New Jersey Home Transfer Planning

New Jersey doesn't yet have a settled, general-purpose transfer-on-death deed the way some other states do. A 2026 Senate committee statement describes S3679, which would establish a Uniform Real Property Transfer on Death Act and permit a TOD deed — but the statement describes a bill favorably reported with committee amendments, which is legislative material, not proof that a statutory TOD deed tool is already available for families to use (New Jersey S3679 committee statement).

This research also didn't turn up an enacted New Jersey statute creating a general real-property TOD deed, or any official source establishing a Lady Bird-style enhanced life estate deed as a standard Medicaid-planning tool in the state. The honest conclusion is that there's currently no confirmed statutory TOD or enhanced-life-estate deed option based on the sources reviewed — not that some deed arrangement is impossible for every title situation.

For a New Jersey home, the right starting point is the existing deed itself: current ownership, any mortgage or lien, who the intended beneficiaries are, the tax consequences, and how likely the owner is to need care soon. A New Jersey real-estate and elder-law attorney is the one who can actually determine whether a conventional deed, a retained interest, a trust, or simply no transfer at all is the right move under current law.