Delaware Pet Trusts | Settled Estate

A Delaware pet trust works, and the section is 12 Del. C. § 3555. It validates a trust for the care of one or more specific animals living at your death, runs until the last of those animals dies, and sets no dollar ceiling. Two Delaware details decide whether yours does its job: the animal has to be alive when you die, and nothing in the section lets a court size the fund for you.

A pet trust is almost always a clause inside a Delaware revocable living trust or a will rather than a document of its own, so read this page beside the rest of a Delaware estate plan. Every section below was read on September 10, 2026 at the Delaware Code online, and the three acts behind them were read in the Laws of Delaware. This page states Delaware law rather than the terms of one document. Read yours first, then take anything with money attached to a licensed Delaware attorney.

Question	Delaware answer	Statute
Is a pet trust valid?	Yes, for specific animals living at your death	12 Del. C. § 3555(a)
When does it end?	When the last covered animal dies	12 Del. C. § 3555(a)
Is there a 21-year limit?	No, and no common-law duration rule reaches it either	25 Del. C. § 503(a)
Is there a dollar cap?	None, and no court power to trim a large fund	12 Del. C. § 3555(d)
Who can enforce it?	A person named in the trust, or a Court of Chancery appointee	12 Del. C. § 3555(c)
Who owns the animal?	The trustee, where you transfer ownership or a legatee disclaims	12 Del. C. § 3555(e)
What care is owed?	What the terms say, or care reasonable under the circumstances	12 Del. C. § 3555(f)
What counts as an animal?	Any nonhuman member of the animal kingdom	12 Del. C. § 3555(g)
Where does the remainder go?	Under the trust terms, or under § 3592 by default	12 Del. C. § 3555(d)

What 12 Del. C. § 3555 Says, Subsection by Subsection

Seven subsections, each doing one job.

Subsection (a) creates the vehicle and sets its life. A trust for the care of one or more specific animals living at the trustor's death is valid, and it terminates on the death of all animals living at the trustor's death and covered by the terms of the trust.

Subsection (b) removes the objection that would otherwise sink it. Such a trust is not invalid because it lacks an identifiable person as beneficiary.

Subsection (c) supplies an enforcer, either from the document or from the Court of Chancery.

Subsection (d) fences the money and points the leftovers somewhere.

Subsection (e) moves the animal itself, which is the question people actually ask.

Subsection (f) sets the standard of care and lets the trustee hire help.

Subsection (g) defines the word animal as any nonhuman member of the animal kingdom, while excluding plants and inanimate objects.

The section lives in subchapter IV of chapter 35, headed Trusts for Cemeteries and Other Noncharitable Purposes, which is why a search for Delaware trust law lands on cemetery upkeep first. Delaware wrote the first version in 75 Del. Laws, c. 301, approved June 27, 2006, under the longer catchline Trust for Care of an Animal and Other Purposes. Then 76 Del. Laws, c. 254, § 11, approved June 26, 2008, deleted that section and substituted the seven subsections above. The same act added § 3556 at section 12 and rewrote the perpetuities rule at section 16, and its section 17 made all of it effective August 1, 2008 and applied it to trusts whenever created. Section 3555 has not been touched since, so the text has stood unchanged for eighteen years.

The Animal Has To Be Alive When You Die

Subsection (a) is written around specific animals living at the trustor's death. That reaches every animal you own on the day you die. It does not reach one bought for you afterward, and it does not reach a litter born later. A clause covering the animals you own at your death sits inside the line. A clause covering their future offspring does not.

Section 3556 is where that second clause belongs. It opens with the words without limiting the effectiveness of § 3555 and validates a trust for a declared purpose that is not impossible of attainment, whether or not the purpose would be called charitable, and whether or not any identifiable person is a beneficiary. A Delaware drafter who wants to cover animals not yet owned writes to § 3556 rather than stretching § 3555 past its own words.

Because the trust ends when the last covered animal dies, the trustee has to be able to tell which animal is which years later. Microchip numbers, registration papers and a dated photograph kept with the trust file cost nothing and settle the question long after the person who knew the dog is gone.

