JDAIn 2009, John and Carol Bergerud irrevocably settled the Bergerud Heritage Trust ("BHT") with the $1,500. Some states, however, have statutorily validated self-settled trusts such that creditors cannot look to self-settled assets to satisfy their claims. One of the most interesting aspects of this case is the Court's commentary on whether the trust in this case was a similar device to a self-settled trust. If Congress meant to limit similar device to trust arrangements, Congress would have simply used similar trust instead⸺ but Congress did not. Thus, we end up with a similar device that we know is like a self-settled trust but is not limited to a trust arrangement.

Source: Forbes April 15, 2019 16:07 UTC