Guest Post from Beth Aarons* Massachusetts estate planners enjoyed a collective sigh of relief as the Supreme Judicial Court (SJC) agreed to further appellate review of the Pfannenstiehl’s plight to determine whether the husband’s interest in his family’s trust should be divisible as a marital asset during divorce.  The SJC issued an opinion that such a trust should not be divided as part of the marital property.  [ SJC-12031 ] When the Pfannenstiehls appeared in case law three years ago, the MA Appeals Court had upheld the Probate and Family Court’s determination that the husband’s one-eleventh fractional beneficial interest in his family’s trust balance (there were 11 living beneficiaries at the time) was a marital asset, with 60% of his one-eleventh share to be paid to the wife as part of the property division in their divorce.  The class of trust beneficiaries was open to include any future descendants of the donor, but the lower court used the existing number...

We are pleased to announce that Attorney Kelsey will be speaking in an upcoming Strafford live phone/web seminar entitled: Divorce and Trust Assets: Support and Property Settlement Considerations Tuesday, June 19, 1:00pm-2:30pm EDT. Trusts present unique challenges when classifying and dividing marital assets in a divorce. Counsel must discover whether one of the parties to the marriage has an interest in a trust, the trust location, and the type of interest. The value of the trust and history of distribution to one of the parties can be relevant in determining support and asset division. Counsel should identify the type of trust, methods for valuing the parties' interest, and ways to reach or protect the beneficiary’s assets from a family law perspective. My fellow panelists and I will prepare family law practitioners with best practices to represent the interests of parties in discovering trusts and classifying a party’s interest in the trust as a marital asset. The p...

According to this recent Daily Mail article , Athelstan Whaley, a millionaire hotel tycoon will be left practically penniless by a UK divorce court's order. Whaley claims that the main source of his wealth, a family trust, cannot be accessed to pay for his divorce settlement, despite the fact that the Judge took the trust into account when calculating the divorce payout. In order to pay the settlement, he will have to use all of his liquid assets including selling his house, and claims that this will make him homeless. While it's hard to feel bad for a millionaire, a family trust could put any divorcing spouse in this position. In Massachusetts the division of marital property in a divorce case is controlled by M.G.L. Chapter 208 Section 34 , which states in pertinent part: "In addition to or in lieu of a judgment to pay alimony, the court may assign to either husband or wife all or any part of the estate of the other, including but not limited to, all vested and no...