Who Ends Up With the Animal

Subsection (e) answers the question most pet owners are really asking. A trustor or another owner of an animal for whose benefit the trust was created may transfer ownership of the animal to the trustee, either when the trust is created or at any point after. Subject to any contrary provision in the trust or in the instrument giving or bequeathing the animal, where the person who was given the animal disclaims or releases that ownership, ownership passes to the trustee on the disclaimer or release. So the plan survives a friend who says yes today and cannot cope later.

Subsection (f) sets what the trustee then owes. Care follows the terms of the trust, and absent terms the trustee shall provide care that is reasonable under the circumstances. The trustee may employ agents or contractors for that care and pay them from the assets of the trust, which is how a trustee two states away funds a local caretaker without holding the leash.

The animal still moves before the money does. Name a caretaker who can take physical custody the same week, tell your executor and your family who that is, and give the trustee written authority to reimburse care advanced before the trust is funded.

The Enforcer Rules Live Next Door, in § 3556

Subsection (c) is short. A trust under § 3555 may be enforced by a person appointed in the terms of the trust or, where there is no such person or the last such person is no longer willing and able to serve, by a person appointed by the Court of Chancery. A person who has an interest in the welfare of the animal other than a general public interest may petition the Court of Chancery for an order appointing an enforcer or removing one.

Read § 3556 beside it and the gap shows. Delaware put the fuller machinery in the general purpose-trust section rather than in the animal one. Section 3556(3) names the role enforcer and lets a governing instrument give that person exclusive standing to enforce the trust. Section 3556(5) treats an enforcer as a fiduciary when exercising the authority. Section 3556(6) provides that a person accepting appointment as enforcer submits to the personal jurisdiction of Delaware on any matter related to the trust. Those three sentences arrived with 85 Del. Laws, c. 160, approved August 21, 2025, effective on enactment and applying to trusts whenever created. Section 3555(c) carries none of them.

The section a Delaware drafter works from is 12 Del. C. § 3303(a), which lets the terms of a governing instrument expand, restrict, eliminate or otherwise vary any laws of general application to fiduciaries, trusts and trust administration, and states the policy of giving maximum effect to freedom of disposition. The same subsection refuses to let any instrument exculpate a fiduciary for the fiduciary's own wilful misconduct or stop a court from removing one on that ground.

Section 3303(b) then hands the settlor a route of their own. A settlor may maintain an action to enforce a noncharitable trust and may designate a person or persons, whether or not born at the time of the designation, to enforce it. The last sentence of that subsection defines a noncharitable purpose as a purpose within § 3555 or § 3556, so an animal trust is squarely inside it.

Keeping the enforcer separate from the trustee is a drafting choice rather than a Delaware rule, and it is the choice that gives the rest of this page teeth. Someone holding the money should not be the only person entitled to complain about how it gets spent. Name a backup enforcer too, since the job can outlast the person you first pick.

Nobody Trims an Overfunded Delaware Pet Trust

Subsection (d) reads in full: property of a trust authorized by this section may be applied only to its intended use, and on termination any remaining property is distributed under the terms of the trust or, absent terms, as provided in § 3592. There is no next clause. The subsection carries no exception letting a court reduce a fund it finds larger than the intended use requires, so a sentence about a court trimming an overfunded pet trust, wherever it was copied from, does not describe Delaware.

That leaves the sizing discipline to the document. Two doors stay open, and neither is a judge sizing the fund:

The trustee's own termination power. 12 Del. C. § 3542(a) lets a trustee who finds that the costs of administration would defeat or substantially impair the purpose of the trust terminate it after written notice to all interested persons, with no court proceeding or approval. Section 3542(b) gives an interested person 30 days to object in writing, and § 3542(d) and (e) let the trustee proceed anyway after a further notice and six months, during which an interested person may petition the Court. Section 3542(g) defines an interested person as a living person or existing organization who is a current income beneficiary, or who would be a vested remainderman if the trust terminated at the time of notification. Section 3542(a) opens with the words unless otherwise provided by the terms of the trust instrument, so your document can switch that power off.
Modification by consent. 12 Del. C. § 3342(a) allows an irrevocable trust to be modified by the written consent or written nonobjection of all trustors, all serving fiduciaries and all beneficiaries having an interest, unless the governing instrument expressly says the trust may not be modified that way.

