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Trusts Act 2019

Miscellaneous provisions - Life tenant to have powers of trustee in certain cases

159: Life tenant to have powers of trustee in certain cases

You could also call this:

"Life tenants can make some decisions about the land they live on if there's no trustee."

Illustration for Trusts Act 2019

If you have a life estate or another limited estate in a piece of land, you are called a life tenant. You get to live on the land or get the money it earns. If there is no trustee to manage the land, you can make decisions like a trustee would. You can do things that a trustee can do, but there are some limits.

You can do things that a trustee can do, and the court can give you the same powers as a trustee. What you decide has the same effect as if a trustee had decided it. But you cannot sell the land or borrow money using the land unless the money goes to a trustee.

The court can give you powers, but you still have to follow the rules. You can find more information about this in the Trusts Act 2019 and by comparing it to the 1956 law, which you can read about here.

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View the original legislation for this page at https://legislation.govt.nz/act/public/1986/0120/latest/link.aspx?id=DLM7383105.

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Part 8Miscellaneous provisions
Life tenant to have powers of trustee in certain cases

159Life tenant to have powers of trustee in certain cases

  1. This section applies in relation to land if—

  2. there is no trustee of the land; but
    1. the land is vested in a person (the life tenant) who is entitled to possession of the land or entitled to receive rents and profits from the land for—
      1. a life estate; or
        1. another limited estate.

        2. The life tenant may (subject to subsection (4)) exercise all the powers of a trustee under this Act, and the court may confer on the life tenant all the powers that it could confer on a trustee under this Act.

        3. Anything done by the life tenant in exercise of that power has the same force and effect as if it had been exercised by a trustee.

        4. However, this section does not authorise the life tenant to sell the land or to raise money by a mortgage or other dealing with the land, unless the money paid on the sale or raised by the mortgage or other dealing is paid to a trustee who is duly appointed and entitled to receive it.

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