October 10
Professors' Corner - Uniform Directed Trust Act: Promises and Frustrations
Tuesday, October 10, 2023
12:30pm – 1:30pm ET
Presented by the Joint Legal Education and Uniform Laws Group of the ABA Section of Real Property, Trust and Estate Law
Panelists include Robert Sitkoff, Harvard Law School; John Morley, Yale Law School; and Renee Salley, Bessemer Trust. Moderated by Bradley Myers, University of North Dakota Law School,
As directed trusts came to be viewed as a shrewd estate management tool, there was much legal uncertainty about the risks and responsibilities for trustees and trust directors. In 2017, the Uniform Law Commission promulgated the Uniform Directed Trust Act (UDTA), which purports to resolve many of the legal uncertainties about directed trust provisions by, among other things, imposing fiduciary duties on persons not formally trustees and providing guidance on issues of administration, such as filling vacancies and sharing information. To date, only 16 states have adopted the UDTA. This slow rate of adoption leaves practitioners in the precarious position of navigating the permissible uses and limits in cases of clients with assets in non-adopting states. The panelists will discuss the promises of the UDTA and frustrations as states resist embracing it.