Probate and Fiduciary Litigation, with Nicholas Van Brunt of Sheppard Mullin

0:02 Welcome to Probate Weekly. One of the keys is we either want to avoid being sued or how do we negotiate businesses real estate agents and professionals when our clients are being sued in probate or trust litigation. Looks like I have today one of the leading litigators in probate and fiduciary litigation here in Los Angeles. Nick Van Brunt of Sheppard Mullin. Nick, thank you so much for taking time with us again today. Hey Bill, great to see you again. Thanks for having me. So, what are the most common areas that cause litigation that you get involved with? Meaning I'm sure there's a lot of smaller things that don't come across your desk, but what are some of the key topic areas that cause people to get sued or open up trust or estates to lawsuits that maybe are avoidable? Yeah, so the three areas that I'm finding are generating the most litigation from practice. The first would be will and trust contest. The second would be disputes between trustees and beneficiaries, and the third would be conservatorship. With will and trust contest, typically what you have is somebody passes and their relatives or other loved ones are engaged in a battle as to what their real intentions were and typically the claims are there's lack of capacity or that there was undue influence or fraud or forgery and we're starting to see more and more interesting versions of that I'm sure we can get into. The second bucket disputes between trustees and beneficiaries and that can be anything from a breach of fiduciary duty claim or a petition by a trustee for instructions to the court as to what to do and the beneficiary may disagree with that or you know, disagreements between the beneficiaries and the trustees trying to seek again instructions from the court as to what to do.

1:56 And so, you know, that's a big bucket. And then, conservatorships, you know, continue to become more and more prevalent as the boomer generation, you know, physically is outliving their full capacity more and more. And we're just seeing a lot of disputes and efforts sometimes by people to take advantage of the elderly and conservatorships or, you know, elder abuse cases being filed during their lifetime. So, okay. So, great. We have so three different areas to talk about today. One, let's talk about wills and trust disputes. And I think often there it's who has the right or someone who doesn't have the right to file and they went ahead and filed. What are some of the key mistakes that you see made that you're brought in and you go, "Wow, if they had just done this, we would have avoided a lot of this conflict." Yeah, and I'll add to that. You actually raised an interesting point though about who can file a suit. And I just want to pick up on that because the courts have recently depending on your point of view, either confirmed or expanded the standing involved for somebody to bring a contest in a trust. It used to be that people would argue that you had to be either a trustee or a beneficiary under the instrument. And the law is pretty clear now that you can be a former beneficiary or even an heir. So, the standing is really expanded as to who can bring who can bring a trust contest. And that was always kind of the case with wills. You know, it's a little It was a little broader, but So good for litigators, I guess, more litigation. What are Speaking of what's good for litigators, the mistakes that people make. You know, I've said this before. I may have even said it when I've been on before, but I can't stress enough so many of the cases that we have are born of a lack of communication

3:56 During the lifetime of the settlor of a trust or the you know proponent of a will. And What I mean by that is parents, grandparents sitting down, having a conversation with their relatives, their loved ones saying this is what I'm going to do. You know, and just having that conversation ahead of time. See it particularly with business succession battle, right? When they're family businesses. But you can just see it generally. And you know, sometimes that's not feasible, right? Sometimes there's estranged relationships and that happens, but I just a lot of times I think if there had just been communication a lot of issues can be resolved. And it's understandable why the communication does not happen. Often the communication does not happen because what are people afraid of? They're afraid of death. We're afraid of death. I mean, you don't know what's going to happen. Naturally, some people have more faith than others, but it's an unknown. And people don't want to talk about it. And people don't want to talk about taxes. You know, the two certainties death and taxes. And people don't want to talk about what they're doing with their money, you know? And so I it's all understandable. All I'm saying is that lack of communication is helping me to stay in business. It also seems to me that the lack of communication during the probate in particular probate administration, even trust administration that it's almost like anything else, the longer it sits there, the more likely there is to be conflict and the more likely conflict, more likely it's going to lead to legal conflict or litigation. And I was I try to tell people and say just move as fast as you can, obviously accurately, because the longer you wait, you're just waiting for somebody to say something that son or he is like, "Oh, you know, F him. I'm going to go ahead and hire an attorney and right? Is there then that must be some of the business also?" Absolutely. Yeah, no, there that's it's related to what I was saying before, but it's absolutely It's a corollary, you know, the longer you wait to do planning, you know, the more risk you're creating. And also

