What Section 736.0801 Says
Here is the whole section, quoted from the Legislature’s own text.
Upon acceptance of a trusteeship, the trustee shall administer the trust in good faith, in accordance with its terms and purposes and the interests of the beneficiaries, and in accordance with this code.
One sentence, one trigger, and four things administration has to accord with. It has never been amended since it took effect on July 1, 2007.
Everything else in Part VIII is this sentence made specific. Loyalty is administering solely in the beneficiaries’ interests. Impartiality is doing it fairly between them. Prudence is doing it carefully. The duty to inform and account is showing that you did.
Upon Acceptance, and Why That Phrase Matters
The duties attach when the trusteeship is accepted. Not when the settlor dies, not when the trust is funded, not when a beneficiary first asks a question.
That is worth stating plainly because the most common failure in family trusts is not dishonesty, it is a relative who agreed to serve, did nothing for two years, and assumes the clock had not started. Under this section it had.
It also cuts the other way for someone deciding whether to take the role. Acceptance is the moment of exposure, and it is a decision worth making deliberately rather than by signing whatever the estate lawyer put in front of you.
Why It Almost Never Appears Alone
Look at how Florida courts actually use it. In 2014 the Third District found a bank co-trustee liable, and named three duties in one sentence.
The failure of Wells Fargo to carry out the terms of the Trust, under the factual circumstances of this case, violated sections 736.0801, Florida Statutes (2010) (duty to administer the trust in good faith, in accordance with its terms and purposes and the interests of the beneficiaries), 736.0803 (duty to act impartially as among beneficiaries), and 736.0804 (duty to prudently administer the trust by considering the purposes, terms, distribution requirements, and other circumstances of the trust). These breaches of duty establish the liability of the co-trustees for a breach of trust. § 736.1001(1), Fla. Stat.
Kritchman v. Wolk, 152 So. 3d 628 (Fla. 3d DCA 2014).
That is the pattern. A single course of conduct, here a refusal to pay a student’s tuition the settlor had directed, breaches the general duty and the specific ones together, and the court moves straight to liability under the remedies section.
It also means something for a claim. If a trustee has genuinely failed to administer, you are rarely arguing about one section. Our pages on impartiality and prudent administration cover the other two duties in that sentence.
The Clearest Statement Comes From a Federal Court
The fullest description of what this duty demands is not from a Florida appellate court. It is from a federal district judge in the Middle District of Florida, hearing a bankruptcy appeal in 2014.
Here, West was Co-Trustee before he entered into the Fee Agreement with Aleta. Accordingly, as the Bankruptcy Court held, he had the duty to do more than simply not to act unreasonably. He had the duty to "administer the trust in good faith, in accordance with ... the interests of the beneficiaries," and to "administer the trust solely in the interests of the beneficiaries." Fla. Stat. §§ 736.0801 and 736.0802 (emphases added).
West v. Chrisman, 518 B.R. 655 (M.D. Fla. 2014).
Read the first half of that. More than simply not to act unreasonably. This is not a negligence standard with a fiduciary label; it is an affirmative obligation to administer in a particular way.
The court added the disclosure obligation that travels with it.
And he had "[the] obligation to make full disclosure to the beneficiary of all material facts." First Union Nat'l Bank v. Turney, 824 So.2d 172, 188 (Fla. 1st DCA 2001).
West v. Chrisman, 518 B.R. 655 (M.D. Fla. 2014).
The co-trustee had not lied. He had signed a beneficiary up to a fee agreement without telling her the fee was not mandatory, and the resulting debt of $212,478 was held non-dischargeable in his bankruptcy.
Because it is a federal court applying Florida law, it is persuasive rather than binding on a Florida state court. Our page on the duty of loyalty covers that case in full.
The Two Enforcement Duties Beside It
In 2018 Florida’s Fifth District reversed a summary judgment and, in doing so, put this section next to two provisions that rarely get attention.
