Family Law
Family Law News VOLUME 45, ISSUE 1, FALL 2023
Content
- Cheers! European Beverage and One-judge Rules
- Legislative Liaisons and Designated Recipients of Legislation
- Letter From the Chair
- Letter From the Editor
- Military Service and Child Custody
- Reproductive Coercion In California Domestic Violence Law
- SECTION OFFICERS & EDITORIAL BOARD
- Table of Contents
- The Business of Family Law
- Intersection of Estate Planning and Family Law
INTERSECTION OF ESTATE PLANNING AND FAMILY LAW
Written by Steven Brumer*
Parties to dissolution matters transition quickly from "partners" to "adversaries." Much in the way married persons without prenuptial agreements perhaps unwittingly agree to be bound by the terms of the Family Code upon divorce, parties without estate planning documents have agreed to be bound by the Probate Code upon their death.
In essence, if one does not make an estate plan, the State has made an estate plan for you. As the rock band Rush said best in their song, Freewill: "If you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice."1
Probate Code section 6122 provides that dissolution or annulment revokes a disposition of property to a former spouse and any provision in a will nominating a former spouse as personal representative of the estate of the decedent; however, this revocation only occurs upon completion of a case and entry of judgment.