Beneficial Interest, real or personal property in WA

[buzzboxParticipant]

It has been suggested to me that a “beneficial interest” held in a Land Trust in Washington State may be considered (legally), as Real Property rather than Personal Property. Can anyone clarify this and why it might be so?

Let me take this one step further – if it is considered “real property” then, if the Land Trust is formed in California with a California based Trustee and the Washington property conveyed to that Trustee, it would seem to me the beneficial interest(s) would be personal property and it wouldn’t matter if the beneficiaries lived in Washington or not. Any thoughts on this?

[buzzboxParticipant]

OK I’m still thinking about this issue.

I’ve concluded that a beneficial interest held in a Washington State Land Trust is considered real property, and not personal property, at least that seems to have been the drift of the courts. Now the question is, how can this situation be minimized?

For maximum privacy my current thinking is that an EHTrust Land Trust, formed in California, who’s Trustee holds title to a Washington State property, could have, as it’s single (100%) beneficiary, a personal property trust (PPT) under a third State’s (Oregon for example) jurisdiction.

Beneficial interests can then be assigned in the PPT to the various beneficiaries (SB, IB and RB) according to the parties intent. The PPT’s Trustee could be a managing LLC, set up specifically to handle multiple PPT’s and granted with the power of direction with respect to instructing the EHTrust Trustee.

[Author]

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