5:59 The longer that you wait to do planning you run the risk that you may not plan in time, right? And also not updating your You may have done planning 5 years ago that may not reflect what you want to do right now. So, that's really important. You know, yeah. One of the challenges I see also with wills and trust heir disputes is that sometimes you have multiple heirs four five siblings or whatever and you know, one or two one's filing as petitioner and maybe has the state paying for an attorney to guide and then one of the heirs feels they're being taken advantage of but doesn't have the resources to hire an attorney. And that's a that's a tough attorney to find, right? Cuz if it's not really a dispute it's not really litigation, it's not really administration, but it can blow into full litigation and no attorney wants to sign on. So, you must see those either you get into them accidentally or you watch them on the side. What advice would you give to that heir who on one hand is being taken advantage of and on the other hand hiring an attorney for them is a very uncertain and can be very expensive proposition? Yeah, it certainly can and there are people in the probate bar who will take matters on contingency meaning that they'll take a percentage of whatever favorable outcome.

7:19 I don't know that many people do it, but I do know people who do it. It's a little bit of a trap for the unwary. I can think of one real life example where we came into this case later on, but in a situation where one beneficiary is like, "I want to remove my brothers as trustee. I want to remove them and but I can't afford counsel. So, he hires a contingency lawyer and the contingency lawyer does a little bit of work and ultimately negotiates a resolution whereby the brothers agree to step down from one of the two trusts actually, not from both trusts. And the engagement letter said, "We'll take 25% I think it was of the beneficial interest you know, the recovery in the trust itself." Let's just say I'm not going to say the exact amount. Let's just say this is a multi-million dollar trust.

8:22 Right. Or multi-million dollar trusts in aggregate and you know, for a little bit of work and just getting someone to agree to step down from one of the trusts, they were taking the position that they're now entitled to a quarter of the trusts, the entire trust. Ultimately resolved it for much less than that, but it's, you know, I mean, that's sort of the trap that they're laying. So, you know, I do think that there's a risk when you have a contingency arrangement, I do see that some lawyers are out there asking for contingencies on things that people are going to get anyway and the contingency should really be only on what you wouldn't be getting but for the fact that you entered into the case, right? So, if you already have a million dollar interest in the trust and you recover two million, the contingency should be on that second million, not on the entire I mean, that's the risk out there. But yeah, I mean, sure, it's a the deck can be stacked. There are other options. There are litigation funders that are out there. So, there're third-party litigation funders, some of whom do get into the estate space. It can be very expensive in terms of interest rates for those who do lending or they can take a pretty significant multiplier, but there are other options that are available that sometimes make sense depending on the case, but you have to look at it carefully.

9:44 Yeah, I mean it sounds it can sound very expensive to get money on a will or trust, but the companies who do that, I mean, there's not that many who do it that find litigation or advance heirs or lend money to estates. There's not it's not like you can Google search and find 15 of them. There it's a very competitive business, very specialized. And so, I think sometimes attorneys poo-poo the percentage that those funders take, but they're not lending the money themselves because it's a risky proposition. So,

10:11 Oh, you're absolutely right. Now, they're they've got investors that they're that they're beholden to and you know, they do pretty fair amount of underwriting. And again, it's not it doesn't make sense for a lot of cases, but it can make sense for some cases, absolutely. And you know, I've seen it happen. And so, for those heirs who are coming into money, it's just a matter of needing an attorney to it you know, over I call third base coach, right? There you're you need somebody that you're not the administrator petitioner, but you need somebody to make sure it's being done that before you sign things are done properly, the notice is being done, that's you know, timing's being done, there's no self-dealing. That can be expensive and again, that's where maybe an heir advance can be worthwhile if you're protecting a million dollar beneficial interest to spend 10, 20 thousand dollars up front to protect that you get to you get it to you know, life change what could be life changing money for people something to look into and I help with that. Okay, so, let's talk about disputes between trustees and heirs cuz I think one of the you know, there's several misconceptions in the probate world. One is if you have a will, you don't go to probate. Well, by definition in California, that's not true. The other one is and I don't know if you ever if you hear this as an attorney, but I hear this all the time. Well, I have a trust so that I can't get sued. I'm like, no. This whole industry is of people who sue trusts, defend trusts. There's the whole a whole backlog of cases of trusts being sued. So, talk a little bit about when you say disputes between trustees and heirs, what's the nature of those disagreements? Cuz one would think, hey, you wrote an agreement to avoid being sued. Now, why am I being sued?

