What Is the Difference Between a Trustee and an Executor in Florida?

1. Two Different Jobs With Two Different Sources of Power

An executor is the person who settles a probate estate. Florida law uses the term personal representative for the same job, and the statute says so directly, listing executor among the older names the term replaces. A personal representative has no power at all until a Florida probate court appoints them and issues letters of administration.

A trustee manages property that belongs to a trust. The trustee’s power comes from the trust document, and a Florida trust is not supervised by a court unless someone asks a court to step in. A named successor trustee takes over under the trust’s own terms, often the same week the grantor dies.

The dividing line is title. Property titled in the dead person’s own name, with no beneficiary designation and no joint owner, goes through probate and belongs to the personal representative’s job. Property titled in the name of the trust belongs to the trustee’s job. A family with a funded living trust may need no personal representative at all, and a family whose parent left only a will needs no trustee unless the will creates one.

2. What a Trustee Named in a Will Actually Does

People search for a trustee for a will because their parent’s will names one. A will names a trustee for one of two reasons, and the reason decides what happens next.

The first reason is a trust written into the will itself. Lawyers call it a testamentary trust, and it is common in wills that hold a young child’s share until a set age. A testamentary trust does not exist while the parent is alive. The will goes through probate, the personal representative pays the bills, and only then does the trustee receive the property and start managing it for the child.

The second reason is a pour-over will. The parent already signed a living trust, and the will leaves anything still in the parent’s own name to the trustee of that trust. Florida law says property left this way joins the existing trust and is not held in a separate testamentary trust. The trustee of the living trust is usually already at work on everything that was titled to the trust, and the pour-over will only catches what was missed.

In both cases the personal representative acts first and the trustee receives what the probate estate delivers. The trustee never controls property that is still in probate.

3. The Personal Representative’s Job, Step by Step

The person named in the will has first priority for appointment, and the court appoints them by issuing letters. Unless the will or the court waives it, the personal representative files a bond with a surety, which is an insurance-backed promise to cover losses the personal representative causes. Florida law holds a personal representative to the same standard of care as a trustee and directs them to settle the estate as quickly and efficiently as the estate’s interests allow, without asking the court for permission at each step.

The work runs in a fixed order.

1. Collect and inventory the property that was in the person’s own name.
2. Pay the bills in the order Florida sets, eight classes in all, starting with the costs of administration and funeral expenses up to $6,000, and ending with ordinary creditors.
3. Wait out the distribution period. A personal representative cannot be required to hand any gift or share to an heir until 5 months after letters are issued.
4. File a final accounting and a petition for discharge with a plan of distribution, then distribute. The court’s order of discharge releases the personal representative.

Our guide to the Florida personal representative covers each step in more detail, and the personal representative fee schedule shows what the job pays.

4. The Trustee’s Job, Step by Step

A trustee accepts the job by following the method the trust provides, or by taking delivery of trust property or acting as trustee. A person named as trustee may decline instead, and someone who does not accept within a reasonable time is treated as having declined. Once accepted, the trustee must administer the trust in good faith, following its terms and purposes and the interests of the beneficiaries. Our guide to the Florida successor trustee covers taking over and proving authority to a bank.

After the grantor of a living trust dies, the trustee has four early tasks.

1. File a notice of trust with the court in the county where the grantor lived, so the court and any personal representative know the trust exists.
2. Send the two 60-day notices to the qualified beneficiaries, one of the trustee’s acceptance and one of the trust becoming irrevocable, which tells them they can ask for a copy of the trust and are entitled to accountings.
3. Cover the estate if it runs short. A revocable trust is liable for the estate’s expenses and debts to the extent the probate estate cannot pay them, so the trustee and the personal representative have to talk before either one distributes.
4. Account every year to the qualified beneficiaries once the trust is irrevocable. Our guide to Florida trust accounting shows what the report must contain.

The rest of the process, including how long a trust administration takes, is in our guide to Florida trust administration. What the beneficiaries can demand from the trustee is in our guide to Florida trust beneficiary rights.

