Florida Statutes 497.268 – Care and maintenance trust fund, percentage of payments for burial rights to be deposited
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(1) Each cemetery company shall set aside and deposit in its care and maintenance trust fund the following percentages or amounts for all sums received from sales of burial rights:
(a) For burial rights, 10 percent of all payments received; however, for sales made after September 30, 1993, no deposit shall be less than $25 per burial right. For each burial right which is provided without charge, the deposit to the fund shall be $25.
Terms Used In Florida Statutes 497.268
- Burial right: means the right to use a grave space, mausoleum, columbarium, ossuary, or scattering garden for the interment, entombment, inurnment, or other disposition of human remains or cremated remains. See Florida Statutes 497.005
- Care and maintenance: means the perpetual process of keeping a cemetery and its lots, graves, grounds, landscaping, roads, paths, parking lots, fences, mausoleums, columbaria, vaults, crypts, utilities, and other improvements, structures, and embellishments in a well-cared-for and dignified condition, so that the cemetery does not become a nuisance or place of reproach and desolation in the community. See Florida Statutes 497.005
- Cemetery: means a place dedicated to and used or intended to be used for the permanent interment of human remains or cremated remains. See Florida Statutes 497.005
- Cemetery company: means any legal entity that owns or controls cemetery lands or property. See Florida Statutes 497.005
- Contract: A legal written agreement that becomes binding when signed.
- Income: means earnings on trust assets, including interest, dividends, and other income earned on the principal. See Florida Statutes 497.005
- individual: includes both natural persons and legal entities. See Florida Statutes 497.005
- Licensee: means the person or entity holding any license or other authorization issued under this chapter, except where expressly indicated otherwise. See Florida Statutes 497.005
- Mausoleum: means a structure or building that is substantially exposed above the ground and that is intended to be used for the entombment of human remains. See Florida Statutes 497.005
- Monument: means any product used for identifying a grave site and cemetery memorials of all types, including monuments, markers, and vases. See Florida Statutes 497.005
- Net income: means , in relation to a trust, ordinary income minus any income distributions for items such as trust expenses. See Florida Statutes 497.005
- Purchaser: means a person who executes a preneed or an at-need contract with a licensee for merchandise or services. See Florida Statutes 497.005
- Trust account: A general term that covers all types of accounts in a trust department, such as estates, guardianships, and agencies. Source: OCC
- Trustee: A person or institution holding and administering property in trust.
(b) For general endowments for the care and maintenance of the cemetery, the full amount of sums received when received.
(c) For special endowments for a specific lot or grave or a family mausoleum, memorial, marker, or monument, the cemetery company may set aside the full amount received for this individual special care in a separate trust fund or by a deposit to a savings account in a bank or savings and loan association located within and authorized to do business in the state; however, if the licensee does not set up a separate trust fund or savings account for the special endowment, the full amount thereof shall be deposited into the care and maintenance trust fund as required of general endowments.
(2) Deposits to the care and maintenance trust fund shall be made by the cemetery company not later than 30 days following the close of the calendar month in which any payment was received; however, when such payments are received in installments, the percentage of the installment payment placed in trust must be identical to the percentage which the payment received bears to the total cost for the burial rights. Trust income may be used to pay for all usual and customary services for the operation of a trust account, including, but not limited to: reasonable trustee and custodian fees, investment adviser fees, allocation fees, and taxes. If the net income is not sufficient to pay the fees and other expenses, the fees and other expenses shall be paid by the cemetery company.
(3) Any payments made to the care and maintenance trust fund on contracts which are canceled shall be credited against future obligations to the care and maintenance trust fund, provided they have been refunded to the purchaser.
(4) When a cemetery which is exempt from the provisions of this chapter changes ownership so as to lose its exempt status, it shall establish and maintain a care and maintenance trust fund pursuant to this chapter. The initial deposit for establishment of this trust fund shall be $25 per space for all spaces either previously sold or contracted for sale in the cemetery at the time of conversion or $50,000, whichever is greater.
(5) In each sales contract, reservation, or agreement wherein burial rights are priced separately, the purchase price of the burial rights shall be the only item subject to care and maintenance trust fund deposits; but if the burial rights are not priced separately, the full amount of the contract, reservation, or agreement shall be subject to care and maintenance trust fund deposits as provided in this section, unless the purchase price of the burial rights can be determined from the accounting records of the cemetery company.
(6) If an installment contract or promissory note for the purchase of a burial space is sold or discounted to a third party, the entire amount due the care and maintenance trust fund shall be payable no later than 30 days following the close of the calendar month in which the contract was sold or discounted.