11:44 Right. So, yeah, there's a bunch of misconceptions about trusts. One of which is to touch on the early part of the question. There's a distinction between revocable trusts and irrevocable trusts. And for purposes of liability and for speaking of judgment, a revocable trust is generally indistinguishable from the from the person who establishes the trust. So, for example, let's say you have $5 million in assets, you put them all in a revocable trust that you can change until, you know, until you're passing or you make it irrevocable somehow. If you get sued, that money's available, right? That money's available to whoever is suing you, generally speaking. And even with an irrevocable trust, which is a trust that you make a gift into this trust, you can't take it back. And you know, the beneficiaries of the trust may be the settler or the person who establishes the trust may be other people, could be a combination of both. Even there, a beneficiary of that trust, if they're being sued, even if the trustee has like full discretion whether or not to make distributions, some portion of that can be reached by a judgment creditor, right? So, it trusts aren't trusts are certainly not a panacea to protect you from, you know, your assets from being garnished. In terms of trusts being sued, and just as a technical matter, you don't sue a trust. A trust is just a collection of assets.

13:27 You sue the trustee as the as the representative, you know, who's going to control those assets. But, trustees can get sued all the time if a if a trustee breaches a contract just like any other person with somebody, they can be sued for breach of contract, right? A trustee can, you know, be sued by third persons for anything that generally that a that a non-trustee can be sued for. It's just that, you know, what's being what's at risk generally there is what's in the trust, you know, not the personal assets of the trustee. Now, the trustee can also be sued obviously by beneficiaries if they breached their fiduciary duties to the beneficiaries and you know, a fiduciary duty is pretty high standard. Are there one of the complaints I get often is, "Hey, I so-and-so passed and I'm a beneficiary of a trust. They don't know that. They don't have a copy of the trust to prove that, but they believe they are or they reasonably they are should be. And I haven't heard anything from my brother who's running the trust. What are the requirements of notifying beneficiaries, immediate family members if any? And what do you see are the common failings of people who open themselves up to litigation? No, that's a good question. So, within 60 days of a trust becoming irrevocable by reason of the death of the person who established the trust, the trustee is supposed to send a notification.

14:51 It can be by mail, but it's supposed to send a notification to all beneficiaries under the trust and all heirs at law, meaning generally family members that would receive the assets if it was in a state without a will, right? And so, family members, so in your example, the brother typically would be entitled to receive that notice within 60 days of the passing of the relative. The trustee does not have to include a copy of the trust. They just have to give a notification that it's become irrevocable. But they have to include a notice in what they're sending that says you have 120 days to contest the trust or your claims may be barred. And if the person receiving the letter requests a copy of the trust, that deadline can be extended by 60 days from when they receive a copy of the trust from the from the Oh. Deadline. With the caveat that like if you make that request on day 30, that extension doesn't help you cuz that only takes you to day 90. You have 120. But if you make the request and you get it on day 119, then you've got an additional 60 days from there. So.

16:09 So just to clarify then, so any beneficiary or heir-at-law, meaning even a child who might have been written out of the trust, theoretically, worst case, is entitled to notice within a certain time period, and the ones getting noticed are able to request a copy of trust and are it's obligated on the trustee to give a copy to those people request it? Yeah. I didn't know that. Well, there's

16:33 No, it's the terms of the trust. So just to be if we're going to be really technical, and it doesn't have to be like all of the amendments. Sometimes trusts are amended 40 times. I kid you not. I just had a case recently that resolved where that was the case. But it's the last full restatement of the trust. So, you know, you maybe established a trust in 1980 and you completely rewrite it in 2020. And then you amend it again in 2022, but you don't fully rewrite it. What needs to be provided is that last restatement in 2020 and whatever was amended in 2022. Now, what's interesting about that is you could have been a beneficiary from 1980 all the way to like, I don't know, 2019. And you wouldn't see any of that based on what's required to be produced in the first instance. Now, if your if your brother who was sees that you're completely disinherited under 2020, you file a contest, you know, you're entitled to discovery rights. And then you can ask for those copies and generally those are going to be produced. But yeah, I mean, it's there's definitely limitations to what's required to be provided, but you can't as a trustee just say I don't want to give that information. You got to give it.

17:54 So, it happens a lot. And so, we've been watching here, I think at least any Of course, we're talking about California law, though these things may apply in other states as well by coincidence, but we're talking about mostly California law at this point or exclusively, that any beneficiary or heir at law gets noticed and has a right to request it. And if it's not provided, there's a reason to call an attorney to get involved and review the case because I hear often times people say, "I haven't received anything. I haven't got any notice. I haven't got I asked for copy of trust. I'm not getting a copy of it." and then that would theoretically show either what you're stand to gain from the trust or nothing, right? If you're written out in the latest version, it would say, you know, all the heirs but you and you're in zero. At least you would see that in writing rather than just thinking the trustee on their own came up with that as their own plan. Right. Right. Yeah.