5. Who Can Serve in Each Role

Florida sets real limits on who can serve as personal representative. The person must be at least 18, must not have a felony conviction or a conviction for abusing, neglecting or exploiting an elderly or disabled adult, and must be mentally and physically able to do the work. A Florida resident who meets those rules qualifies. A person who lives outside Florida qualifies only as a close relative of the person who died, such as a child, grandchild, parent, spouse, brother, sister, uncle, aunt, nephew or niece, or the spouse of one of them. A longtime friend in Georgia cannot serve.

No residence rule applies to trustees. Florida’s own statute on trustee pay recites that any person, regardless of state of residence and including a family member, friend or corporate fiduciary, is eligible to serve as a trustee unless the trust disqualifies them. The residence rule is a practical reason families with children in other states choose a living trust over a will.

The pay rules differ too. A personal representative’s fee follows a statutory schedule of presumed reasonable fees tied to the size of the estate, and a trustee is entitled to reasonable compensation when the trust sets no fee. Our page on Florida trustee fees covers what reasonable tends to mean.

6. When One Person Holds Both Roles

Holding both jobs is common and entirely allowed. A parent with a living trust and a pour-over will usually names the same child as successor trustee and as personal representative, so one person handles the small probate that collects a forgotten account and then receives that account as trustee.

The two jobs still run on separate tracks, and the person holding them has to keep them apart.

• Separate records and accounts. The estate has its own bank account and the trust has its own. Money moves from the estate to the trust only as a documented distribution.
• Separate fees. The personal representative’s fee and the trustee’s fee are figured under different rules and paid from the property each job manages. A Florida appeals court held in 2022 that a woman serving as personal representative and as testamentary trustee could be paid from homestead sale proceeds for her trustee work, and could not be paid from them for her personal representative work.
• Separate duties. As personal representative the person answers to the court and to the estate’s beneficiaries. As trustee the person answers to the trust’s qualified beneficiaries, and owes them the notices and annual accountings described above.

A court can remove a trustee and a personal representative in the same order when one person neglects both jobs, and the story at the bottom of this page shows how that happens.

What Does It Cost to Handle a Probate or a Trust Administration?

Our probate fees start at a flat fee from $3,500 for a routine formal administration, and a summary administration for a smaller estate starts at $2,500. A trust administration after a death is a flat fee quoted at consult, because the work depends on what the trust holds and what the beneficiaries need. Court costs such as filing fees, publication and certified copies are additional and passed through at what the government charges. Advertised fees are honored for 90 days from the posted date. If a dispute turns into a lawsuit, that work is litigation, and we quote it per matter rather than as a flat fee.

Most families bring us one of two questions, whether a probate is needed at all given the trust, and who should do what in the first month. Both are answered in the free consult, and you do not need to have the documents sorted first.

Frequently Asked Questions

Common Situations

The trust that missed one account. A father’s living trust holds his house and his brokerage account, but a certificate of deposit opened two years before he died is in his own name. His daughter is successor trustee and also the personal representative under his pour-over will. She opens a small probate to collect the certificate of deposit, pays what the estate owes, and then transfers the balance to herself as trustee.

The out-of-state friend. A widow’s will names her closest friend, who lives in North Carolina, as personal representative. The friend is not a relative, so she cannot qualify in Florida, and the court appoints someone else under the statutory order of preference. Had the widow put her property in a living trust, the same friend could have served as trustee.

