However, the statement in Mesler about the trustee's duty to
remaindermen has been repeated by another Florida court in NCNB National Bank of Florida v.
The revenue ruling may allow an individual to fractionalize the ownership of a single residence, place the interests into two or more QPeRTS with different
remaindermen, and use a minority interest discount in valuing the interests before applying the Sec.
These responsibilities relate to the interests of
remaindermen and the future needs of the current beneficiary.
The beneficiaries receiving the aforementioned tax benefits are normally the
remaindermen, not the income beneficiaries.
Decisions involving the improvement or sale of the homestead often involve conflicting interests among the life tenant and the
remaindermen. As difficult as these conflicts may be, federal estate and gift tax laws present an even more thorny dilemma with respect to homestead property when a sale of the homestead is contemplated by the surviving spouse and children.
The other category of beneficiaries are those who will receive the trust property itself, and these persons are referred to as
remaindermen. A beneficiary may be both an income beneficiary and remainderman.
With the first provision, upon the death of the husband the class of possible
remaindermen closes and there is no possibility of additional members being added to the class.
At the end of the term, the grantor was to enter into lease agreement with the
remaindermen (grantor's two sons), where the grantor would have the right to continue to reside in the cooperative apartment after the trust term ended.
With the arrival of the Prudent Investor Rule[1] and the development of the modern portfolio theory,[2] trustees now have great flexibility to invest aggressively and to improve the total return for both income beneficiaries and
remaindermen.
The tax burden is still on the same
remaindermen (50% on the son and 50% on the grandchildren in Choate; 20% on the son and 80% on the four grandchildren in Nossiter).
(One can visualize thousands of
remaindermen gasping their last breaths!)
In addition to the reduced valuation, the reversion provision avoids the possibility of having the residence includible in the grantor's gross estate and the loss of a potential marital deduction, by having the property pass to the
remaindermen. If the grantor retains such a reversion, the trust also becomes a grantor trust with respect to principal for income tax purpose (assuming the value of the reversion is greater than 5%).