Beneficial Interest

People with non-beneficial interests: the wicked queen's interest in Snow White; Napoleon's interest in Austria; our interest in a Chipotle burrito.

Now, to the beneficial interest. In its basic form, a person with a beneficial interest financially benefits from a particular asset. It may seem like an unnecessary distinction...there are people who benefit from an asset, and there's everyone else. Why the fancy term?

Well, there are times when a party has an interest in an asset, but not a beneficial one. An example might be someone put in charge of overseeing a trust.

Say your grandpa doesn't believe you'll spend your inheritance wisely (because you mostly split your time between the craps table at the Bellagio and stalking the floor at Maserati dealerships), so he creates a trust to oversee the money he plans to leave you. He names his lawyer as trustee. The lawyer now has responsibility for the assets in the trust, but doesn't directly benefit. You have the beneficial interest in the trust. The lawyer does not.