Sources of Law

• Fla. Stat. §731.201(28) (personal representative defined, including what has been known as an executor).
• Fla. Stat. §§733.617(1)-(2) (personal representative’s commission presumed reasonable on a schedule tied to the estate’s value), 733.301(1)(a) (preference for the person nominated by the will), 733.302 (Florida residents qualify), 733.303(1) (persons not qualified), 733.304 (nonresidents, relatives only), 733.402(1),(4) (bond unless waived by the will or the court), 733.504 (removal of a personal representative), 733.602(1) (standard of care of trustees; settle expeditiously), 733.603 (proceed without court order), 733.707(1),(3) (order of payment; revocable trust liable when the estate is insufficient), 733.801(1) (no required distribution until 5 months after letters), 733.901 (final discharge).
• Fla. Prob. R. 5.400(a) (final accounting and petition for discharge with a plan of distribution).
• Fla. Stat. §§732.513(1),(5) (devises to the trustee of an existing trust; not held under a testamentary trust unless the will says otherwise); 732.901(1) (deposit of the will within 10 days after death).
• Fla. Stat. §736.0103 (annotated)(21),(27) (settlor includes a testator; trustee defined), §736.0201 (annotated)(3) (no continuing judicial supervision unless ordered), §736.0401 (annotated)(1) (trust created by will), §736.05053 (trustee’s duty to pay expenses and obligations of the settlor’s estate), §736.05055(1) (notice of trust), §736.0701(1)-(2) (accepting or declining), §736.0702 (annotated)(1) (trustee’s bond), §736.0706(2)(c) (removal for persistent failure to administer), §736.0708(1),(4)(a)1. (reasonable compensation; any person regardless of residence eligible to serve as trustee), §736.0801 (duty to administer), §736.0813 (annotated)(1)(a),(b),(d) (60-day notices; annual accountings).
• Case retold below: Gnaegy v. Morris, No. 3D22-2065 (Fla. 3d DCA Dec. 13, 2023) (removal of a daughter serving as personal representative and trustee). Fee point in section 6: Lanford v. Phemister, No. 5D21-1015 (Fla. 5th DCA Apr. 8, 2022). Opinions read in full; retrieved September 30, 2026.

What Happens When One Person Neglects Both Jobs

The calls I take about this almost always come from a brother or sister of the person who holds both jobs. One sibling is the personal representative and the trustee, the others are beneficiaries, and a year has gone by with no inventory and no accounting.

A decision of a Florida appeals court in December 2023 follows that exact shape. A father in Miami-Dade died in 2019 with a will and a revocable trust. His property included bank accounts, his homestead, an IRA, an avocado farm of more than six acres, shares in a family company and a loan that company owed him. He named one daughter as both personal representative and trustee. She and her husband were directors of the company that owed her father money, so as personal representative she was the one who had to collect a debt from a company she helped run. She hired her father’s lawyer and an accountant, and she waited more than a year after his death to open the probate. Once the court appointed her, she did not follow its order, which called for an inventory and for the cash to go into a court-designated depository, and she gave the trust beneficiaries no notice of her acceptance and no accounting. Her sister sued. The trial court removed her from both jobs and appointed the sister in her place, and the appeals court affirmed. Her defense was that she relied on the lawyer and the accountant she had hired, and that defense did not save either appointment.

My reading of that case is that the two jobs failed together because nobody kept them apart. In reviewing Florida cases where one person held both roles, I have a few take-home points.

The first is the calendar. A probate order carries deadlines, including an inventory and, in that case, a 12-month target to close, and a trust carries its own 60-day notices. A person holding both jobs needs one calendar with both sets of dates on it, because the court enforces the first set and the beneficiaries enforce the second.

The second is the conflict. A child who is also a director of a company that owes the parent money is collecting a debt from herself. The practice pointer is to disclose that conflict to the other beneficiaries in writing at the start, and to let someone else decide how the loan is collected.

The third is advice of counsel. Relying on a lawyer is sensible, and the court in that case still held the fiduciary responsible for the orders she did not follow. Avoid treating the lawyer’s silence as permission to let a deadline pass, because the deadline belongs to the personal representative and the trustee, and so does the consequence.

An owner can head this off at the drafting stage. A parent who names one child in both roles can require the trust to deliver an annual accounting by a fixed date and can name a second child or an independent person with the power to remove the trustee. Removing a fiduciary through the court is litigation, and I quote that per matter at the consult. One limit is worth stating plainly. The appeals court reviewed only the removal, because the rest of the order was not yet final, so the case does not tell us what the daughter ultimately owed.

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.