What Is a Trustee Supposed to Tell Me? A Court Just Rejected the Bare-Bones Answer

A trust report with a few totals and labels like “Legal” and “Other” doesn’t tell you what you’re owed. On September 22, 2026, the Court of Appeals of Virginia said so in a published opinion, Hamilton v. Kornides (Record No. 1241-25-4). The trial court had found three bare-bones reports good enough. The appeals court reversed and sent the case back with orders for a real one. California’s statute goes further than Virginia’s. It lists six things every trustee’s account has to contain, three of which Virginia’s doesn’t require, and a beneficiary can hold the trustee to every line.

The Virginia case is a useful way to see what that list protects you from.

What happened in Hamilton v. Kornides

James Hamilton created a revocable trust and served as its trustee. He named his daughter, Susan Kornides, as co-trustee, gave her his power of attorney, and put her name on some of his bank accounts. When he died in August 2021, his will poured his estate into the trust, and the trust split everything three ways: a third to his son John, a third to Susan, and a third to his grandchildren.

After his father’s death, John learned that Susan had moved the money left in the joint accounts to herself. He sued her as trustee, as his father’s agent, and individually. His theory was that she had moved trust money into the joint accounts and then into her own account, $676,462.29 in all. That number is his allegation. The trial court found he hadn’t proven the money belonged to the trust. The appeals court reversed the judgment without reaching that question, so it’s open again on remand.

What the appeals court did decide was the paperwork. Susan gave John three reports, in 2022, 2023, and 2024, and they said essentially the same thing. The trust’s assets were “House,” “TD Ameritrade,” and “Interest earned,” worth more than $1 million at the start. Expenses came to a little over $34,000 in four lines: fees from the house sale, “Legal,” “Other,” and “Taxes on interest earned.” Two disbursements totaled about $750,000. One was labeled “House-partial.” The other was labeled “TD Ameritrade liquidated.” That was the whole report.

The trial court held this was enough, because Virginia’s statute doesn’t prescribe a format. Chief Judge Decker, writing for the panel, disagreed. The statute “logically requires more than generic descriptions and barebones reporting,” and a trustee’s duty to inform “necessarily includes information identifying trust assets and specifying on what the trust funds were spent.” Susan’s reports also never disclosed what she paid herself, which the Virginia statute names outright. The court reversed, ordered a report with the material facts, and gave John the option to amend his complaint once he has it. It also denied Susan’s request that John pay her attorney fees on appeal.

The opinion also warns that a trustee who gives an informal report instead of an account “bears the risk that the information provided is inadequate.” As of October 26, 2026, I found no report that Kornides has asked the Supreme Court of Virginia to review the decision.

California’s six items

Hamilton is a Virginia decision, and it doesn’t bind a California court. Virginia’s statute names some contents too, including the trustee’s compensation. California’s adds the agents the trustee hired and two statements the beneficiary has to receive. Under Prob. Code, § 16063, subd. (a), every account a trustee furnishes has to contain six things.

On the facts the opinion describes, those reports would miss most of California’s list. If you hired your brother-in-law’s firm to sell the house, the account says who they are, that they’re family, and what they got paid.

Who is owed an account

Under § 16062, subd. (a), the trustee accounts at least once a year, when the trust ends, and whenever the trustee changes. The duty runs to each beneficiary who is entitled to current distributions of income or principal, or who can receive them in the trustee’s discretion. After a parent dies and the trust divides among the children, that’s usually all of them.

While a trust is still revocable and the person who made it is competent, nobody else gets an account. The trustee’s duties run to the person who can revoke it (§ 15800; § 16069). If Dad still runs his own trust, his children aren’t owed a report on it. If Dad has been found incompetent under the trust’s terms or by a court, the duty to account shifts to the beneficiaries who would take if he died (§ 16069, subd. (b)).

Once the trust is irrevocable, a beneficiary who isn’t owed an annual account, such as a remainder beneficiary, still has a right to information. Under § 16061, the trustee has to answer a reasonable request for information about the trust’s administration that’s relevant to your interest. Section 16060 sits over all of it: the trustee has to keep beneficiaries “reasonably informed of the trust and its administration.”

