How Much Does It Cost to Maintain a Trust in Florida?

1. Does It Cost Money to Keep a Trust?

For most Florida families, no. A revocable living trust with you as trustee has no annual fee, no court filing and no separate bank account requirement. You manage your house and your accounts exactly as before, and you sign as trustee instead of in your own name.

Florida’s trust code says a trust is not under continuing court supervision unless a court orders it, and while a trust is revocable the trustee’s duties run to you alone. Nobody is entitled to an accounting, so there is no accountant to pay for one. The IRS treats a revocable trust as a grantor trust, which means its income goes on your own Form 1040 under your own Social Security number. Our guide asking does my trust need a tax return covers the rule.

A revocable trust has two real upkeep costs, and both are occasional. The first is titling new property into the trust, such as a deed when you buy a new home or a new brokerage account opened in the trust’s name, because an asset outside the trust goes through probate. The second is a review when your family changes, such as a marriage, a divorce or a death in the family, or when the law changes, so the trust still says what you want. Our guide on how to fund a trust in Florida covers the titling.

2. Is There a Yearly Fee for a Trust?

Florida charges no yearly fee for a trust. Florida has no trust registry, no annual report and no state income tax, so a trust owes the state nothing each year. Our page asking is a trust public record in Florida explains why the trust is never filed anywhere while you live.

The only yearly fee is the one a paid trustee charges. A bank or trust company serving as trustee bills an annual fee under its published schedule, usually taken from the trust quarterly. A family member serving as trustee is entitled to reasonable compensation under Florida law, and many waive it, because a fee is taxable income to the trustee and an inheritance is not.

3. What Is the Average Fee to Manage a Trust?

Florida sets no percentage for trustee fees. If the trust sets the fee, the trustee is paid as the trust says, and a court can adjust it only where the job turned out substantially different or the specified fee is unreasonably low or high. If the trust is silent, the trustee is entitled to compensation that is reasonable under the circumstances. Our page on what a Florida trustee is paid covers the statute.

In practice, published bank and trust company schedules commonly run about 0.5% to 1.2% of trust assets a year on the first million dollars, stepping down on larger balances, with minimum annual fees often in the low thousands. On a $600,000 trust, a 1% fee is $6,000 a year. A trust company may add charges for real estate, tax preparation or unusual assets. Our guide to Florida trustee fees covers the schedules and how to challenge a fee.

Naming two trustees does not ordinarily double the fee. The Florida Supreme Court held in 1958 that co-trustees ordinarily share the compensation one trustee would have earned, unless the trust or special assets call for more. A lawyer who drafts a trust naming himself or his firm as trustee cannot collect a trustee fee unless he is related to you or you sign a separate written acknowledgment of three disclosures, one of which is that any person, including a family member or friend in any state, can serve.

4. How Much Does a Trust Cost Monthly?

A revocable trust with you as trustee costs nothing a month. A trust with a professional trustee costs the annual fee divided by twelve, so a $1,000,000 trust at a 1% fee costs about $833 a month, and a $300,000 trust at a trust company with a $3,000 minimum costs $250 a month. The monthly figures do not include tax preparation for an irrevocable trust, which the trust pays separately.

5. How Much Does It Cost to Maintain an Irrevocable Trust?

An irrevocable trust costs more to keep, because it is usually its own taxpayer. A non-grantor irrevocable trust needs its own taxpayer identification number and files Form 1041 for any year it has taxable income or gross income of $600 or more. A trust that keeps its income pays federal tax at 37% on retained income above about $16,000 in 2026, a rate a single person does not reach until taxable income passes $640,600. The trustee’s accountant charges for the return every year.

An irrevocable trust also owes its qualified beneficiaries a written accounting at least once a year, as well as on termination and on a change of trustee. A family trustee can prepare it with good records, and many hire an accountant. A beneficiary can waive the accounting in writing, which saves that cost. Our guide to Florida trust accounting covers what the accounting must show.

Some irrevocable trusts are grantor trusts on purpose, such as many Medicaid asset protection trusts and spousal lifetime access trusts, and those report their income on the creator’s own return. The drafting decides which kind you have, and it decides the yearly cost with it.

6. What Does a Trust Cost After the Owner Dies?

The largest cost of most trusts comes once, at death, when the successor trustee administers it. The trustee files a notice of trust with the court, sends the 60-day notices to the beneficiaries, pays the bills, files the final income tax return and the trust’s own returns, and distributes the property. Our guide to Florida trust administration covers each step, and the successor trustee guide covers the first 30 days.

Florida sets a presumed-reasonable fee for the lawyer who advises the trustee in that initial administration, at 75% of the schedule for probate attorneys. On a $500,000 trust that comes to $11,250, compared with $15,000 on the same estate in probate. The lawyer must disclose in writing that the fee is not mandatory, that it is negotiable, and that the trustee may choose any lawyer. A flat fee agreed in advance is allowed and often lower. Florida pays these trust administration expenses, including the trustee’s fee and the trustee’s lawyer, before any of the estate’s debts the trust has to cover.

7. Who Pays the Costs of a Trust?

The trust pays its own costs, and the beneficiaries bear them indirectly. A trustee is entitled to be reimbursed from the trust for proper expenses, and the trustee’s fee and the trustee’s lawyer are paid from trust assets. Florida’s principal and income rules, and the trust’s own terms, decide whether a cost comes out of income or principal, and that choice matters when one person receives the income for life and another receives what is left. Our page on trustee expenses covers reimbursement.

