Trust Decanting Requirements in Maryland

At a glance

Requirements one by one

Covered trust and fiduciary

Maryland Code, Estates and Trusts § 14-602 covers an express trust that is irrevocable or revocable only with consent of the trustee or an adverse-interest holder. The trust also needs a Maryland principal place of administration or one of the listed Maryland governing-law connections. The 2023 act makes the scheme retroactive to trusts created before, on, or after October 1, 2023.

Under § 14-601, the ordinary authorized fiduciary is a nonsettlor trustee or other fiduciary with discretion to distribute or direct distribution of some or all principal to a beneficiary. The definition also reaches a court-appointed special fiduciary and the special-needs fiduciary.

Expanded, limited, and special-needs routes

Estates and Trusts § 14-608 lets a fiduciary with expanded discretion decant covered principal, generally without adding current, presumptive-remainder, or successor beneficiaries or reducing a vested interest. It permits specified changes to powers of appointment, including a broader or different permissible-appointee class.

Limited discretion under § 14-609 is constrained by an ascertainable or reasonably definite standard. The second trusts in aggregate must preserve substantially similar beneficial interests, subject to narrow deferred- distribution and appointment-power changes written into that section.

Section 14-610's disability route can reach a nonsettlor fiduciary with principal discretion, then income discretion, and finally mandatory income or principal authority. It may reduce or eliminate the disabled beneficiary's vested interest when the special-needs requirements are met while generally preserving other beneficiaries' interests in aggregate.

Notice, delivery, and the exercise record

Estates and Trusts § 14-605 requires notice in a record at least 60 days before exercise to the listed settlors, qualified beneficiaries, present appointment-power holders, fiduciary removers, other fiduciaries of both trusts, and the Attorney General when applicable. The notice describes the manner and effective date and includes the first and all second trust instruments. All recipients may waive the period in signed records.

Since October 1, 2025, § 14-602.1 requires a reasonably suitable method likely to result in receipt. It specifies personal service, prepaid return-receipt mail, or prepaid confirmation-requested courier. First-class mail without a return receipt, fax with confirmation, or acknowledgment-requested email requires the recipient's written agreement and remains subject to revocation and an actual- nonreceipt safeguard.

The notice is not the exercise. Section 14-607 separately requires the authorized fiduciary to sign a record identifying both trusts, property distributed to each second trust, and property remaining in the first trust; the record may incorporate notice information by reference.

Court review and statutory saving rules

The default is no consent and no court approval. Under § 14-606, however, an authorized fiduciary or notice recipient may seek a permissibility ruling, appointment of a special fiduciary, approval, an ineffectiveness ruling, or other relief.

Reasonable care to comply with notice prevents a missed notice from automatically making the exercise ineffective. Section 14-619 separately preserves an exercise that otherwise complies when part of a second-trust instrument does not: the forbidden term is void or the required term is deemed included, and the fiduciary must take corrective action.

What trips people up

The 2025 delivery statute is easy to miss because it is numbered § 14-602.1 and sits between the original act's whole-numbered sections. An email or ordinary first-class mailing is not automatically enough: the alternative method requires written agreement, and a fiduciary who knows or should know notice was not received must use one of the primary methods.

An express decanting or further-trust restriction controls and must carry into the second trust. A generic no-amendment, no-revocation, spendthrift, or transfer- restraint clause alone does not.

Common questions

Can a second trust use another state's law?

Usually yes under the expanded and limited routes. A determinable charitable interest under § 14-611 can require Maryland administration unless the Attorney General does not object within 60 days, consents in a signed record, or a court approves.

Can a second trust last longer?

Its stated duration may differ, but property attributable to the first trust keeps the first trust's maximum-perpetuity, accumulation, and alienation- suspension rules.

What happens to property discovered later?

Under § 14-623, a complete decanting presumptively carries later property to the second trust; a partial decanting presumptively leaves it in the first trust, unless the exercise or second-trust terms provide otherwise. Estates and Trusts § 14-620 separately preserves an animal trust's intended purpose for the original period.

Statutes and sources

• Md. Code, Estates & Trusts §§ 14-601 to -625 — Maryland Trust Decanting Act baseline and retroactivity. Official 2023 Chapter 716 text (accessed September 12, 2026; all current section pages also checked).
• Md. Code, Estates & Trusts § 14-602.1 — current notice and document- delivery methods. Official current text (accessed September 12, 2026).
• 2025 Md. Laws ch. 221 — enacted § 14-602.1, effective October 1, 2025. Official chapter text (accessed September 12, 2026).