said, he was erring on the side of caution.
Colorado resident here. When my GTL drew up my trust my wife was added. No BGC.
Thanks for chiming in. Did your trust initially have a firearm on schedule A?
My understanding after talking with the lawyer was that if I took possession of the lower as an individual then I would have to do a background check at that time, and then to transfer it to the trust would be another background check. The thought being that since all transfers in Colorado now require a background check, then the transfer from me to the trust was yet another transfer. And to top it off since there are two of us in the trust it would require two more background checks. So doing it my way only cost me two background checks instead of three. I never took possession of the non-NFA lower myself…the trust did. The form1 was done as a trust, so when that gets approved the non-NFA lower in the trust will then become a NFA lower that is already in the trust and no more transfers needed or background checks needed. Am I mistaken?
I kind of get the impression that you all are saying that not everybody in the trust has to undergo a background each and every time an item is added to the trust…only the person picking up the item has to. Maybe that is correct and I am mistaken. But then what stops you from having a felon in your trust as long as you are able to pass the background check yourself? I thought that was the point of the universal background checks in Colorado now…that everybody in the trust had to do a background check. Like I said…maybe I am over-doing it. But for the cost of an extra background check I am not losing any sleep over it either.
And you are right…my situation and the OP situation are not the same…so I hope I didn’t add any confusion with my reply.
No confusion at all. Thanks for sharing your experience. I don’t think these new laws were very well thought out.
All Colorado firearm transfers require a background check. If transferring into a trust all trustees must also have a background check. It’s that simple.
If the trust already has firearms as trust property, adding a new trustee does not require a background check.
A person would run afoul of co law if you perform a background check only one trustee during a transfer into trust property, as the law clearly requires all trustees to have the background check.
Thanks for that. I have been reading through the law and seeing the same thing. If she is already on the trust, we both must have a BGC any time a firearms is transferred into the trust.
It doesn’t get more clear than that.
What is interesting is that I think this could be interpreted to mean that every time I transfer possession to her or back to me, a BGC is required.
It appears to me that I should not use the CBI website for her BGC, but instead go to a FFL and retain a copy of the BGC.
I wonder if the mention of possession in (1)(a) is differentiated from control. The trust has possession, but a trustee has control. I think this is where the law is ambiguous in this situation. The quoted area of (1)(b) makes it sound like transferring control of a firearm to a different trustee requires a BGC every time. I think there exists a strict interpretation that a BGC is required every time a trustee hands a rifle to another trustee.
Disclaimer: I am not a lawyer. I am not giving legal advice. I will consult a lawyer, as should you.