18:43 Yeah, you definitely want to in that situation, I think you're well advised. If you're interested, I mean, some people are like, "Life's too short." Right. But, you know, if you're interested in your inheritance and you've been written out, probably makes sense to spend the $2 and probably one or $2, but they can they can counsel to give you at least some advice on what to do.

19:04 Yeah. Wow. Okay, so there's a great piece of advice that I've I didn't know. Thank you for that. And then trustee I had another question I wanted to ask between trustees and heirs. Oh, so, once you have the notice, once you have that, often times I'll hear a complaint, "Well, he's just not moving quickly. He's not selling the house. He's living in the house. It's been 2 years, and we're all entitled to a quarter of it, but he's not selling it, right?" So, I to me, I'm not an attorney, but from a business person, I'd say, "Well, that's really using the trust assets for your personal benefit, and would possibly violate his fiduciary responsibility, unless he makes some sort of a settlement. You give them an interest, you give them some rent." so, talk a little bit about the And that's I think that's a classic case you must see of the of the trust of the mystery of the trust, kind of self-dealing on a property, or maybe ignoring requests, and continuing to live in the property. Is that something you see, and what are possible remedies there? Yeah, sure. And part of it's going to depend on what the trust says, right? The trust is like The trust is like the constitution for the assets of the trust that are involved, right? And so, if the trust says, "My trustee is allowed to live in the house for the next 36 months, you know, rent-free, and then it's to sell it after that," then, you know, not many trusts will say that, but you do have terms sometimes where a trustee is allowed to live in the house for a period of time. Or if even if not the trustee, maybe a surviving spouse typically is also allowed to stay in the house for a particular period of time.

20:33 So, you got to look at what the trust says. But let's assume that the trust doesn't have any of that language, and it's just it's, you know, the trust basically says, "Trustee is to divide everything and sell it." I mean, if 2 years have gone by, and the trustee is just ignoring you, then yeah, that's another situation where, you know, get a lawyer, probably try to informally resolve it first, and if you can't, you file a petition, in at least California, under Probate Code section 17200, asking the court to instruct the trustee to sell the asset, or otherwise distribute it, you know. I mean, typically you're not going to want to have a property distributed in fractional interests to heirs because, well, you know, then you're looking at difficulties with sale or having to go to partition or whatever, but you can move to the court at that point to ask for something like that. Got it. And so the third area the third bucket we're going to talk about and I have a couple other questions after that, but the third is conservatorship or guardianship. Conservatorship would be when somebody's incapacitated. Famous case I don't know if you follow it all, Jay Leno, really one of the great one of the nicest human beings in the world. I've met him personally. He's an amazingly generous man with his money and time to diverse nonprofits. Unfortunately, his long time wife, over I think 50 years, is incapacitated and famously has to go to LA court to get a conservatorship. And I and I think now I don't think you're involved in this case. I imagine with all the attorney's fees he must have paid in his career, didn't somebody put together something to avoid having to file a conservatorship? Like to me it just seems like a big fail for a guy who must have spent over his career, you would think tens of millions of dollars on attorney's fees.

22:15 They're definitely I mean, I don't know if it's a fail or not. I don't I don't know the particular circumstances, but you certainly can do things to avoid that, right? One of the things would be to have robust powers of attorney and advanced health care directives in place so that at the time that someone loses their capacity you can then, you know, basically jump in as the power of attorney, you know, the agent under power of attorney to handle finances and to make health care decisions. And that there's a whole lot I mean, that could be a whole podcast episode frankly about end-of-life planning along those lines, you know, cuz an advanced health care directive gets you part of the way there, but you also there's something separately called a physician's order on life-sustaining treatment that you want to have kind of figured out at a time if you can. It's not always feasible, but certainly want to have the advanced healthcare directive so that people can make decisions and be really clear about what they want in terms of, you know, life-sustaining treatment, what they want frankly in terms of their organs, where they're going to be buried, that kind of thing. And who they want making those decisions. All of that stuff if that's done, you can minimize the chance of ever having to go to court for a conservatorship as appears to have happened in Mr. Leno's situation.

23:35 It's just heartbreaking to hear and then having been in court, I used to go every day before COVID, and those conservator cases were just always heartbreaking. Just I got I think the court wants to see the conservatee at least once in person. That's always a nightmare health-wise and just the story and the and the and the expenses and the court-appointed this and it just seems that if there's any way to avoid conservatorship and maybe in his case his that was done long ago. I know these laws have changed quite a bit. So, and oftentimes clients don't follow up when they're told they need to update things. So, it's just heartbreaking to see. He's really a very kind man and to see him going through this in a public way, I'm sure it's just not it nobody wants this, let alone a celebrity like him. So, Yeah, and it's, you know, and there are there are certain rules in place with respect to conservatorship where there's supposed to be some confidentiality around those sorts of things. But, since we're talking about it, obviously you see that sometimes these things leak, right? And existence of that proceeding is not confidential. And so, yeah, you know, I know absolutely. It's you never want to end up in that situation. You don't want to be a conservatee and frankly, you don't really want to be a conservator because especially in a in a post-Britney Spears world, you know, the rules for a reason are, very protective now of conservatees and of people potentially taking advantage of them.

