Withdrawals work differently depending on whether you choose a Standard CRUT, a NIMCRUT, or a Flip CRUT. So, what are their key differences?

1. Standard CRUT
There are two types of Standard CRUTs. The first is Unitrust where you’ll receive a set percentage of the trust’s assets each year. Because this is a unitrust, you’ll know the rate at the start of the trust, but each years distributions will depend on the value of your trusts assets each year.
The second type of standard CRUT, is an Annuity Trust. It works the same way as Unitrust, except that you determine a fixed amount of Income you wish to receive each year, versus a percentage. The value of the Annuity Trust does not affect your annual payout.
Standard CRUTs can be a good fit for customers willing to give up some returns in exchange for relatively predictable, consistent payouts.

2. NIMCRUT
With a NIMCRUT, you are owed the same percentage of trust assets yearly as you would from Standard CRUT and you have some ability to defer those distributions to future years. These trusts distribute the lower of the trusts realized income and the percentage of trust assets it owes you. If the realized income is lower than the distribution percentage the trust owes you, any underpayments are rolled over to future years, giving you control over your annual distributions by controlling how much income your trust realizes each.
Although NIMCRUTs carry the highest expected returns, they can only distribute realized gains, so down markets can be a problem. For that reason, a NIMCRUT can be a good fit for those who are set on maximizing total returns, setup their CRUT for a long period and can weather down years.

3. Flip CRUTs
Flip CRUTs ‘flip’ from a NIMCRUT structure to a Standard CRUT structure after a predetermined event, such as the sale of a non-marketable asset or a certain number of years.
They are commonly used if you want consistent distributions but have non-liquid assets that won’t be liquid for a while. With a Standard CRUT the trust may be forced to liquidate or distribute non-liquid assets due to its forced distributions. Flip CRUTs also work for those who want to defer distributions for some time and then switch to the consistent, predictable distributions of a Standard Charitable Remainder Unitrust — for example, if you are planning for a period of growth and then will need retirement income.

4. Lead Trust
A Charitable Remainder Lead Trust (CLT) is an irrevocable trust is designed to provide financial support to one or more charities for a period of time. The charity receives payments for a set period or the life of the trust,, with the remaining assets eventually going to family members or other beneficiaries after which the remaining assets go to non-charitable beneficiaries. It’s essentially the opposite of a Charitable Remainder Trust(CRT), where the charity receives the remainder after income payments are made to beneficiaries. 

A charitable lead trust can be funded either during the lifetime of the individual creating the trust or by will. It is a strategy most frequently used by the charitably inclined for estate or gift tax planning purposes. It can potentially provide benefits such as an income tax deductions or estate or gift tax savings on assets ultimately passed to the individuals designated as remainder beneficiaries. At the same time, the trust distributes regular payments to benefit a preferred charity or charities during the term of the trust.