Selecting Trustees and Drafting Trustee Powers

What this guide covers

• Match the fiduciary to the trust's duration, asset mix, and conflict level, and expect the right answer to change over the life of the trust.
• Limit a beneficiary-trustee's power over his own share to an ascertainable standard and route broader discretion to an independent trustee who is not a related or subordinate party under IRC 672(c).
• Enumerate powers over retention, concentration, business operation, tax elections, delegation, and situs change rather than relying on statutory defaults third parties will question.
• Directed-trust and protector structures are creatures of state law; allocate each function explicitly and confirm the governing state's protection for the directed trustee.
• Provide a private removal and successor-appointment mechanism, because court removal under UTC 706 is slow and expensive.
• Exculpatory clauses cannot reach bad faith or reckless indifference, and the Uniform Trust Code's mandatory core limits how far any instrument can go.

The full guide includes the detailed analysis, worked examples, statutory citations, and related resources below.