The purpose itself is guarded. 12 Del. C. § 3541(a) provides that a trust having a noncharitable purpose shall not be modified to alter or eliminate that purpose except under § 3342 or under § 3541 itself, and § 3541(c) defines a noncharitable purpose as a purpose within § 3555 or § 3556. Where the purpose becomes unlawful under the Delaware or United States Constitution, or the trust would otherwise no longer serve any purpose, § 3541(a) keeps the trust from failing, keeps the property from reverting to the trustor, and directs the Court of Chancery to apply or distribute the property in a manner consistent with the trustor's purposes. Section 3541(b) makes all of that yield to a contrary provision in the instrument.

So build the funding number rather than picking a round one. Food, routine veterinary care, medication, grooming, boarding while the caretaker travels, and the illness that arrives late in an animal's life, multiplied by a remaining lifespan you can defend, plus what the trustee will charge. On that last item, 12 Del. C. § 3561(b) allows reasonable compensation where the instrument does not fix it, unless the instrument says the trustee serves without compensation. A trustee whose activities are supervised by the Bank Commissioner, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation or the Comptroller of the Currency, which § 3561(a) calls a qualified trustee, files a schedule or formula for its allowance with the Register in Chancery under § 3561(b)(1). For every other trustee, § 3561(b)(2) leaves the method to a rule of the Court of Chancery.

What Happens to the Money Left Over

Subsection (d) sends the remainder wherever the trust says. Where the trust says nothing, it borrows 12 Del. C. § 3592, and that section deserves a careful read before anyone relies on it.

Section 3592 is written around an inter vivos trust and splits by timing. Paragraph (1) covers a failure to dispose that happens at the same moment as the trustor's death: the property is treated as an additional part of the trustor's estate and passes under the will, or under the intestacy rules at 12 Del. C. § 501 and following where there is no valid will. Paragraph (2) covers a failure at any other time, which is exactly what a pet trust does when the last animal dies years after you: the property is distributed as though the trustor had died on that date, a resident of Delaware, owning it, under those same intestacy rules, except that where 12 Del. C. § 502(2) or (3) would set a surviving spouse's share, that share becomes half the personal property of the trust plus a life estate in the real estate of the trust.

Two consequences follow. Your heirs are worked out as of the animal's death, not as of yours, so the people who take are whoever answers the intestacy rules on a date nobody can predict. And because § 3592 speaks of an inter vivos trust in its own opening clause, a pet trust created by will leans on a default drafted for a different vehicle. Naming the remainder taker yourself, whether that is a relative, a rescue group or a shelter, removes the whole question.

There Is No 21-Year Ceiling in Delaware

Many readers arrive expecting a 21-year cap. Delaware does not have one for an animal trust, and it disarmed the underlying common-law rule in the same 2008 act that rewrote § 3555.

25 Del. C. § 503(a), as substituted by 76 Del. Laws, c. 254, § 16, says no interest created in real property held in trust is void by reason of the common-law rule against perpetuities or any common-law rule limiting the duration of noncharitable purpose trusts, and that no interest created in personal property held in trust is void by reason of any rule, whether the common-law rule against perpetuities, any common-law rule limiting the duration of noncharitable purpose trusts, or otherwise. A trust holding cash and securities for an animal has no duration problem in Delaware at all.

Real estate is the one place a clock still ticks. 25 Del. C. § 503(b) sets a 110-year rule for real property held in trust, measured from the later of the date the parcel was added to or purchased by the trust and the date the trust became irrevocable. A pet trust that owns a Delaware farm or a house should know that rule exists, though the animal covered by § 3555 will have ended the trust long before it matters.

Where the Trust Lives in Your Plan

The execution rule is 12 Del. C. § 3545(a), and a pet trust naming a remainder taker whose enjoyment depends on surviving you sits inside it. The creation, modification or revocation of such a trust is void unless it is in a writing executed by the trustor, or by someone subscribing the trustor's name in the trustor's presence and at the trustor's express direction, and witnessed in writing in the trustor's presence by at least 1 disinterested person or 2 credible persons. A disinterested person is one with no beneficial interest that the change would materially increase or decrease, and a notary public or similar official may serve as that witness whether the official signs as a witness or only in a notarial capacity. Paragraph (a)(2) offers a second route: a writing executed by a trustee who is a disinterested person, whether or not anyone else signs.

