Beneficiary Rights Attorney in West Hills

Beneficiary Rights Attorney in West Hills

West Hills searches more for powers of attorney and advance directives than for probate, which fits the households here: long-settled families doing careful incapacity planning rather than estates fighting over money after the fact.

It also produces a specific confusion. A beneficiary asks the trustee about transactions from three years ago and gets told those are none of the trust’s business. That answer is often correct, and it is not the end of the conversation.

Two fiduciaries, two sets of records, two ways to compel

A durable power of attorney appoints an agent to act on a person’s behalf while they are alive. It terminates on death. A trustee administers the trust, and after the settlor’s death the trustee’s duties run to the beneficiaries. Frequently the same person held both roles, which is why the distinction gets lost.

For the trust period, the tools are the ones you would expect. § 16060 requires the trustee to keep beneficiaries reasonably informed of the trust and its administration. § 16061 requires him to report information relevant to your interest on reasonable request. § 16062(a) requires an account, though only to beneficiaries currently entitled to income or principal.

For the lifetime period, the route is § 4541. It lets the court compel an attorney-in-fact to submit his accounts or report his acts where he has failed to do so within 60 days after a written request from the person filing the petition. Note who can ask: the statute directs the accounting to the principal, the principal’s spouse, a conservator, or any other person the court in its discretion requires. As an adult child you are not automatically owed it, which is a limit worth knowing before you write the letter.

The practical consequence is that the two-year period before death, where most of the money usually moved, is reached by a different statute and often by a different route than the trust accounting.

What the trust accounting actually has to contain

§ 16063 sets it out: what came in, what went out, what the trust holds now, and what the trustee paid himself. A statement of assets with a total is not an account, and a great many of the documents beneficiaries are handed are exactly that.

Check whether the duty reaches you before you press. § 16062(a) runs to beneficiaries to whom income or principal is required, or authorized in the trustee’s discretion, to be currently distributed. If you take only after somebody else dies, a trustee declining may be right, and § 16061 is the route that stays open.

§ 16062(e) is worth checking too. Trust instruments sometimes purport to waive the duty to account, and that waiver is void where the sole trustee is a disqualified person under the statute.

What has to happen before a court will order an accounting

§ 17200(b)(7)(C) requires both that the trustee failed to submit a requested account within 60 days after your written request and that no account was made in the six months preceding that request. § 17200(b)(7)(B) applies the same test to information.

The 60-day structure is the same under § 4541 for the attorney-in-fact, which makes the drafting easy: one letter to the person as trustee, one to the same person as former agent, both dated, both kept.

Where a West Hills trust petition is heard

West Hills is in Los Angeles County, which centralises probate and trust matters at the Stanley Mosk Courthouse, 111 N. Hill Street in downtown Los Angeles. There is no Valley probate court, so the closest courthouse is not the one that hears this.

§ 17203 then requires at least 30 days’ notice of the hearing to all trustees and beneficiaries, and the court cannot shorten it. Nothing here happens quickly, which is an argument for making the written requests early.

Questions West Hills beneficiaries ask

The trustee says the transactions before my father died are not the trust’s business. Is that right? Often yes. A power of attorney ends at death and the trust accounting covers the trust. The lifetime period is reached under § 4541, which compels an attorney-in-fact to account where he has not done so within 60 days of a written request. It is a different statute and a different request.

Can I demand the power of attorney accounting myself? Not automatically. § 4541 directs the accounting to the principal, the principal’s spouse, a conservator, or any other person the court in its discretion requires. As an adult child you may need the court to include you, which is a real hurdle and worth knowing before you start.

The same person was agent and is now trustee. Does that help me? It helps in the sense that one person holds both sets of records and both requests can go out on the same day. It does not merge the two roles. The trustee’s duties still start at death, and conduct before that is judged under the power of attorney rather than the trust.

The trustee sent me a list of assets. Is that an accounting? No. § 16063 requires receipts, disbursements, assets on hand and the trustee’s compensation. A list of what exists with a total tells you nothing about what moved, which is usually the question. Say so in writing and ask for the rest.

Do I file in the Valley? No. Los Angeles County hears probate and trust matters downtown at the Stanley Mosk Courthouse, 111 N. Hill Street. There is no Valley probate court.

Talk to Eric or call 805-244-5291. I serve West Hills and all of Los Angeles County.

For the statewide rules, see beneficiary rights in a California trust and the duty to inform and account. For the document itself, see the California durable power of attorney.