Florida also lets a small trust close when it costs more than it is worth. A trustee of a trust worth less than $50,000 may terminate it after notice to the qualified beneficiaries, if the value no longer justifies the cost of administration, and a court can do the same for a larger trust. Our page on terminating a small trust covers the procedure, and our guide asking how long does a trust last covers the other ways a trust ends.

What Does It Cost to Set Up a Trust?

The Complete Trust Plan is a flat fee from $3,200, and $4,500 for a couple. The plan includes the revocable trust, the pour-over will, the power of attorney and health-care documents, one funding deed for your Florida home and help retitling your accounts, so the trust costs nothing to keep once it is signed. A revocable trust drafted on its own is a flat fee from $2,400, and each additional funding deed with a plan is a flat fee from $199. Trust administration after a death and a review of an existing trust are each a flat fee quoted at consult. Recording and other government costs are additional and passed through at cost. Advertised fees are honored for 90 days from the posted date. A dispute over trustee fees is litigation, which we quote per matter.

Frequently Asked Questions

Common Situations

The couple who feared an annual bill. A retired couple in Sarasota put off a trust for years because a friend told them trusts cost thousands a year. They serve as their own trustees, their income stays on their joint tax return, and their trust has cost nothing since the day they signed it. Their daughter, named as successor, will see the costs only at administration.

The bank trustee on a modest trust. A widower names a bank as trustee of a $250,000 trust for his grandson. The bank’s $3,000 minimum annual fee is 1.2% of the trust every year, before tax preparation. Naming his daughter as trustee, with the bank as a backup, would have cost the trust nothing a year.

Sources of Law

• Fla. Stat. §736.0708(1)-(3) (reasonable compensation where the trust is silent; compensation as specified, adjustable by the court; compensation for other services); §736.0708(4)(a)1. and (b) (a drafting attorney named as trustee is paid only if related to the settlor or after the settlor signs the written disclosure acknowledgment).
• Fla. Stat. §736.0201 (annotated)(3) (no continuing judicial supervision); §736.0603 (annotated)(1) (while revocable, the trustee’s duties are owed exclusively to the settlor); §736.0813 (annotated)(1)(d),(2),(4) (annual accountings for irrevocable trusts; written waiver; no duty to account to beneficiaries while revocable); §736.0709 (reimbursement of the trustee’s expenses); §736.0414(1)-(2) (termination of a trust under $50,000, or by the court, where value does not justify the cost of administration).
• Fla. Stat. §736.1007 (annotated)(1)(a)-(b),(2) (trustee’s attorney in the initial administration of a revocable trust; required disclosures; presumed-reasonable fee at 75 percent of the §733.6171(3) schedule); §733.6171(3) (the probate attorney schedule); §736.05053 (annotated)(4) (trust administration expenses paid before the estate’s obligations).
• 26 U.S.C. §6012(a)(4) (a trust files a return if it has taxable income or gross income of $600 or more); Treas. Reg. §1.671-4 (reporting of grantor trust income); Rev. Proc. 2025-32 (2026 rate tables for estates and trusts).
• Case retold below: West Coast Hospital Ass’n v. Florida National Bank of Jacksonville, 100 So. 2d 807 (Fla. 1958). Opinion read in full; retrieved September 30, 2026.

When a Simple Trust Paid Three Trustees

My reading of one of the oldest Florida trustee fee cases is that the cost of a trust is decided the day the owner picks the trustees. A Florida widow died in January 1950 and left her estate in a trust for a Clearwater hospital, in memory of her husband. She told her executors to sell everything and buy United States government bonds, keep the principal intact forever, and pay the income to the hospital twice a year. She named three trustees, a Jacksonville bank and two individuals, and about $800,000 of bonds went into the trust in April 1952.

Over the next 33 months the bonds paid $54,951.15 in income. The trustees paid themselves $19,993.78 in fees and claimed $3,506.60 more, and they charged part of those fees to the principal the widow had said to keep intact. The hospital objected, and the trial court approved a formula paying the bank a quarter of one percent of principal from income and another quarter of one percent from principal every year, with the two individual trustees splitting an equal amount on top. The Florida Supreme Court approved the bank’s fee, struck the separate fees for the two individuals so that all three trustees would share the bank’s one fee, and ordered every fee paid from income.

In reviewing the Florida cases on what a trust costs to run, I have a few take-home points.

The first is the number of trustees. The job here was buying government bonds and keeping the books, and the court said it could hardly imagine a simpler trust. Three trustees on a simple trust meant three sets of hands reaching for the income, and Florida’s answer was that the trust pays for one trustee’s work unless the trust says otherwise.

The second is the fee clause. The widow’s will said nothing about compensation, so the fee was fought over in court, and the trust paid the lawyers for that fight. Avoid leaving the fee unstated. A trust should say how the trustee is paid, whether co-trustees share one fee, and whether fees come from income or principal.

The third is the beneficiary’s leverage. The hospital was receiving about 83 cents of every income dollar, and it had to threaten a lawsuit to be heard. A trust that gives a beneficiary a simple way to see the fees and replace the trustee keeps that conversation out of court.

An owner can settle every one of these questions at the drafting stage, and every Complete Trust Plan I prepare, flat fee from $3,200, states how the trustee is paid. One limit applies. The court approved the fees only for the period in front of it and declined to bless the formula for future years, so the opinion does not tell us what the trust ultimately paid over its life.

Kevin D. Klagge, Esq., admitted in Florida since 2012. Each case described above is a decision of a Florida court rather than a matter handled by this firm. Past results do not guarantee a similar outcome.

Updated on September 30, 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, not legal advice, and no attorney-client relationship is created. Do not send confidential information until we have agreed to represent you.