Colorado Beneficiary Deed

Colorado's version of a death-transfer deed goes by a specific name — a beneficiary deed — and it isn't the same animal as a Florida-style enhanced life-estate deed. The statute defines it as a deed the owner can revoke that conveys real property effective only at death. An owner creates one by executing a deed that says "conveys on death," "transfers on death," or otherwise makes clear the transfer takes effect at death, then recording it with the county clerk and recorder before dying.

The statutory form spells out that the deed is revocable and doesn't transfer ownership until the grantor's death — a meaningfully different legal event than an immediate conveyance of a remainder interest or a completed lifetime gift. Recording isn't optional paperwork here: both the statute and the required form state the deed must be recorded before death to have any effect at all.

Here's the part that surprises families: Colorado law separately states that a person seeking or receiving the medical assistance described in the statute isn't entitled to it while a beneficiary deed is in effect, because the property counts as a resource. The statutory form itself warns that using this deed may disqualify the grantor from Medicaid — a sharp departure from states that treat a transfer-on-death tool mainly as a probate-avoidance convenience.