America’s Most Advisor-Friendly Trust Companies Showcase - Flipbook - Page 9
2026 ADVISOR-FRIENDLY TRUST COMPANIES
THE ROLE OF WEALTH
MANAGERS IN TRUST PLANNING
Wealth managers play a critical role in
integrating trusts into comprehensive
financial plans. Unlike estate attorneys
who draft the documents, wealth
managers focus on the long-term
financial implications of trust structures:
how they interact with broader wealth
transfer strategies, tax planning
objectives, and asset protection goals.
Recent research makes clear that 60%
of independent advisors now offer some
form of fiduciary capability, a significant
increase from prior years, reflecting the
degree to which trust services have
moved from a specialized niche to a
standard expectation among high-networth clients.
Trusts require periodic review to ensure
they remain aligned with evolving
financial goals and shifting regulatory
landscapes. Delaware’s Trust Act
2025, for example, updated provisions
around non-charitable purpose trusts,
beneficiary rights, and marital property
rules, reflecting the kind of incremental
but consequential legislative change
that advisors and their partners need to
monitor continuously.
The demand for sophisticated trust
structures will only grow as highnet-worth individuals seek greater
control over their wealth and as
the generational transfer of assets
accelerates. Advisors who can
integrate trust planning into a broader
financial strategy will strengthen client
relationships and establish themselves
as irreplaceable stewards of family
wealth across generations.
RETAIN AUM AND CAPTURE
NEW ACCOUNTS
Every advisor needs an edge. Wealthy
families today are not willing to settle
for someone who simply manages their
portfolio or delivers a template financial
plan. They’ve done their research. They
know what a comprehensive, holistic
advisory relationship looks like, and
they’re looking for one.
One of the most valued capabilities
on their list is the ability to create and
use trusts. While an individual can
technically run a trust, the complexity
and fiduciary burden make it difficult
and in most cases unwise for an advisor
to do so. The SEC has ruled that any
advisor seeking to serve as trustee or
trust administrator faces expensive and
demanding audits. A third party, almost
always a specialized corporate entity,
needs to handle administration.
The corporate trustee has the
resources and expertise to manage the
paperwork, meet filing deadlines, and
bear the fiduciary burden. In the past,
that arrangement tended to squeeze
the advisor out of the relationship. The
emergence of advisor-friendly trust
companies changed that equation
permanently.
To be genuinely advisor-friendly, a
trust company must pledge not to
compete with you. Unlike captive
trust departments that exist to give
their corporate parents access to
your clients, these companies have
unbundled trust administration from
wealth management and sell the
administrative function as a standalone
service. Conflicts of interest are
eliminated. They could not replace your
active management of client trust assets
even if they wanted to, and none of the
companies in this guide want to.
The trust industry still contains players
looking to compete directly with
advisors for asset control, but their
dominance has been meaningfully
eroded. Progressive trust companies
9
Estate Planning
Checklist
7 Musts Before Meeting with an Estate
Planning Lawyer
Create an Inventory
Identify Your Beneficiaries
Does Someone Need a
Guardianship?
Gather Essential Documentation
Choose an Executor
What If You Become Ill or
Incapacitated?
Generational Wealth
Management
understand that investment advisors
are the right people to manage the
investments, and that running a trust is
challenge enough on its own.
It is not enough for a trust company to
passively refrain from competing. A true
advisor-friendly partner actively supports
your efforts to differentiate yourself as
the advisor that high-net-worth families
consult when they want to open a trust,
integrate it into their long-term financial
plan, or extract better performance from
an existing trust structure. Marketing
support makes a decisive difference for
advisors adding trust services to their
platform. The closer your administration
partner can take you to a seamless,
plug-and-play solution, the faster you
will see concrete results in both client
retention and new business.
RACING THE CLOCK
Clients are broadly frustrated with raw
investment performance as the basis for
an advisory relationship. At this point, a
