Smith County Special Warranty Deed (Grantor to Own Revocable Trust) Form

Placing Texas real estate into a revocable living trust happens through a recorded deed, and the deed carries more weight here than in most states. This special warranty deed conveys property from an individual owner to the trustee of the owner's own revocable trust and writes the qualifying trust homestead language directly into the transfer instrument.

A Warranty Scoped to the Grantor's Own Time on Title

Texas recognizes a spectrum of deed warranties under Property Code Chapter 5. The special warranty deed conveys the property itself with words of grant and binds the grantor to defend the title against claims arising by, through, or under the grantor, but not otherwise; claims older than the grantor's own ownership stay outside the covenant. That scope matches this transfer: the person conveying and the trust receiving are, in substance, the same, so a covenant against the whole chain of title adds little, while a bare quitclaim would put a weaker instrument in the chain than the title deserves. A reservations and exceptions section keeps the record honest about the deed of trust lien, easements, and restrictions that follow the property into the trust.

Homestead Benefits That Follow the Property Into the Trust

Texas ties two homestead benefits to trust ownership through matched statutes. Property Code Section 41.0021 keeps the creditor protection homestead intact where a settlor or beneficiary occupies property held through a qualifying trust, and Tax Code Section 11.13(j) extends the residence homestead property tax exemption to property owned through a beneficial interest in a qualifying trust. Both statutes allow the qualifying terms to appear in the instrument transferring the property to the trust, not only in the trust agreement. This form uses that mechanism: its qualifying trust provision recites the trust's revocability and the settlor's right to use and occupy the property as a principal residence, in wording that tracks both statutes, on the face of the recorded deed.

The Mortgage and the Marriage

Two other legal systems meet this deed at the signing table. Federal law, the Garn-St Germain Act at 12 U.S.C. Section 1701j-3(d)(8), bars a residential lender from calling the loan under a due-on-sale clause on a transfer into an inter vivos trust in which the borrower is and remains a beneficiary; an owner's transfer into the owner's own revocable trust is the pattern the exemption describes. Texas marital property law supplies the second: Family Code Section 5.001 and Property Code Section 41.0021(c) call for the joinder of a married grantor's spouse in a conveyance of homestead property, so the deed carries a labeled joinder signature block with its own notary certificate, used only where the property is a married grantor's homestead.

Recording in the Property's County

The deed is recorded with the county clerk of the county where the property is located, and recording matters twice here: it protects the conveyance against later purchasers and creditors, and both qualifying trust statutes contemplate a recorded instrument describing the property with certainty. The confidentiality notice required by Property Code Section 11.008 appears at the top of the first page. The package includes the blank deed as a fillable PDF, a completed example on a Bexar County fact pattern, and a plain language guide covering every numbered section; the materials are informational and are not legal advice.