The choice between funding during your life and funding by will changes the timing. A pet trust inside a revocable trust you funded while living starts the day you die. A pet trust written into a will waits for the estate: 12 Del. C. § 1302(a) proves the will before the Register of Wills of the county where you were domiciled at death, and § 1302(b) makes admission to probate the step that lets the will transfer property or nominate an executor. Keeping assets out of probate is usually a conversation about houses and bank accounts. Here it is about an animal that needs feeding on Tuesday. If you are writing the pet trust into a will, read what a Delaware will has to do first.

What To Put in the Document

The animals covered, described so a stranger can identify them years later.
A caretaker and at least one backup, each of whom agreed in advance.
A trustee, and a separate enforcer, each with a named successor.
The standard of care in the animal's own terms: food, veterinary schedule, medication, boarding, exercise, and who picks the veterinarian.
A sentence transferring ownership of the animal to the trustee under § 3555(e), so custody never depends on goodwill.
The funding figure and the asset it comes from.
Whether the trustee's § 3542(a) termination power is switched off.
The remainder taker, so § 3592 does not choose one for you on a date nobody can predict.
What happens to the animal's remains, and whether the trust pays for it.
A verification schedule that gives the enforcer something concrete to check.

When To Bring In a Delaware Attorney

Draft this alongside the rest of the plan rather than as an afterthought. A Delaware attorney earns the fee where the fund is large enough to attract a challenge, where the animal is a horse or a bird whose care runs decades, where you want the trustee's termination power under § 3542(a) turned off, or where you want the § 3556 enforcer protections written into a § 3555 trust. Where a document already exists, have someone read it against the sections above before assuming it does what you were told it does. Whoever administers the trust afterward will be working from that text and nothing else.

Frequently Asked Questions

Are pet trusts legal in Delaware?

Yes. 12 Del. C. § 3555(a) makes a trust for the care of one or more specific animals living at the trustor's death valid, and § 3555(b) says such a trust is not invalid because it lacks an identifiable person as beneficiary. The section sits in subchapter IV of chapter 35, headed Trusts for Cemeteries and Other Noncharitable Purposes. Its current wording arrived through 76 Del. Laws, c. 254, § 11, approved June 26, 2008, which deleted the 2006 original and substituted the seven subsections in force today. Section 17 of that act made the change effective August 1, 2008 and applied it to trusts whenever created, so a Delaware pet trust signed before 2008 is read under the same words. Nothing has amended § 3555 since.

How long can a Delaware pet trust last?

For as long as the covered animals live. 12 Del. C. § 3555(a) terminates the trust on the death of all animals living at the trustor's death and covered by the terms of the trust, and it names no number of years. The 21-year ceiling readers expect from other states does not appear anywhere in the section. Delaware went further in the same 2008 act: 76 Del. Laws, c. 254, § 16 rewrote 25 Del. C. § 503(a) so that no interest in personal property held in trust is void by reason of the common-law rule against perpetuities, any common-law rule limiting the duration of noncharitable purpose trusts, or otherwise. A horse or a macaw that outlives the calendar stays covered.

Who enforces a Delaware pet trust?

A person named in the trust, or one the Court of Chancery appoints. 12 Del. C. § 3555(c) hands enforcement to a person appointed in the terms of the trust and, where there is no such person or the last such person is no longer willing and able to serve, to a person appointed by the Court of Chancery. Anyone who has an interest in the welfare of the animal other than a general public interest may petition the Court of Chancery for an order appointing an enforcer or removing one. 12 Del. C. § 3303(b) adds a second route: the settlor may maintain an action to enforce a noncharitable trust and may designate a person or persons, whether or not born at the time of the designation, to enforce it.

Can a Delaware court cut back a pet trust it considers overfunded?