25:09 You know, the unfortunate thing is probably, I don't I'm throwing a number out there, but probably 95 plus percent of conservators are just trying to do, you know, the right thing for their conservatees, you know, and they're just, you know, acting out of love, but there are people out there who were taking advantage, absolutely. And so, it's definitely it's a thicket. I mean, that is definitely a world where if you're a conservator, you need counsel. Yeah. And the hard part there is often times they don't have it because a conservatorship by its nature somebody has a severe medical problem of some sort. They're spending all kinds of money on that. They're not earning any money. So, it's just it's just that's just such a heartbreaking situation to see that they're spending and the time involved when the court on top of the medical treatment people need that if there's anything you can do to avoid that, you know, and again, I don't mean to point out Jay Leno in a negative way. It's just some of these things are who knows the reasons why he's there, but nobody wants to end up in the conservatorship. Yeah. On either side of the deal. It's like whether it's your parent or you're the one who's in the in the courtroom. You don't want to be there. Let's go back a little bit to now just kind of general on wills and trust disputes and disputes between trust trustees and beneficiaries. Every firm's different and every attorney's a little different. So, give me an idea of like, but there's, you know, obviously we work for one of them one of the better known law firms in Los Angeles. I don't know how to how to rank you or how to evaluate it other than I recognize your name as a firm as well as you individually.

26:41 I'm you certainly not the going to be the cheapest. You're not going to be the TurboTax of law firms. Give me an idea of when somebody has a dispute, what kind of dollar amount at risk should there be or what kind of fee structure are they talking about before it's worth bringing to you to your attention? Is there such a range? Oh, that's I mean that's a good question. It's it really depends, right? And cuz like obviously the dollar amount in dispute is important, but also the runway I was just saying the runway that's going to be required to get there is the other question, right? So, you might have a $5 million dispute that we're going to be too expensive to handle at our rates because it's going to likely lead us to have to go all the way to trial and it's that's going to take 2 years and it's going to be really expensive. But you could also have, you know, a $3 million dispute that could be resolved quickly, right? You know, perhaps with an early mediation and then it might make sense for us to handle. You know, so we don't have like a particular threshold, but you know, I'm always happy to talk to people who reach out and I'm very direct with them. In fact, there was one person who watched your podcast once and then called me and I was like, you know, you have a good case, but we're going to be too expensive here. There's three people I know who are great and you should you should call them. You know, and so then you know, other times you know, we'll take it on if it makes sense. You know, and so it really it's not one size fits all. But yeah, sure. I mean we're pretty expensive, right? So, typically our matters tend to be larger.

28:18 And I and I tell people again, I'm a Realtor®, not an attorney, when they tell me about a dispute and I'm going to say to them you know, it's one thing to have an attorney review your case, maybe give you some advice, maybe write a letter you know, maybe a minor issue, but if you're talking about going to trial just to get to trial, you're talking at least $100,000, maybe $200,000 in costs, fees, discovery, recordings, this, that, filed motions. Does that sound about right? Is that my Am I giving them good Very low. I mean even

28:46 Right. Well, right. For like yours, it's going to be more because it's going to be a bigger matter and a bigger firm and a heavier You're buying a bigger gun, so you're going to pay more, but even just to entertain litigation is not less than that. No, it's not less than that and often it's more than that. And again, I'm not I'm not just talking about with like you doing, you know, less expensive firms or sole practitioner going to be I mean, you're well into the six figures to take a case all the way to trial. Now, the caveat is in probate court, sometimes there are matters where you have a very short trial that needs to happen on a particular issue. And sometimes that'll be less expensive. Yeah, a judge I had in a in a recent trial, you know, said from the bench, he was right about this, that I assume that the amount of time being spent in trial, you multiply that by three and that's the amount of time spent just preparing for trial, not even talking about discovery or anything. You know, because you got to be ready for all sorts of you know, possible arguments for the other side that may or may not occur. You have to prepare your witnesses, you have to you know, prepare them both with your own direct testimony with their direct testimony, I should say, or with you know, potential cross-examination that you're expecting the other side to give. And you got to prepare opening statements, you got to prepare closing statements, there are questions the judge asks, then you have to file briefs and that. I mean, it's trials are really expensive. Yeah. Yeah.

