Help with family trust issue?

[Damap]

Just takes commitment and determination Wayne :-)

[donna]

This doesn't sound right.
If all the friend assets are in a Trust, then his Will would only distribute his personal assets (could include a debt the Trust owes him).
All the assets in the Trust would be governed by the Trust deed, and left for the other beneficiaries of the Trust. The remaining Trustees would administer and manage the Trust.

Maybe in your friend's case there is a big debt owing to him from the Trust, and this is his asset causing all the problems?

Ross

I don't know how his Trust was set up - and if it was set up correctly. I do know he did not have a will - so intestate - where his only living parent (Dad) gets the lot even if he's been absent for pretty much as long as the person who died was alive so the siblings have to spend $$ on lawyers to attempt to right the wrong so to speak and the lawyers costs are theirs - regardless of the outcome. If you don't have the readies to put up a good fight then I assume you just miss out.

cheers,

donna

[Wayne]

Yes you would miss out.
Rights and wrongs are view points - that is what the legal system would have to sort out.
If you don't want this to happen when you die then make a will.

[Ivan McIntosh]

Even I found it very difficult to do a will....especially when it came to choosing a method and place of dealing with my remains. I found it hard to face up to.

Has to be done tho, it avoids so many problems, and it's not expensive.

[Matt Gilligan]

The Trust Deed may, if you read it, have the power to remove and replace a trustee, but the chances are it is your dad who has that power. There will most likely be powers to remove on mental disability but it isn't certain and it is far from easy to get a doctor to certify someone incapable.

I think you need to talk to a lawyer, rather than an accountant, because removal of trustees for acting against the interests of beneficiaries is a court matter, not a structuring one, and to freeze sales etc would require an interim court order. Beneficiaries do go to court with trustees on a fairly regular basis in New Zealand.

I agree with this. But there are a lot of lawyers out there that say they are trust experts but they are in fact suburban property solicitors who set up trusts, a very different skill set to an experienced senior trust legal advisor who has experience with such matters.

To state the obvious, someone needs to talk to your dad and try to rationalise his decisions. That would be by far the best solution. Litigation would be very distructive to your family's life, and expensive.

Failing that it seems relatively easy in my experience to get trustees kicked out of a trust and replaced by administrators if they are behaving in a biased or incompetent manner. The problem is after you make a high court application to do this, if you are successful you end up with professional trustees who charge outrageous fees to do ordinary things, and being court appointed you can't stop them. Moreover your father will likely dislike or at least distrust you for attempting to interfere with his chosen life path. So if you go this path you really don't want to be the front guy on this.

Tricky, sad situation. Sorry to hear you are having to go through this. I can introduce you to a couple of good trust lawyers and litigators, email me for an introduction if you wish. But I would start with getting the accountants and lawyers and family around you that he respects, to stage an intervention and try to reason with him.

[Ivan McIntosh]

I agree with this. But there are a lot of lawyers out there that say they are trust experts but they are in fact suburban property solicitors who set up trusts, a very different skill set to an experienced senior trust legal advisor who has experience with such matters.

To state the obvious, someone needs to talk to your dad and try to rationalise his decisions. That would be by far the best solution. Litigation would be very distructive to your family's life, and expensive.

Failing that it seems relatively easy in my experience to get trustees kicked out of a trust and replaced by administrators if they are behaving in a biased or incompetent manner. The problem is after you make a high court application to do this, if you are successful you end up with professional trustees who charge outrageous fees to do ordinary things, and being court appointed you can't stop them. Moreover your father will likely dislike or at least distrust you for attempting to interfere with his chosen life path. So if you go this path you really don't want to be the front guy on this.

Tricky, sad situation. Sorry to hear you are having to go through this. I can introduce you to a couple of good trust lawyers and litigators, email me for an introduction if you wish. But I would start with getting the accountants and lawyers and family around you that he respects, to stage an intervention and try to reason with him.

All very good points raised by Matthew, and I certainly concur that court action is to be avoided if possible. My mention of court action was in the context of being forced to seek an interim freeze before assets are sold and proceeds disposed of, and getting good quality legal advice around that and your other present issues.

The "professional trustees" that tend to be appointed by the court are to be avoided like the plague, unless one wishes to pay fees that were once surveyed as twice as high than the most expensive blue-chip law firm you can think of.