What Section 736.0501 Says
The section is two sentences, quoted in full from the Legislature's own text.
Except as provided in s. 736.0504, to the extent a beneficiary's interest is not subject to a spendthrift provision, the court may authorize a creditor or assignee of the beneficiary to reach the beneficiary's interest by attachment of present or future distributions to or for the benefit of the beneficiary or by other means. The court may limit the award to such relief as is appropriate under the circumstances.
Read it from the middle and it is a creditor's provision. Read it from the start and it is two conditions and a discretion. The interest must not be subject to a spendthrift clause, section 736.0504 must not apply, and even then the court may limit the relief.
A drafter of the Trust Code called this "the basic statement of creditor remedy" for third-party trusts, which is right, provided you take the conditions seriously.
The Four Words Added in 2007
The opening clause has not always been there. As the Legislature enacted the section in chapter 2006-217, it began "To the extent a beneficiary's interest is not subject to a spendthrift provision, the court may authorize..." There was no reference to section 736.0504 at all.
Chapter 2007-153, section 11, added the words "Except as provided in s. 736.0504," to the front. The bill's own summary describes the change as limiting the ability of creditors or assignees of a beneficiary to reach the beneficiary's interest.
We take that from the two enrolled session laws, compared against each other, rather than from any commentary. It matters because it tells you the subordination of this section to the discretionary trust rule was a deliberate legislative choice made after the Code was written, not an accident of drafting or a judicial gloss.
Why a Discretionary Trust Leaves Nothing to Attach
The reason the carve out is so effective is not procedural. It is that in a discretionary trust there is nothing for an order to bite on. A drafter of the Trust Code put it in one sentence.
Importantly, the rights given to creditors under this section are limited to those cases where a beneficiary has a right to distributions. If distributions are discretionary, a beneficiary has no "attachable" trust interest.
David F. Powell, The New Florida Trust Code, Part 1, 80 Fla. B.J. 7 (July/August 2006).
A beneficiary of a discretionary trust has a right to be considered honestly by the trustee. That is a real right, and our page on Fla. Stat. 736.0814 is about enforcing it. But it is not a right to money, and only a right to money is something a court can order attached.
What This Section Does Reach
The section is not empty, and creditors do sometimes get orders under it. Where a beneficiary has a genuine right to distributions and no spendthrift clause applies, a court may authorise attachment of present or future distributions.
Two details are worth having. The attachment reaches distributions "to or for the benefit of" the beneficiary, which means a trustee cannot defeat an order by paying the beneficiary's bills instead of the beneficiary. And the court may limit the award to such relief as is appropriate, so these orders are commonly written as continuing writs against distributions as they are made rather than as a single lump collection.
If the trust is mandatory but the trustee has simply not paid, there is a separate and more direct route in Fla. Stat. 736.0506, which reaches an overdue mandatory distribution whether or not there is a spendthrift clause.
What Florida Courts Have Said
On August 13, 2026 we searched Florida state and federal decisions for this section number, restricted to Florida courts, and found one case.
It is the Fifth District's 2013 decision rejecting a constitutional challenge to Florida's spendthrift statutes, brought by lenders who were owed $350,000 and had been told the borrower had over six million dollars waiting in a trust. The court referred to sections 736.0501 to .0507 as a group and upheld them. Our page on Fla. Stat. 736.0502 sets that case out in full.
So we located no Florida decision construing the words of this section on their own. In practice that is unsurprising. The fight in a real case is almost always about whether the trust is discretionary, or whether a spendthrift clause is valid, and this section supplies the remedy once those questions are settled.
A section-number search does not find decisions that discuss a provision without naming it, and we have not run a citator pass, so this is a careful review on a stated date rather than a guarantee.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can a Creditor Reach a Beneficiary's Interest in a Florida Trust?
Sometimes, and this is the section that says how. Except as provided in section 736.0504, and to the extent the beneficiary's interest is not subject to a spendthrift provision, a court may authorise a creditor or assignee to reach the interest by attachment of present or future distributions to or for the benefit of the beneficiary, or by other means, and the court may limit the award to such relief as is appropriate under the circumstances. Two large conditions sit in front of that. There must be no spendthrift protection, and the trust must not be discretionary. In practice most Florida trusts are drafted to fail a creditor on at least one of them.
What Does "Except as Provided in s. 736.0504" Mean?
It means the discretionary trust rule wins. Section 736.0504 says a creditor of a beneficiary may not compel a distribution that is subject to the trustee's discretion, whether or not the discretion is subject to a standard and whether or not the trustee has abused the discretion. So where the trust is discretionary, the remedy this section appears to offer is not available. Those opening words were added by the Legislature in 2007, a year after the Trust Code was enacted, and the bill summary described the amendment as limiting the ability of creditors or assignees of a beneficiary to reach the beneficiary's interest.
Why Does a Discretionary Trust Defeat This Section?
Because there is nothing to attach. A drafter of the Florida Trust Code explained it in one line, writing that the rights given to creditors under this section are limited to those cases where a beneficiary has a right to distributions, and that if distributions are discretionary a beneficiary has no attachable trust interest. A right to be considered by a trustee is not the same as a right to be paid, and only the second is property a court can order attached.
