Message to our readers

Dear Readers:

Now that all non-essential workers are required to shelter-in-place (really, they just mean “stay at home”), there’s a couple of things you ought to look into.

Do you have an Advance Health Care Directive?  Does everyone in your family have one in place? Anyone incapacitated by Covid-19 or anything else for that matter needs one. The hard part, is how to get one if you don’t have an attorney or if your attorney is also staying at home.

The good news is that you can get one for free. If you type the phrase “California form AHCD” into Google or Bing, the very first link is a form Advance Health Care Directive written by the California Legislature and provided at no charge by the office of the California Attorney General.

Download the form. You can print it out, or even fill it out on your computer and then print it. It’s pretty self-explanatory. Part 1 is where you name your health care agents. There’s space for three, but you can be more creative, just as “John Smith and/or Mary Smith, my son and daughter.” Just make sure that the agents you select think the same way you do about life-sustaining treatment.

In Part 2, you may elect either to have your life prolonged, or not prolonged, in the event you are going to pass soon, or you won’t likely regain consciousness, or if continued medical treatment just doesn’t make sense. Just remember that your physician may recommend withholding treatment, but won’t actually do it without your health care agent’s consent.

An Advance Health Care Directive is not a Do Not Resuscitate (DNR) order. You get one of those from your physician, on a pink form called a Physician’s Order for Life Sustaining Treatment, or POLST. If you have a DNR in place, that means you’ve already decided against life-sustaining treatment.

In Part 3 you may elect to donate organs upon your death. In Part 4 you may provide information about your physician, but that’s also optional.

To execute the document, you have to sign it before a Notary Public, or two adult witnesses, one of whom must also sign an additional statement on the form stating they are neither related to you nor shall inherit anything upon your death. Invite your neighbors over to sign with you on the front porch, after you and they wash your hands for at least 20 seconds with soap and hot water.

Once signed and witnessed, go wash your hands for at least 20 seconds with soap and hot water.

Len & Rosie

What to do with those accounts that were left out of the Trust

Dear Len & Rosie,

My dad died two years ago. He has an investment account, which is still in limbo. My dad had completed all the paperwork to put the account into his trust and he submitted it, but there was a discrepancy on one of the forms. His declining health prevented him from clearing it up before he died.

According to the company, the account needs to be put into an estate account in the name of my father’s probate estate. Mom is executor and trustee, according to dad’s will and trust. We need to get a letter from the court stating my mom is the executor. I’ve asked my mom’s lawyer about this several times. He says he’ll take care of it, but every month we check the statements and the change has not been made. How to I get the letters I need from the court for my mother?

Judy

Dear Judy,

What your mother needs to do depends on how much the account is worth. If the total value of this account and any other accounts in your father’s estate is less than $162,250 (up from $150,000 last year), then she can transfer the account via a small estate declaration under California Probate Code section 13101. Your mother’s lawyer can include a cover letter to the financial institution explaining why there won’t be an estate account.

If the account is worth more than $150,000, then there are two options left. One is to file for probate, which isn’t the best idea, because probate will take at least nine months to complete. It would also be relatively expensive because probate isn’t cheap in California.

Alternatively, she can petition the court asking for a court order declaring that the investment account belongs to her as the successor trustee of the trust, because your father meant to put it into the trust and tried to do so, even though he failed.

Under a California appellate court decision in a case called Estate of Heggstad, more or less anything that your father listed on the schedule of trust assets attached to the back of the trust can be transferred to the trust by court order without having to go through probate. Since your fathers will probably leave his estate to the trust anyway, it’s hardly likely anyone will object. The court would probably approve your mother’s petition.

Check with your mother’s attorney one last time to see if he or she is actually working on your father’s estate. If nothing is happening now, your mother should probably see another lawyer. It’s been two years since your father’s death, so unless there are other complications we are not aware of, your father’s account should have been transferred long ago.

Len & Rosie