If You Can’t Beat ’Em, Join ’EmIf You Can’t Beat ’Em, Join ’Em

Over the last decade, trust law has evolved so the role of trustee can better reflect the open architecture that modern families desire. It’s now commonplace for trust settlors to design so-called “directed trusts,” and existing trusts are frequently transferred to new jurisdictions to be modified through the use of techniques such as decanting, non-judicial settlement agreements, consent modifications, court orders and trust mergers so they can become directed trusts.¹ Known as the “directed trust model,” these trusts permit duties traditionally held by a trustee to be held instead by an advisor. A directed trust is a trust whose governing instrument includes provisions that allow for a separate fiduciary (or possibly a non-fiduciary) c...