30:16 Yeah. Talk a little bit One of the hottest topics in news and business is artificial intelligence. And as a real estate agent, to me it feels like a lot of hype today and also a lot of developments for the services that I use, meaning I pay for multiple listing service, they're using AI to whatever automate their technology. I'm just a member and I can search it and use it, but it doesn't seem to have really hit the kinds of activities I do with on a daily basis. Can you talk a bit as an attorney, obviously can only speak to your business personally in your firm, where is AI and it's one thing to say it's on the horizon, but as far as today, how often how active is that in your personal usage or your immediate staff that you work with? Well, first I have a prop and the prop is latest issue, this is a couple months old now, Trust and Estate Quarterly for those of your audience who are part of the California Lawyers Association Trust Section, they would have had this, but the second article in here is called Ethica Ex Machina or how I learned to stop worrying and love ChatGPT, ethical considerations for Trust and Estates attorneys using generative AI. Why do I bring that up? It's obviously something a lot of us are thinking about right now.

31:29 Yeah. Yeah. And also a plug that's a great issue and I'm the editor of it. You should get it. But Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Okay, hold on now. You're the editor of Trust the Trust the Quarterly newsletter. Oh, I didn't know that. Okay, good. Thanks for plugging that. You didn't you're very modest with that plug. You need to be a little louder with that plug, just FYI. You know, I've learned that. But so AI there's a lot of different things going on with AI. As a firm, you know, like a lot of lawyers, you have to be familiar with it now. It's almost like ethically you can't not be familiar like any other technology that's out there. They in certain ways it can help clients save money to use AI to generate first drafts of work product. But man, it's a trap for the unwary because you know, I mean, you've probably heard the stories and I'm sure your audience has heard the stories of the attorneys who have a brief done completely by AI and the AI bought literally makes up cases that don't exist that are cited to in the brief, you know, so you can't just like rely on it. But it is a tool that can help you started, right? Like, hey, I need to write a letter to opposing counsel on these three bullet points. And it gives you a place to start, you know, so I mean I do think it's really helpful there. It's helpful for responding to discovery, you know, and but it doesn't like eliminate the work.

32:51 You know, in terms of generating documents, I'll give you an example without revealing too much. Had a client situation where AI was used to actually to generate one of the notices we were talking about earlier that you give to beneficiaries before they counsel. And I was like that's great. This is non-compliant cuz you didn't do A, B, or C. You know, so I mean that's sort of there's a thought that oh AI are going to replace lawyers. I do think that it's going to make the practice of law more efficient in the medium run, maybe in the short run, but it's not going to eliminate the need for lawyers because AI is only as intelligent as the information it has. Right. You can see AI, I'm sure, being used generate wills and other testamentary documents. Same issue. Like it can probably save you some time, but you don't want to just rely on it, you know? If you're going to do that, you're much better off doing something with LegalZoom or like some software that at least has been vetted by attorneys so that you minimize the risk. But I'll tell you, LegalZoom form wills are great source of business for my litigation practice, which is not necessarily the outcome you want. Right. Yeah, no, I mean I It's so interesting. So answer this question then as a as a professional.

34:08 I'm a business person. Can't give legal advice, but I tell people 90% of the time you're better off with a bad form, let's say LegalZoom or the equivalent of a templated online, 90% of the time you're better off with that than with nothing. But 10% you could be worse off or no better off. Is that a fair assessment? I think it's generous with the 90. Okay. What number What you put on? I don't I don't have a percentage. No, I a lot of cases that I have are generated because there are disputes over legal documents, right? And like what how to interpret those legal documents. Right. And you're setting yourself up for more risk when you don't have somebody helping you vet those documents, you know, before they're signed, right? Because then you're going to have questions of interpretation. Now, having a lawyer doesn't eliminate them. I also have cases where you have very high-priced attorneys doing estate plans and there's still a question over what a, you know, clause means in a, you know, will or a trust or a contract or whatever. So it's not like you immunize yourself completely, but it's just I don't know, it's like getting a vaccine, right? Like, you know, I'm not going to get into the science of it, but like, you know, getting a vaccine does not eliminate like for COVID, it didn't eliminate the risk of getting COVID, but it maybe, you know, had effects of reducing the risk of getting it or reducing the symptoms if you get it. Having a lawyer is kind of like that. It's like the flu shot. It's not like, yeah, it's not going to completely cure you know, but it's also not like a complete placebo, you know.

