Trust

A trust is a way of managing assets — money, investments, land or buildings — for people. Three roles sit at the centre of every trust: the settlor, who puts assets into the trust and usually sets out how they are to be used in a document called the trust deed; the trustee, who manages the trust; and the beneficiary, who benefits from it.

Trustees are the legal owners of the assets held in a trust, and their role is to deal with those assets according to the settlor's wishes as set out in the trust deed or their will. There might be more than one beneficiary, such as a whole family or a defined group of people, and — where the settlor can also benefit from the trust's assets — the arrangement is called a 'settlor-interested' trust and carries its own special tax rules.