As an estate planning and elder law attorney, you may sometimes receive a request to serve as the trustee of an estate. While accepting this role may seem like a natural extension of your counsel, it frequently exposes your practice to significant liability, administrative bottlenecks, and potential conflicts of interest.
At Peninsula Bay Trust Company, we offer will and trust administration services for lawyers designed to solve this dilemma. We position ourselves as a professional fiduciary partner, allowing you to maintain your role as trusted legal counsel while we manage the operational burdens of administration.
When attorneys step into the role of trustee, they exchange the advocate’s hat for the fiduciary’s hat. This transition carries inherent risks that can jeopardize both your practice and your relationships.
Acting as a trustee imposes a high standard of duty, often subjecting you to the prudent investor rule and strict statutory compliance. A well-intentioned administrative error or an investment oversight can quickly escalate into a malpractice claim or personal liability issue. By partnering with a corporate trustee, you transfer this liability to an institution built to manage it.
Trust administration requires meticulous attention to operational details, including bill paying, tax reporting, real estate oversight, and income collection. These time-consuming tasks often distract from high-value legal strategy. Partnering with a dedicated administrator ensures these duties are managed efficiently without consuming your billable hours.
Navigating family disputes while serving as both legal counsel and trustee is legally and ethically complex. A trustee must remain impartial, while an attorney is often viewed as an advocate. Working in this dual role can lead to accusations of bias, particularly in discretionary distribution decisions.
A corporate trustee and fiduciary offers stability that no individual can match:
Continuity and longevity: Unlike individual trustees, Peninsula Bay Trust Company does not face issues of illness, retirement, or mortality. We ensure the trust administration outlasts any single individual, providing security for multi-generational trusts.
Neutrality in high-conflict scenarios: A neutral third party is an essential resource for blended families or contentious estates. In this role, we execute the terms of the trust without emotional bias, serving as a “referee” that protects the grantor’s intent.
Regulatory compliance: As a state-regulated trust company, we maintain rigorous internal controls and accounting standards that most law firms cannot ensure compliance with in-house.
It is critical to clarify that we are not attorneys. Our role is to provide fiduciary oversight of the existing financial advisors to ensure compliance with the trust’s objectives.
As a trust administration partner for law firms, we collaborate with you to handle asset custody, beneficiary distributions, and real property management, while you continue to guide the legal strategy. In litigation scenarios, we often serve as a neutral agent for the trustee, helping to resolve deadlocks or manage assets while court proceedings resolve the underlying dispute.
We welcome the opportunity to connect and discuss how our services can support your firm. Contact Peninsula Bay Trust Company to schedule a consultation today.