Section 3555 gives no court that power. 12 Del. C. § 3555(d) says property of the trust may be applied only to its intended use, and the subsection stops there before moving on to the remainder. It carries no clause allowing a court to reduce an amount the court finds larger than the animal needs. Two other doors stay open and neither is a court sizing the fund. 12 Del. C. § 3542(a) lets a trustee terminate a trust whose costs of administration would defeat or substantially impair its purpose, unless the trust instrument provides otherwise. 12 Del. C. § 3342(a) allows a consent modification of an irrevocable trust unless the governing instrument expressly forbids it.

What happens to the money left over when the animal dies?

Whatever the trust says, and where it says nothing Delaware picks your heirs. 12 Del. C. § 3555(d) distributes any remaining property in accordance with the terms of the trust or, in the absence of such terms, as provided in 12 Del. C. § 3592. That default section is written around an inter vivos trust and splits by timing. Where the failure to dispose happens at the same moment as the trustor's death, paragraph (1) treats the property as an additional part of the trustor's estate. Where it happens at any other time, which is what a pet trust does when the last animal dies years later, paragraph (2) distributes the property as though the trustor had died on that date, a resident of Delaware, owning it, under the intestacy rules at 12 Del. C. § 501 and following. Name the remainder taker and none of that runs.

Who owns the animal after I die?

The trustee can, and 12 Del. C. § 3555(e) is the sentence that says so. A trustor or another owner of an animal for whose benefit the trust was created may transfer ownership of the animal to the trustee at the creation of the trust or afterward. Subject to any contrary provision in the trust or in the instrument by which the animal is given or bequeathed, where the person given the animal disclaims or releases that ownership, ownership passes to the trustee on the disclaimer or release. 12 Del. C. § 3555(f) then puts the care duty on the trustee: the terms of the trust govern, and absent terms the trustee shall provide care that is reasonable under the circumstances, employing agents or contractors and paying for that care from trust assets.

Does a Delaware pet trust go through probate?

That depends on where you write it. A pet trust sitting inside a revocable trust you funded during your life begins working the day you die with no court step at all. A pet trust written into a will waits: 12 Del. C. § 1302(a) proves the will before the Register of Wills of the county where you were domiciled at death, and § 1302(b) adds that a will must be declared valid by admission to probate to be effective to transfer property or nominate an executor. Delaware has no probate court. The Register of Wills is the filing office and the Court of Chancery is the court behind it. An animal needs feeding that week either way, so name a caretaker who can take custody immediately.

Can I write a Delaware pet trust for a pet I do not own yet?

Section 3555 does not reach one, and 12 Del. C. § 3556 is where to look instead. § 3555(a) is written for specific animals living at the trustor's death, so an animal acquired for you afterward, or a litter born later, sits outside it. § 3556 opens with the words without limiting the effectiveness of § 3555 and validates a trust for a declared purpose that is not impossible of attainment, is not invalid for lacking an identifiable person as beneficiary, and carries an enforcer appointed in the terms or by the Court of Chancery. 85 Del. Laws, c. 160, approved August 21, 2025 and effective on enactment for trusts whenever created, rebuilt that section: an enforcer is treated as a fiduciary when exercising the authority, a person accepting the role submits to Delaware personal jurisdiction, and the instrument may give the enforcer exclusive standing to enforce the trust.

Sources:

