Practice area

Trust Administration

Counsel on trust administration, fiduciary duties, and beneficiary rights.

Trustees have a wide array of duties involving notices, asset management, taxes, accountings, and distributions.

Mr. Ofseyer regularly advises and represents fiduciaries — with a particular focus on professional and corporate trustees — as well as beneficiaries in trust and estate matters.

Post-mortem trust administration

Although trusts are touted for avoiding probate, administering a trust is far from automatic or easy, and the complex rules governing trusts are full of traps for the unwary.

Trust administration is relatively simple while the persons who created the trust — the trustors or settlors — are all alive and still administering it as trustees. But upon the death or incapacity of a settlor, the duties of a remaining or successor trustee can be very complicated. These duties, under the trust and state law, are quite serious: a trustee who fails to properly perform them can be held personally liable.

Successor trustee duties include, but are not limited to, the following.

Notice to Beneficiaries

If a trust becomes irrevocable in whole or in part at a settlor’s death, the trustee must notify the decedent’s heirs and trust beneficiaries of that fact, and of their right to request a copy of the trust, and their limited time to contest it.

Inventory and Appraisal

Identify, secure, and value trust assets as of the date of death — establishing tax basis and the baseline for accountings and distributions.

Creating and Administering any Sub-trusts

Many trusts must be split into certain sub-trusts upon a settlor’s death.

Decedent Income Taxes

Required personal returns must be filed for the decedent.

Fiduciary Income Taxes

Returns and taxes may be due for income earned at the trust level.

Estate Taxes

Estates worth more than $15 million (for deaths in 2026) may be subject to the Federal Estate Tax.

Accounting

Trust beneficiaries have the right to a complete accounting of the trust with a specific, statutorily prescribed form and content.

Distributions

Plan and document preliminary, final, or ongoing trust distributions.

Trust Litigation: Case Assessment and Strategy

Trust disputes can involve contested trusts, trustee misconduct or mismanagement, and control of a trust during incapacity.

PDEP offers an informed first assessment and litigation strategy. The firm analyzes the issues, and whether the dispute can be resolved without litigation, and — when litigation is warranted — leverages relationships with leading California trust litigation firms to connect clients with experienced trial counsel.

The first decision in a trust dispute is often the most important: whether to litigate, where, and with whom.

Trust disputes can involve short deadlines. Request a Case Evaluation or Litigation Referral.

Why Palm Desert Estate Planning?