35:48 Well, it seems to me that the AI is going to both, you know, create some efficiencies on creating forms and then also create efficiencies in turning apart forms that have defects because you can search them so quickly or look at them so quickly. So, it's kind of like a war where both sides have fewer guns. I don't think it eliminates the mistakes. It doesn't eliminate, like you say, the need for a good attorney to vet something and know your situation, communicate. And that's the other part. The Legal Zoom doesn't ask you that extra question and all of a sudden you don't disclose a child or the child really isn't your child or they're, you know, it was a prior marriage or whatever. You leave out the your second wife appears to be married and all of a sudden you a whole world of potential problems, so Yeah. So, kind of just have to kind of wrap up a little bit on business development. Obviously, you're very established firm, you personally are very established attorney, and so you're not like the young guys out there hustling the first time going to networking events and doing that. You obviously do some high-level work, publications, and such. Talk a little bit about the people that you see who are looking to reach out with attorneys. Maybe they're reaching out with the with the more entry-level associates in your firm or you see, you know, trying to establish business from sole practitioners. What would you say are the best practices that are, you know, obviously I try to get people out of cold calling and pestering and into creating value, but what do you see as the best practices to develop business with, say, your colleagues or your associates, junior associates? So, you're saying for attorneys to develop business, is that the gist?

37:18 Attorneys and real estate agents. I think both of us are similar in that if we create a relation- a business relationship, from there you can talk about and offer your service, but if you can't get a relationship started, so what would you say are some of the best ways to start relationships with like I said, new attorneys, associates, and the like? So, you know, I mean, obviously, one of the good things about you're doing here, right? Which is getting your name out there. And you're obviously very established, but I mean, but for somebody, you know, not that everybody in the world needs a podcast, but you know, putting yourself out there as a thought leader early on, and you don't sort of fake it until you make it. I guess I said that for the for the podcast, but you can, right? Like, you can make yourself You people are scared to put themselves out there cuz they have imposter syndrome, and the fact matters you know more than you think you do, and you probably have something valuable to say. So, putting yourself out there is good. Staying top of mind is important. You know, I think cold calls I'm not crazy about. You know, I get a lot of them, and you know, they're that helpful usually. Same with like you know, mailings like, "Hey, I'm so-and-so real estate agent. I just had these three listings." You can imagine we get a lot of those, so it doesn't That doesn't do much. Where it's actually really good is going to events, right? So, I was just at the county bar event in LA. There was a event with the judges this week.

38:40 And there were there were a few real estate agents that were there. So, one of them sponsored it and another was there meeting people organically. I do think that organic networking still, even in a post-COVID world, Yeah. Is a great way to meet people. Just going to events. There's ProVisors. I know some people do that. Bar events, industry events, that kind of thing. There's really no substitute for that because

39:01 Right. You know, you want to I mean, you want to work with people that you've connected with. That's just generally human nature. And it can be virtual like this, too, right? Like this is great, also. But I think that's what where I see some success. In terms of sort of my own practice and career trajectory, the probate bar, we all kind of know each other. I mean, there's obviously some lawyers that dabble in whatever, but even in LA, which is the biggest county jurisdiction in the country, there aren't that many people who do probate litigation day in day out. And even that do estate planning, you know? And so, part of the way that we help each other, you know, develop business is that we know each other. We know we have to be straightforward with each other in court because otherwise we're not going to trust one another. Right. You know, we need to be straightforward in negotiations. And we see each other's work and then, you know, if I can't take on a case, it's like the example I gave earlier, here are three lawyers I know who are good, who I think may fit your particular situation, right? And I get that vice versa where it's like, "Hey, this case is maybe too complex for me to handle right now in my staffing. Can your firm take it on?" And that's actually a pretty substantial source of business.

40:18 And then it's obviously from other professionals, real estate agents, accountants, financial managers, that kind of stuff. And again, it's the same kind of thing, you know, having lunches, seeing people at events, staying in touch, not being a jerk, you know, I mean, all that stuff.

40:31 Oh, that one's tough. I can't help with that one, but I know. I probably deserve that, but somehow we both made it. Yeah. I do think that the post-COVID world, there's a lot less opportunity for interaction, human, and it's more valuable when you do have it. It really is interesting how it seems like there's less competition, too, for that. The younger people are more online, and when I go to a live event, I just feel like I really have a chance to really make deep relationships. So, that's great advice. And for all those listening, any real estate agent line here, you know, he gave a nugget early on trusts, cuz we as Realtors®, we get this I get this phone call regularly, and we all could, that trusts trustees are required to notify beneficiaries and heirs of law of a of a trust becoming irrevocable. And then, they're if requested, they're obligated to give a copy of the trust as active at that time, as amended at time, with the proper verbiage is. But, the point is, that's not done all the time. And just knowing that, and if you go back and rewind and play that, when you get a phone call, you can refer people to this knowing that nugget puts you ahead of your customer, and that's education. I think I you know, I know you use the term fake it till you make it, but I will always feel like you know one or two good nuggets. That's you can make a living off one or two good nuggets. And if you know like everybody you know in your database that you know, trusts are obligated to notify beneficiaries and heirs of law, that's a massive piece of information. And somebody's going to call you and say, "Really, you know, because I have this friend." And you can confirm to either Nick or one of the other attorneys in your database, and from there, you have a some business. So, I think you've really been very helpful to us.

