1. Posting Requirements for Apartments

For four units or more the following signs must be posted in a conspicuous place in your building:

1. Federal Fair Housing Poster
2. Toxic Substance Warning – Prop 65
3. Emergency Phone Numbers

2. Supreme Court Grants Daughter the Right to Challenge Trust Amendments that Disinherited Her from Her Mother’s Trust

In the case of Barefoot v. Jennings, California Supreme Court No. S251574 overturned the Court of Appeal and determined that a disinherited daughter can challenge the trust amendments procured by fraud, undue influence, or incompetence as alleged in this case. Prior to this decision rendered on January 23, 2020, the Appellate Court had ruled, which trust attorneys found shocking, that disinherited beneficiaries had no standing to challenge in court trust amendments that disinherited them based upon claims of fraud, undue influence, etc.

The Supreme Court held that “the probate code was intended to broaden the jurisdiction of the probate court so as to give the court jurisdiction over practically all controversies which might arise between the trustees and those claiming to be beneficiaries under the trust.”

In this case, Joan Barefoot (plaintiff) is one of three daughters who were beneficiaries of the mother’s trust. In fact, Joan, at one time, was successor trustee as well. From 2013 to 2016, mom executed eight amendments and restatements to the trust. The amendments and restatements expressly disinherited plaintiff and removed her as successor trustee. They also provided for a much larger share of the trust to one of the daughters and named her the successor trustee. Mom died in 2016 and plaintiff sued, claiming the sisters unduly influenced mom, mom was incompetent to make the amendments, and the amendments were the product of sisters’ fraud. The sisters moved to dismiss the petition under Probate Code § 17200 and § 17202, arguing that the plaintiff lacked standing because she was neither a beneficiary nor a trustee under the trust since she had been removed. Unbelievably, the Superior Court in Tuolumne County, as well as the Fifth District Court of Appeal, found against the plaintiff and agreed she had no standing to challenge her being disinherited.

The Supreme Court overturned those decisions, stating that the plaintiff did have standing to challenge the amendments and restatements in the probate court.

Comment: That would have been one crazy precedent if a disinherited beneficiary could not assert their claims of fraud, undue influence, or incompetence that lead to being disinherited in favor of their siblings. Do you think the daughters who received the lion’s share of the estate were taking “good care” of mom towards the end of her life? That’s sisterly love for you.