Can a trustee also be a trust beneficiary?

Yes, a trustee can also be a beneficiary of that trust. In fact, this is done commonly, especially with spouses.

You might think that making the trustee a trust beneficiary would eliminate any asset protection benefits of the trust. However, according to section 736.0504 of the Florida Statutes, this is not entirely the case. As long as the trustee’s discretion in trust distribution to himself or herself is limited to an ascertainable standard, trust creditors cannot force distributions outside of that standard. For example, if the trustee is allowed to distribute assets to himself only for medical expenses, a payday loan creditor would have no ability to force distributions from the trust because the debt has nothing to do with medical expenses. But if the trustee/beneficiary owed a medical debt, then the assets could be distributed, even though the creditor will end up with those assets.

On the other hand, if the trustee has complete discretion to distribute assets to himself or herself whenever desired for whatever purpose, then there is no asset protection benefit to the trust. Additionally, if the debt is related to the ascertainable standard, then the creditor can still access the trust assets. Simply put, the creditor has the same rights to the trust assets that the trustee/beneficiary has. If the trustee/beneficiary has the authority to distribute the assets, then the creditor has the ability to access those assets by forcing the distribution and attaching an interest to that distribution.