When the account can be skipped

The trust instrument can waive the account, and so can a beneficiary in writing (§ 16064). Neither waiver is airtight. A beneficiary can withdraw a written waiver at any time for transactions after the withdrawal. Either way, the court can still order an account on a showing that it’s reasonably likely a material breach of trust has occurred. And a waiver in the trust is void as to a sole trustee who falls in the disqualified-transferee categories, such as the person who drafted the trust (§ 16062, subd. (e)). If a trustee is asking you to sign a waiver, read the trustee wants me to waive the accounting before you do.

The three-year clock

The sixth item ties the account to the statute of limitations. Under § 16460, once a beneficiary receives a written account or report that adequately discloses a claim against the trustee, the beneficiary has three years to bring it. A report adequately discloses a claim when it gives the beneficiary enough to know about it, or enough that the beneficiary reasonably should have asked. When the report doesn’t disclose the claim, or there’s no report at all, the three years run from when the beneficiary discovered, or reasonably should have discovered, the problem.

For a trustee, a complete account is the surest way to start the three-year period on what it discloses. For a beneficiary, don’t count on a vague report to buy you time. A line reading “TD Ameritrade liquidated,” in a report showing about $750,000 going out, is the kind of entry that should prompt questions, and a court could find the period started the day you received it. Ask for the detail now.

If you’re a successor trustee

Pull your last report and hold it against the six items above. If you can’t point to the line that satisfies each one, the next account should fix it.

The full rules, including the release-clause procedure that can shorten the objection window, are in California trust accounting requirements.

If you’re a beneficiary who has only seen a summary

Ask the trustee in writing for a full account under § 16062, and keep a copy with the date. If the trust is still revocable and its maker is competent, you aren’t owed an account or information yet (§ 16069). If you’re not entitled to current distributions, ask for information under § 16061 instead.

If the trustee doesn’t produce an account within 60 days of your written request, and hasn’t given you one in the six months before you asked, you can petition the probate court to compel it under § 17200, subd. (b)(7)(C). The same 60-day rule applies to an unanswered request for information, under subdivision (b)(7)(B). Once you have the account, how to object to a trustee’s accounting covers what comes next.

A trustee who sends a summary is often a sibling doing a job nobody trained them for. A written request for a § 16063 account often gets one, and if it doesn’t, you have a dated record of asking.

Talk to a California trust attorney

If you’re a successor trustee, I’ll go through your last report against the § 16063 list with you and tell you what the next one needs. If you’re a beneficiary, I’ll tell you whether you’re owed an account and how to ask for it. Talk to Eric Ridley is a free 30-minute consultation by phone or Zoom, anywhere in California. Or call (805) 244-5291.

Frequently asked questions

What does a trustee have to tell beneficiaries in California?

A trustee has to keep beneficiaries reasonably informed (Prob. Code, § 16060) and answer reasonable requests for information about their interest (§ 16061). Beneficiaries entitled to current distributions also get an account at least once a year, when the trust ends, and when the trustee changes (§ 16062), with the six items § 16063 lists.

What has to be in a trustee’s account under Probate Code section 16063?

Receipts and disbursements of principal and income, assets and liabilities, the trustee’s compensation, the agents the trustee hired with their relationship to the trustee and their pay, a statement that the beneficiary may petition the court to review the account, and a statement that breach claims are barred three years after an account or report discloses them.

Is a one-page trust summary enough?

Usually not, if it leaves out items § 16063 requires. In Hamilton v. Kornides (2026), a Virginia appeals court held reports listing assets as “House” and “TD Ameritrade” and disbursements as “House-partial” were too general. That case doesn’t bind California courts, but California’s statute is more specific than Virginia’s.

Can I get an accounting while my parent is still alive?

Not while the trust is revocable and your parent is competent. The trustee’s duties run to the person who can revoke the trust (Prob. Code, §§ 15800, 16069). If your parent has been found incompetent under the trust’s terms or by a court, the duty to account shifts to the beneficiaries who would take at death.

What if the trustee ignores my written request for an account?

If the trustee doesn’t provide an account within 60 days of your written request, and hasn’t given you one in the six months before the request, you can petition the probate court to compel it (Prob. Code, § 17200, subd. (b)(7)(C)). A trust waiver or your own written waiver can limit that right, but the court can still order an account when a material breach is reasonably likely.