42:05 Again, Nick from Sheppard Mullin Law Firm in Los Angeles. Yeah, I'm sorry, put your hand up. I've got one more nugget, just Great. That I think is actually for your audience. And this is California specific, you know, but California as of this year has instituted

42:23 Yeah. In the probate you know, in the probate code they've instituted now that real property up to $750,000 in value can be transferred through probate without a formal probate process. It used to be that the limit was, you know, in the high 100,000s depending on the year and inflation. But now 750,000, which is I think around the median house you know, value throughout California. I You and I both probably take exception with that, but that's what the legislature thought. And so there are a lot of people who can now take advantage of this process and not have to go through a cumbersome probate. You still have to give notice to heirs and there's rules around it and all that. You still probably need some advice on it, but it really decreases the amount of time that is needed to transfer a decedent's property to heirs and it's not particularly viable. And you know, it's good. It actually provides some access to streamlined procedures for people who can't afford that. Right. The estate planning at the time. So that's out there as well. It has great potential. I think it's for deaths on or after April 1st and there's some other restrictions as you say. To me it seems like there's ripe opportunity for fraud as well. I have a feeling you could see some lower priced, you know, fraud litigation work created as a result too because anytime you lower the restrictions, you create more opportunities for nefarious parties to get involved. We'll see.

43:53 No, what it does is it creates another way in which people can be defrauded I suppose. I don't know. I mean, the proof will be in the pudding. We'll see. That is definitely that is something that a lot of people were talking about. You know, you know, people were discussing that even with the legislature. But it's sort of like another thing that it percolates every few years is electronic wills, right? And whether we're going to join like a lot of other states allowing documents that are electronic or even videos or whatever to be deemed as wills. And people are like, "Oh, there's all sorts of you know, potential for fraud there." And there is, but we have like 100 plus years of cases involving people forging signatures on too. So, I mean, I you know, it's just changing the way in which things happen. And there may be like fraud bubbles as a result of all this. There might be a lot. We'll see. Yeah. Well, I think we're planning to do another episode just on that. That's a little below your level threshold for work. I appreciate you bringing it up cuz it's important, I think. But I do think there's a And I think there's going to be I've talked to two firms that are planning like a reduced fee, like $1,500 you know, for a single property. And that's what this new law covers. So, there's going to be I hopefully some, you know, pulling out of some of the cases that are I think filed the lower income where the legal fees eat up so much of the equity. I think the goal is to get those cases out of the probate process and into more of a streamlined. And I know those I think that the heart's in the right place. Time will tell if it if it works.

45:26 So, I look forward to that and going forward. Where there's a will, there's a lawyer. Well, probably or there should be. If there is a will and without a lawyer, probably should have had a lawyer and that's why they're ripe for litigation. And we know good litigator. Actually, it's yeah, you're right. It's where there's a will, there's a lawyer. Where there isn't a will, there's a lawyer. Okay. Well, we're glad to have you as a lawyer. And next one Brett from Sheppard Mullin. More information if you want to reach out to him. Let me Ooh, I lost my spot here. There's his contact information. Feel free to reach out to his website. And as well with a picture of him there with his contact information on the on the firm website. Feel free reach out to him as appropriate if you have something and you know obviously before if you have a litigation a lower price or questions about that feel free to call me I'd be more glad to make to vet it and make the introduction. Again Nick thank you so much for your time I as always really appreciate you. Hey thanks for having me Bill it's a pleasure to be And for the rest of you this is Probate Weekly we do this every week we have a new episode where we interview attorneys leading professionals in the industry to help you be more effective in helping your customers get better outcomes as a result of probate continue the conversation on our Facebook group probateweekly.com is a Facebook group. If you want to get notified of episodes go to probateweekly.com put your email address in you don't have to put your phone number in it's optional if you want to though we can also notify you from time there. If you scroll down there's our audio formats as well as the past episodes on YouTube. Love to have you participate. If you like this please like it subscribe it if you have suggestions on future topics or you're a trainer that would like to be interviewed for this please reach out to me I'd love to talk to you about that.

46:58 As always make today your best day ever. Thanks so