Title: 12 Del. C. § 3555, Trust for care of an animal. Publisher: Delaware Code Online, State of Delaware. Publication Date: 75 Del. Laws, c. 301, § 3; 76 Del. Laws, c. 254, § 11; accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://delcode.delaware.gov/title12/c035/sc04/index.html#3555
Title: 12 Del. C. § 3556, Trust for other noncharitable purposes. Publisher: Delaware Code Online, State of Delaware. Publication Date: 76 Del. Laws, c. 254, § 12; 85 Del. Laws, c. 160, § 4; accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://delcode.delaware.gov/title12/c035/sc04/index.html#3556
Title: 12 Del. C. § 3592, Failure of trust to dispose of all assets. Publisher: Delaware Code Online, State of Delaware. Publication Date: 75 Del. Laws, c. 299, § 1; 79 Del. Laws, c. 198, § 1; accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://delcode.delaware.gov/title12/c035/sc07/index.html#3592
Title: 12 Del. C. § 3541, Administration of charitable trusts or noncharitable purpose trusts; cy pres rule. Publisher: Delaware Code Online, State of Delaware. Publication Date: 81 Del. Laws, c. 149, § 2; accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://delcode.delaware.gov/title12/c035/sc03/index.html#3541
Title: 12 Del. C. § 3542, Termination of small trusts. Publisher: Delaware Code Online, State of Delaware. Publication Date: 80 Del. Laws, c. 153, § 4; accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://delcode.delaware.gov/title12/c035/sc03/index.html#3542
Title: 12 Del. C. § 3545, Limitations on oral trusts; execution requirements for written trusts. Publisher: Delaware Code Online, State of Delaware. Publication Date: 83 Del. Laws, c. 69, § 3; accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://delcode.delaware.gov/title12/c035/sc03/index.html#3545
Title: 12 Del. C. § 3561, Reasonable compensation when trust instrument does not determine. Publisher: Delaware Code Online, State of Delaware. Publication Date: 85 Del. Laws, c. 346, § 7; accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://delcode.delaware.gov/title12/c035/sc05/index.html#3561
Title: 12 Del. C. § 3303, Effect of provisions of instrument. Publisher: Delaware Code Online, State of Delaware. Publication Date: 82 Del. Laws, c. 52, § 1; accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://delcode.delaware.gov/title12/c033/index.html#3303
Title: 12 Del. C. § 3342, Modification of trust by consent while trustor is living. Publisher: Delaware Code Online, State of Delaware. Publication Date: 83 Del. Laws, c. 69, § 2; accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://delcode.delaware.gov/title12/c033/index.html#3342
Title: 12 Del. C. § 1302, Proving will. Publisher: Delaware Code Online, State of Delaware. Publication Date: 70 Del. Laws, c. 186, § 1; accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://delcode.delaware.gov/title12/c013/index.html#1302
Title: 25 Del. C. § 503, Rule against perpetuities. Publisher: Delaware Code Online, State of Delaware. Publication Date: 79 Del. Laws, c. 352, § 5; accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://delcode.delaware.gov/title25/c005/index.html#503
Title: 76 Del. Laws, c. 254 (Senate Bill 247), AN ACT TO AMEND TITLE 12 OF THE DELAWARE CODE RELATING TO TRUSTS AND ESTATES AND TITLE 25 OF THE DELAWARE CODE RELATING TO PROPERTY, section 11 substituting 12 Del. C. § 3555, section 12 adding § 3556 and section 16 substituting 25 Del. C. § 503(a). Publisher: Delaware General Assembly, Laws of Delaware, 144th General Assembly. Publication Date: Approved June 26, 2008; effective August 1, 2008; accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://legis.delaware.gov/SessionLaws?volume=76&chapter=254
Title: 75 Del. Laws, c. 301 (Senate Bill 312), AN ACT AMENDING TITLES 10 AND 12 OF THE DELAWARE CODE RELATING TO TRUSTS, section 3 adding the original 12 Del. C. § 3555 and section 1 retitling subchapter IV of chapter 35. Publisher: Delaware General Assembly, Laws of Delaware, 143rd General Assembly. Publication Date: Approved June 27, 2006; accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://legis.delaware.gov/SessionLaws?volume=75&chapter=301
Title: 85 Del. Laws, c. 160 (House Bill 103), AN ACT TO AMEND TITLE 12 AND TITLE 13 OF THE DELAWARE CODE RELATING TO DECEDENTS ESTATES AND FIDUCIARY RELATIONS, section 4 rewriting 12 Del. C. § 3556. Publisher: Delaware General Assembly, Laws of Delaware, 153rd General Assembly. Publication Date: Approved August 21, 2025; effective upon enactment; accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://legis.delaware.gov/SessionLaws?volume=85&chapter=160
Title: Delaware Code Title 12, Chapter 35 (Trusts), chapter index listing subchapter IV, Trusts for Cemeteries and Other Noncharitable Purposes. Publisher: Delaware Code Online, State of Delaware. Publication Date: Not listed; accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://delcode.delaware.gov/title12/c035/index.html

It is not legal advice.