What Can a Court Actually Order Under This Section?
Attachment of present or future distributions to or for the benefit of the beneficiary, or relief by other means, and the court may limit the award to what is appropriate. The phrase to or for the benefit of matters, because it reaches payments the trustee makes to third parties on the beneficiary's behalf rather than only cash handed over directly. The court also has express discretion to tailor the relief, so an order under this section is not an all or nothing proposition.
Is a Florida Spendthrift Trust Constitutional?
Yes, and creditors have tested it. In 2013 Florida's Fifth District rejected an argument that sections 736.0501 through .0507 violate article I of the Florida Constitution, reasoning that the creditor protection effect of a properly drafted spendthrift trust was recognised at common law long before those sections existed, so they did not remove a right creditors previously had. The court also distinguished between access to courts, which concerns filing nonfrivolous claims, and the ability to enforce a judgment, which the constitution does not guarantee. Our page on Fla. Stat. 736.0502 covers that decision in detail.
Has a Florida Court Construed Section 736.0501 Itself?
Not that we located. The one Florida decision citing it does so as part of a reference to sections 736.0501 to .0507 as a group, while deciding a constitutional challenge to the Part as a whole. So there is no Florida appellate decision we found interpreting the words of this section on their own, and that is our review on a stated date rather than a certainty. What that means practically is that the argument in a real case is usually about section 736.0504 or about whether a spendthrift clause is valid, and this section supplies the remedy once those questions are answered.
Common Situations
The judgment creditor who found the trust. A business creditor holds a judgment and discovers the debtor is a beneficiary of a family trust. Before anything else, the question is whether distributions are required or discretionary. If discretionary, this section gives nothing and section 736.0504 is why. That answer is cheaper to get from the document than from a motion.
The trustee paying the bills instead. A creditor obtains an order and the trustee begins paying the beneficiary's mortgage and utilities directly rather than sending money. The statute reaches distributions to or for the benefit of the beneficiary, so routing around the beneficiary is not the answer it looks like.
The trust with no spendthrift clause at all. Occasionally a homemade or older trust simply omits one. Then the first condition in this section is met, and the analysis moves straight to whether the distributions are mandatory. This is the situation the section was actually written for.
Sources of Law
- Fla. Stat. §736.0501 (rights of beneficiary's creditor or assignee). Official text, Online Sunshine. History: s. 5, ch. 2006-217; s. 11, ch. 2007-153. (retrieved 2026-08-13)
- Laws of Florida, ch. 2006-217, s. 5 (as enacted, beginning "To the extent a beneficiary's interest is not subject to a spendthrift provision") and ch. 2007-153, s. 11 (adding the opening words "Except as provided in s. 736.0504,"; the bill summary describes the amendment as limiting the ability of creditors or assignees of a beneficiary to reach the beneficiary's interest). The two enrolled chapters were compared directly; the change described on this page is taken from the session laws, not from a secondary source. (retrieved 2026-08-13)
- Related sections from the same official source: §736.0502 (spendthrift provision); §736.0504 (discretionary trusts); §736.0506 (overdue distribution). (retrieved 2026-08-13)
- Zlatkiss v. All America Team Concepts, LLC, 125 So. 3d 953 (Fla. 5th DCA 2013), No. 5D12-3324, which refers to sections 736.0501 to .0507 as a group while rejecting a constitutional challenge to those provisions. Reading note: it does not construe section 736.0501 on its own, and this page does not present it as doing so. Source and date caveats for that decision are set out on our §736.0502 page. (retrieved 2026-08-13)
- David F. Powell, The New Florida Trust Code, Part 1, 80 Fla. B.J. 7 (July/August 2006), at 24, quoted above for the limit on creditor rights where distributions are discretionary. The author was a drafter of the code and the article was published before it took effect. (retrieved 2026-08-13)
- Gap note, stated for the record: a search of Florida state and federal decisions for this section number, restricted to Florida courts, returned one case on August 13, 2026, and it cites the section as part of a group. We located no Florida decision construing the words of this section on their own. A section-number search does not find decisions that discuss a provision without naming it, and no citator pass was run.
- Quotation note: the passages above reproduce the Legislature's own statutory and session law text and a signed bar journal article by a named author. Nothing is drawn from a headnote, case summary, or other editorial layer of a commercial research service.
- Nothing on this page predicts a result. Whether a creditor can reach a particular interest depends on the trust's own terms and the facts.
Updated on August 13, 2026. Reviewed by Kevin D. Klagge, Esq., Fla. Bar No. 99502. Attorney Kevin Klagge represents families, businesses, and international clients in estate and tax planning, business structuring, and international law, with a focus on Florida legal tools. He litigates estate and business issues in court. General information about Florida law and published court decisions, not legal advice, and no attorney-client relationship is created. Whether this section reaches a particular trust interest depends on the document, which we review at a free consult. Please do not send confidential details until we have connected.
