Cheryl Tan Yi Lin & Anor

Facts

The first applicant, Cheryl Tan Yi Lin, bought a condominium flat in 2019 for $1.8m, holding it on trust for her son, who was then six years old. She applied in Originating Application No 1067 of 2025 for the court's approval to sell the flat to a buyer prepared to pay $2.28m. Her brother, Tan Yue Liang, joined as co-applicant because s 15 of the Trustees Act 1967 requires the sale proceeds of trust property to go into an account in at least two names.

At the first hearing the judge asked why the first applicant's husband was not a party and whether he had been served. Before the adjourned hearing she filed two affidavits stating that her husband had died in Australia from "a fall from height" and disclosing that she had changed her name by deed poll in 1996 and 2007, which counsel said was for feng shui reasons. The court then noted from reported judgments that she had been a party to several High Court actions: an unsuccessful suit against AIA Singapore Pte Ltd on a $1m policy taken out by her husband, a failed appeal from it, a claim against Aviva Ltd that settled, and a dismissed application to tax her former lawyer's bills. In the AIA proceedings it had emerged that the insurer repudiated the policy for non-disclosure, and that the husband had made seven applications for life cover totalling $6,250,000 in 2014. On 16 September 2016, while the couple were viewing a flat on the 33rd floor in Australia, he fell to his death.

Issues

1. Whether a rise in the flat's value was a sufficient reason for the trustee to sell the trust property.
2. Whether the court had to be satisfied that the trust was not created to avoid additional buyers' stamp duties, and what disclosure that required of the trustee.
3. Whether the applicants' lack of candour justified refusing the approval sought.

Holding

Choo Han Teck J dismissed the application for approval to sell the trust flat. The court was not satisfied that the sale was in the interests of the trust and found the first applicant had not been forthcoming.

Reasoning

The only reason given for the sale was that the flat had gone up in value. The court held that this alone was sufficient ground to dismiss the application. A trustee must protect trust assets and, unless the trust specifically empowers it, should not deal with them as if they were investment capital.

The court added that it had to be satisfied the trust was not a device to evade additional buyers' stamp duties. An application to liquidate a trust asset may be refused if the trustee holds properties in her own name, so the trustee was obliged to disclose her personal assets and liabilities fully. Had the husband been alive, the court might also have wanted to know whether the trust had been set up to shield the couple's assets from creditors.

Here there were no reassuring facts. The first applicant had not disclosed her personal assets and liabilities, and her failure at first to disclose her husband's death and the unsuccessful litigation added to what the judge called the furtive nature of the application. The court was not comfortable granting it.

From the judgment