Fiduciary or confidential relation

Definition of Fiduciary or confidential relation

A very broad term embracing both technical fiduciary relations and those informal relations which exist wherever one person trusts in or relies upon another. One founded on trust or confidence reposed by one person in the integrity and fidelity of another. Such relationship arises whenever confidence is reposed on one side, and domination and influence result on the other; the relation can be legal, social, domestic, or merely personal. Heilman’s Estate, Matter of, 37 Ill.App.3d 390, 345 N.E.2d 536, 540.

A relation subsisting between two persons in regard to a business, contract, or piece of property, or in regard to the general business or estate of one of them, of such a character that each must repose trust and confidence in the other and must exercise a corresponding degree of fairness and good faith. Out of such a relation, the law raises the rule that neither party may exert influence or pressure upon the other, take selfish advantage of his trust, or deal with the subject-matter of the trust in such a way as to benefit himself or prejudice the other except in the exercise of the utmost good faith and with the full knowledge and consent of that other, business shrewdness, hard bargaining, and astuteness to take advantage of the forgetfulness or negligence of another being totally prohibited as between persons standing in such a relation to each other. Examples of fiduciary relations are those existing between attorney and client, guardian and ward, principal and agent, executor and heir, trustee and cestui que trust, landlord and tenant, etc.

See also Confidential communications.

That's the definition of Fiduciary or confidential relation in Black's Law Dictionary 6th Edition. Courtesy of Cekhukum.com.