What is a "Discretionary Trust"?

[galwayhous]

Roughly speaking, what is a "Discretionary Trust" and how might one set one up?

I am thinking of setting up a trust fund for the benefit of one of my adult children, who has a disability, to be administered jointly by myself and others.

Can anyone tell me - rougly speaking what the procedure is for setting up a trust fund?

 

[huskerdu]

A solicitor will give you more details, but I will recount what my solicitor told me in order to give you some idea.

A discretionary trust is where the trustees have discretion to make decisions about the money in the trust. I dont know how this would work for the situation you describe.

If you have more than one child, and stipulate in your will that your childrens inheritance goes into a trust until they are adults, then a discretionary trust is recommended as this allows the trustees to take money from the trust in exceptional circumstances, like illness of one of the children.