Therefore, questions of fact remain over Appellant's breach of fiduciary duty claim. See § 736.0801, Fla. Stat. (2013) ("[T]he trustee shall administer the trust in good faith, in accordance with its terms . . . ."); id. § 736.0811 ("A trustee shall take reasonable steps to enforce claims of the trust . . . ."); id. § 736.0812 ("A trustee shall take reasonable steps to compel a former trustee or other person to deliver trust property to the trustee . . . .").
Prewitt v. Kimmons, 237 So. 3d 1158 (Fla. 5th DCA 2018).
Those two are worth knowing about. A trustee is not entitled to sit on a claim the trust could bring, and a successor trustee is not entitled to shrug about property the previous trustee never handed over. If that is your complaint, the general duty is not the only provision in play. The handover obligation on the outgoing side is on our §736.0707 page.
What Florida Courts Have Not Decided
On August 13, 2026 we searched Florida state and federal decisions for this section number, restricted to Florida courts, and found five. We read them all.
None construes what administering in good faith requires. The 2014 Third District decision finds the duty breached without analysing it. The 2018 Fifth District decision quotes it in support of a finding that fact questions remained. A 2016 Second District decision cites it in a single sentence with no quotation, for the proposition that dividing the trust is the trustee’s job rather than the court’s. A 2014 Fourth District decision cites it in a string citation in a case really about service of process. The federal decision is the fullest treatment and it is not binding.
So the section is invoked constantly and interpreted almost never, which is what you would expect of a provision that states a standard everyone accepts and litigates through its more specific offspring.
A section-number search does not find decisions that discuss a provision without naming it, and we have not run a citator pass.
Frequently Asked Questions
What Does a Florida Trustee Have to Do?
Section 736.0801 states the core obligation. Upon acceptance of a trusteeship, the trustee shall administer the trust in good faith, in accordance with its terms and purposes and the interests of the beneficiaries, and in accordance with the Code. Four things have to line up at once. Good faith, the terms of the document, its purposes, and the beneficiaries interests, all within the framework of the Trust Code. The rest of Part VIII, loyalty, impartiality, prudence, records, information, is that sentence broken into specifics.
When Do a Trustee s Duties Begin?
On acceptance of the trusteeship. That is the trigger the statute names, and it is worth being precise about because it is often earlier than people assume. Duties do not wait until the settlor dies, until the trust is funded, or until a beneficiary makes a request. Somebody who has accepted the role is administering from that moment, and a trustee who accepts and then does nothing for a year has not avoided the duty, they have arguably breached it.
Can a Trustee Follow the Trust and Still Breach This Duty?
In principle yes, because the section requires more than obedience to the text. Administration must accord with the trust s terms and its purposes and the beneficiaries interests and the Code. A trustee who follows a literal reading in a way that defeats the evident purpose of the trust is not obviously within the section. Florida s appellate courts have not construed that tension under this section, so it is an argument from the statutory words rather than from authority.
Has a Florida Court Found a Breach of This Section?
Yes. In 2014 Florida s Third District held that a corporate co-trustee s failure to carry out the terms of a trust violated this section, together with the duties of impartiality and prudent administration, and that those breaches established liability for a breach of trust. The facts were a bank that stopped paying a young beneficiary s university expenses which the settlor had directed be paid. What the court did not do is separately analyse what administering in good faith requires, so the decision establishes that the duty can be breached without explaining where its edge is.
What Is the Clearest Statement of the Duty?
It comes from a federal court applying Florida law, which makes it persuasive rather than binding. In a 2014 bankruptcy appeal a district judge in the Middle District of Florida said a co-trustee had the duty to do more than simply not to act unreasonably, because he had the duty to administer the trust in good faith in accordance with the interests of the beneficiaries and to administer it solely in their interests, together with an obligation to make full disclosure of all material facts. The co-trustee had signed a beneficiary up to a fee agreement without telling her the fee was not mandatory, and the resulting debt survived his bankruptcy.
Does the Trustee Have to Chase Money Owed to the Trust?
