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The utilisation of trusts for asset protection, estate planning and tax planning purposes has exploded over the last 20 years. I suspect many readers are currently trustees of trusts. I equally suspect that very few readers have read the Trustee Act 1956, which was essentially..

Property contracts, including sale and purchase agreements and building contracts, sometimes include clauses that can be harmful to the unwary. And by unwary, I simply mean people who are not used to dealing with such legal documentation.  One of the advantages of using a professional..

Women and moneyI reckon all women are in the protection business. Just look around. They are born protectors. They look out for their friends and family and are constantly trying to protect those they love. They even look out for friends of friends. Experience has..

As a professional trustee, I'm often asked two questions. First, what's the difference between trustee minutes and trustee resolutions and secondly, why are they so important?To answer the first question first, trustee minutes are really notes made of a meeting of trustees and the decisions..

Many people ask me what is a professional trustee is, what they do, and what value they can bring to a trust. Often, these people are considering how they want to structure their asset holdings and what sort of return they want to make from..

Last week a friend of mine unexpectedly passed away. His passing left behind many family members and friends in great pain. It also resulted in quite a nightmare when it came down to dealing with his business and his personal assets. Since this is a..

Life has a great way of teaching us lessons and one big lesson I've learned is this - if you get the right people on the bus, sitting in the right seats, life just flows a whole lot easier.  So, what's this lesson got to..

Ever have a property settlement about to go through and at the last minute your professional trustee has held up the game by asking pesky questions like “Why are you buying this?” or “Is this the right entity to be buying it in?”  What about..

As you are probably already aware, trusts now have more reporting requirements with the IRD. However, in some circumstances, trusts, especially family trusts, may have been made non-active with the IRD, which means there is no income to report (and no tax to pay). Although a..