Murdoch Family Trust Breakdown

if you are a property investor in Australia and you're thinking about buying a property under a trust or you already have a few properties under a trust and you're thinking man what does my current setup look like compared to the best in the world what am I not doing in my trust that the best in the world is doing what does the ultimate Mount Everest trust look like well today let's look at the Murdoch Family Trust And as we dive into the rabbit hole of old might ruper Murdoch's Family Trust we find some juicy mistakes that you should avoid keep watching cuz it's going to get juicy now let's first boil down the mechanics of this Family Trust we have om over here the director of the trust and then you have the beneficiaries down there the six beneficiaries his kids but then out of the six kids not all kids are made equally we have Patricia Booker which is the first wife married in 1956 divorced in 1967 then we have Anna to married in 1967 divorced in 1999 then we have Asian fevera Wendy Deng married in 1999 divorced in 2013 then we have Jerry horal married in 2016 and divorced in 2022 and no kids from her because all mate at that age was shooting blanks now before we look at Mr Rupert Murdoch's Family Trust I want to let you guys know before you said up a family trust there's actually two types of trust that you can set up which is a Family Trust with a corporate trustee or number two a Family Trust with a individual trustee and there is a difference now with Alma over here his trust name is called Murdoch Family Trust and he's chosen a corporate trustee Family Trust and the corporate trustee is called cruden investment limited so to visually draw out the structure of his Family Trust we have the Murdoch Family Trust over here and then the corporate trustees under it which is AC cruded investment limited and then this company the corporate trustee acts as a vehicle to control News Corp and fox Corp and a bunch of these other companies that he also owns besides 21st Century Fox which was bought out by Disney chick Ching Mr ruper Murdoch now keeping it simple and keeping it basic so we can learn about Mr Murdoch's Family Trust the reason why he didn't choose an individual trustee and chose a corporate trustee instead is because the key feature that one would choose a corporate trustee over individual trustee is for this keyword over here called continuity because when you set up a Family Trust under a corporate trustee the company can never die whilst under individual trustee it ends upon that person's death now before I continue no pun intended I want to make it very clear the corporate trustee is not the ownership of the Family Trust okay the corporate truste holds the legal title to the trust assets but this is not the same as ownership the truste holds these assets for the benefit of the beneficiaries and these beneficiaries over here they have equable interest in the trust assets meaning they are entitled to the benefits from the trust as specified by the trust deed now this is where it gets interesting and juicy The Trusted sets out what will happen to the ownership of the media assets upon Murdoch's death his voting share will be transferred to the four oldest children that could lead to a scenario in which the children are fighting over the future of the media assets but wait you might say Q you said he had six kids let me show you something this is a very simple diagram I made on word on ret Murdoch's Family Trust as you can see here he has the trust set up and obviously under here is the corporate trustee but it is broken down into voting rights and non voting rights beneficiaries as you can see under voting rights the four oldest children Lan James Elizabeth and Prudence have voting rights to his trust and assets but his two other daughters Khloe and Grace Murdoch which is produced by his third ex-wife Wendy D they unfortunately dang it have non voting rights compared to their their other Step Brothers and step sisters now the biggest difference between voting rights and non-voting rights aside from the fact that these six children have access to the financial benefits of the trust is that the four children that have voting rights have control and decision making and influence and this is critical guys examples of decision- making for example oh make Cox said these guys have choices in terms of investment choices trusty appointments and removals amendments to trust terms and distribution schedules which means Lan James Elizabeth and Prudence have active roles in the governance and management of the Family Trust whilst Grace and Chloe have passive roles which in layman terms according to old's ex-wife Wendy d means do the nothing but get the money with what's left over and what is left over really depends on the power struggle between Lan Murdoch and James Murdoch which in this work Society will criticize allate for being too old school and being gender biased and patriarchal because at the end of the day prudence and Elizabeth you guys don't have any dicks and this is where it gets juicy out of the two dicks that will jizz over his Empire Mr old mate over here is going to leave Lan in charge he's going to Dish James and put Lan the bigger dick in charge now here's the masterful thing you need to learn from all might Mr Murdock over here when set up with your own Family Trust besides Grace and Chloe because those were seeds from his Asian fever day his four legit kids Prudence Elizabeth Lan and James were all given equal voting rights but the ultimate goal of Mr Murdoch was to favor his two boys Lan and James but old mate was always pitting these two against each other he knew if one of them didn't listen he will downgrade their voting rights in 20124 James has been kind of naughty Leti his views he doesn't like it old mate's old school he likes the conservative view held by Lan and therefore he's got to upgrade his rights and move him up the chain to control all this stuff so if you watched thus far these are the three things you can take away from ruper Murdoch's Family Trust setup number one put your kids as beneficiaries in that way you can pit them against each other this Fosters competition amongst them and also Fosters worthiness of leadership despite the emotional trauma caused to your kids who cares because the company Vision trumps family Unity which leads to the second Point understand what is your Empire for example this trust owns a bunch of properties or this trust also tied to your company what is the uh company's vision for example old mate Murdoch over here he holds a conservative View and even though James has been working tirelessly to build up his Empire since James swayed and changed his view to be more leftist he dropped in and picked up Lan which leads to the third benefit of setting up a trust with so many beneficiaries is that you always have a backup especially when you're succession planning and for example the First Choice which is James you know didn't work out well well can always choose a backup which is llin which is now the favorite child and that ladies and gentlemen is the ultimate benefit of why Mr Murdoch set up a Family Trust because out of six over here yes Lan might be the preferred successor at the moment but remember the director of the trust which might be you of the trust can always change your mind remember James he was previously preferred over Lan now what if in the next few years LAN doesn't play ball H maybe Prudence maybe Elizabeth or maybe our Asian sisters Chloe and Grace has a chance either way you the director of the trust or Mr murder omate over here holds the ultimate power to the side before he it now despite the ultimate obvious flaw of setting up a trust this way which means your kids really hate the crap out of you and there's emotional trauma amongst the beneficiaries this is the most legal jetto way of setting up a trust where you use your kids to build up your freaking Empire for you hats off to you Mr ruper Murdoch you are the Darth Bader of Family Trust jump in the comments let me know what you think