Yes, and that duty sits in a neighbouring section most people never read. In 2018 Florida s Fifth District cited this section alongside two others. Section 736.0811 requires a trustee to take reasonable steps to enforce claims of the trust, and section 736.0812 requires reasonable steps to compel a former trustee or other person to deliver trust property to the trustee. If your complaint is that a trustee is sitting on a claim the trust could bring, or has not chased the previous trustee, those are the provisions to look at.
Is the Court or the Trustee Supposed to Make These Decisions?
The trustee, and a Florida court has said so when declining to do the job itself. In a 2016 Second District case about how a trust should be divided, the court observed that the actual division depending on the circumstances at the settlor s death would appear, under both the terms of the trust and statutory law, to be a task for the corporate trustee to perform as trustee, citing this section. Courts construe documents and review conduct. They are reluctant to administer trusts, and this section is why.
Common Situations
The relative who accepted and then did nothing. A brother agreed to serve as trustee eighteen months ago and has not opened an account, filed a return, or spoken to anyone. The duty attached on acceptance, so the question is not whether he has started yet but what the delay has cost.
The claim nobody is bringing. A trust has a good claim against a third party and the trustee will not pursue it, perhaps because the defendant is family. Section 736.0811 requires reasonable steps to enforce claims of the trust, and a Florida court has cited it alongside this section.
The bank that read the trust narrowly. A corporate trustee declines to make a payment the settlor plainly directed, relying on a technical reading of the document. That is close to the 2014 case, where the court found the general duty breached along with impartiality and prudence.
Sources of Law
- Fla. Stat. §736.0801 (duty to administer trust). Official text, Online Sunshine, quoted in full above. History: s. 8, ch. 2006-217. Never amended since the Florida Trust Code took effect on July 1, 2007. (retrieved 2026-08-13)
- Related sections from the same official source: §736.0802 (duty of loyalty); §736.0803 (impartiality); §736.0804 (prudent administration); §736.0811 (enforcement of claims) and §736.0812 (compelling delivery of trust property) as quoted by the Fifth District above. (retrieved 2026-08-13)
- Kritchman v. Wolk, 152 So. 3d 628 (Fla. 3d DCA Oct. 1, 2014), No. 3D12-2977 and No. 3D12-2457, Salter, J. Quoted above. Reading note: the court found three duties breached by a single course of conduct, describing each in a short parenthetical, and did not separately analyse this one. Also discussed on our §736.0803, §736.0804 and §736.1009 pages. (retrieved 2026-08-13)
- West v. Chrisman, 518 B.R. 655 (M.D. Fla. Sept. 19, 2014), Honeywell, J., on appeal from the bankruptcy court. Quoted above. Reading note: a federal court applying Florida law, so persuasive and not binding on a Florida state court. The ellipsis inside the first quoted passage is the court’s own. (retrieved 2026-08-13)
- Prewitt v. Kimmons, 237 So. 3d 1158 (Fla. 5th DCA Feb. 9, 2018), No. 5D16-3076, Evander, J.; affirmed in part, reversed in part. Quoted above for the pairing of this section with sections 736.0811 and 736.0812. The bracketed capitalisation and the spaced ellipses in that passage are the court’s own conventions. (retrieved 2026-08-13)
- Vigliani v. Bank of America, N.A., 189 So. 3d 214 (Fla. 2d DCA Mar. 9, 2016), No. 2D14-4595, Altenbernd, J.; rehearing denied March 30, 2016. Referred to above, deliberately without quotation beyond the proposition described, for the observation that dividing the trust is a task for the trustee to perform. Source caveat: the online rendering of this opinion carries extensive character-level scanning damage elsewhere in its text. Nothing beyond the single clean sentence relied on has been taken from it. (retrieved 2026-08-13)
- Gap note, stated for the record: five Florida decisions cite this section and all five were read. We located no Florida decision construing what administering in good faith requires under this section. The fullest treatment is federal and therefore persuasive only. 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 courts’ own published words and the Legislature’s own statutory text. 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 trustee administered properly depends on the trust 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 a trustee has administered properly depends on the trust and the facts, which we review at a free consult. Please do not send confidential details until we have connected.
