Bill > SB1910

This bill makes several changes to Tennessee trust and estate law, including clarifying how wills can be admitted to probate if they meet the requirements of where they were signed, the testator's domicile at the time of signing, or specific Tennessee probate procedures. It also grants charitable organizations designated in a trust the same rights as individual beneficiaries, allowing them to receive notices and information, and empowers the attorney general and reporter to act similarly for charitable trusts. The bill streamlines the process for using "nonjudicial settlement agreements," which are agreements among interested parties to resolve trust matters without court intervention, by replacing references to "agreement of the qualified beneficiaries" with this term. It also increases the threshold for certain trust provisions from $100,000 to $250,000 and allows trustees to directly pay properly incurred expenses, including legal fees, from the trust estate, though this doesn't prevent a court from intervening. Furthermore, the bill clarifies that trustees, trust advisors, and trust protectors are generally not liable for losses or failure to maximize returns when managing closely held businesses, provided they act in good faith and in the best interest of the trust, and it allows for confidential trust information in court filings to be redacted or sealed without a prior court order under specific conditions to protect privacy. Finally, it modifies the definition of "family-owned" for tax purposes and makes technical corrections to existing statutes.