The settlor’s language deemed to require the trustee to pay the surviving spouse’s statutory allowance

The decedent’s inter vivos trust stated that should his probate estate be insufficient, “there shall be paid” to the estate sums necessary to pay taxes and amounts requested by the executor to pay expenses, specific bequests, and statutory allowances. In Zahn v. Nelson, 866 N.E.2d 58 (Ohio Ct. App. 2007), the court held that the language required the trustee to pay to the estate funds necessary to pay to the decedent’s surviving spouse her statutory support allowance, dismissing objections by the decedent’s children by a prior marriage that the decedent’s intent that the trust benefit them prevented payment of the allowance from trust property.