Title Company Litigation in Probate, with Attorney Courtney Writer

0:02 So, welcome to Probate Weekly podcast where we often interview probate attorneys or probate litigation attorneys that litigate or trust administration attorneys or even interviewed title company account executives or underwriters. Never had the pleasure or the need to talk to a title company litigator, but I heard her on a recent podcast. Shout out to Sam Price, one of the best podcasts on probate. Courtney Writer is the litigation attorney and vice president at Fidelity National Title. Courtney, thank you for joining us today.

0:33 Of course. No problem, Bill. Happy to be on. And definitely a shout out to Sam Price. also, if you if you get a chance, also listen to his podcast, Probate Notes. It's a it's a great series.

0:46 Must listen. He I mean, he gets a good I just poach his guests. You know, I've got all kinds of content [laughter] thanks to him. He's fantastic. So, Courtney, you know, most of us I'm a real estate agent. Most of the people call are we get a lot of attorneys as well. Most of us think of title reps as a the person who gets you the title report, preliminary report, maybe research information, deeds and comps and stuff like that. in the old days, you used to bring us pens, pads, cookies, occasional sponsor items. That's great.

1:13 But you actually do work for the title company. You actually protect the title company's interest or the customer's interest. Talk a bit about what is a litigation attorney inside a major national player like Fidelity National Title.

1:24 Absolutely. Happy to, Bill. so basically what my job entails is I work on the litigation side of for the title company. and basically what that means is essentially obviously when you buy a property and you're you know you're you're purchasing title insurance and pretty much anyone in California that buys a property gets a title insurance policy and if they don't they should. and so essentially, what that does is that protects you and make sure that you have a good title to the property. And what that means is that when you go to sell or refinance a property, there's no issues. And the title company when you buy the property, they're able to insure that and provide you insurance policy. So on my end, what I do is I help handle the litigation side in the event that there are any problems that require litigation to resolve. and how that works is you purchase a title insurance policy and let's say you want to sell your property later on down the line. and you discover that there's an issue with title and this happens more often than not. there could be issues such as simple as the legal descriptions wrong on your deed or bigger there could be bigger issues such as you know issues that with u there was an outstanding interest that never was dealt with. so the issues are wide limiting. And so you make a claim with your title insurance policy. and then the claim eventually goes through a claim center in Omaha. They make what's called a coverage determination, meaning they confirm that, you know, this type of issue is covered under the policy, you're covered. And then if it does require litigation, it gets routed to you one excuse me and we call it IHL which is in-house litigation. And so we're

3:27 Nationwide. We have offices all throughout the nation because as you mentioned though you know fidelity major players we have Chicago Title Insurance, Lawyers Title, Commonwealth, say pretty much the one of the big players in the title industry. And again, if any of the claims involve litigation, they would get routed to one of our offices and one of them attorney like me and we attempt to kind of analyze, handle it, and represent our insurance to resolve the issue. So that's kind of just generally how it works.

4:03 So again, there's a lot that goes on behind the scenes at a title company. And one of the things behind the scenes also in your case because you work for one of the largest, if not the largest, I think one of the largest for sure is you have multiple brands that really kind of roll up. So when somebody gets a title policy from Chicago title, it's part of the Fidelity National family of companies or whatever you want to call it. And so number one, people should know that. And oftentimes there's smaller companies that Fidelity has a relationship with. And really, you're kind of getting the brand of the small company. Maybe it's an escrow company or a broker that has it, but it's really fidelity that that's behind that and you want to have those resource behind you. Now, it's interesting as a real estate agent, I would say, [laughter] okay, true confessions. I've not been a big fan of operations of companies like yours that title insurance is about ensuring reasonable risk. Like you have a house and it's there's trees and there's fire hazards, but you take reasonable risks, you get it insured. I feel like title companies sometimes only ensure a policy once there's three belts and four sets of suspenders and then everything is is in glass enclosed. The fact that you even have any work at all as a trial litigator on matters regarding title is news to me because it seems to me and no offense whenever there's been a claim the title company just says no and makes you kind of go through the whole process of getting sued. to talk about what are the more not that we want to encourage claims that are unfair or unreasonable to your company, but what are the more common types of claims that you have to litigate and defend the policy or defend in this case the buyer of the policy most commonly a buyer.

5:40 So, I think we lost your audio. I'm sorry. specialist in

5:56 Hold on one second. I think we've lost your audio. Did you do something to your microphone? Is this better? Much better. Okay. Sorry about that.

6:04 So, going back to a couple of examples, that I could provide. [snorts] some common examples are like I said issues with the legal description on leads. Those are kind of the more simple ones that if we get cooperation we can kind of correct that fairly easy. others are outstanding interest. Let's say a kind of a common one is people think that a property is held in joint tenancy which has attached to it a [unclear] and just to explain that a little bit. Obviously, if a property is held in joint tenancy, it has what's called a right of survivorship, which means it goes to the other joint tenant rather than passed through, let's say, intestate succession or kind of through any other means through the natural heirs of a person. and so sometimes kind of another common issue what I see a lot is people you know think that the property is held in joint tenancy and it's really not or there was something that happens in you know prior in the chain of title that inadvertently severed the joint tenancy and no one realized it and so there's this outstanding interest that needs to be resolved. That's a fairly common one and like I said I since I am a certified specialist in probate and estate planning as well. I do see it a lot.

7:34 My practice and kind of what gets assigned to me are what they call dead people cases involving either outstanding probate matters, 850 petitions, which are basically quiet title actions in the probate world, right?

7:49 And a lot of kind of common things just generally in the title litigation world is us some certain neighbor disputes. if there are lot trees, certain boundary disputes, things like that. I've dealt with a lot of easement issues, either interpretation of certain easements, things like that. So, it's a wide variety. but I feel like the most common usually what it stems down to and kind of what we do is what it what it sends down to is actual title to the property. We have good title and we're just continually.

8:30 Yeah. Typically, you're buying a house from a stranger. How do you know they own it? And how you know, even if even if they own it, how do you know how they own it and what rights they have to distribute it? And I think some people take it for granted the process and it's just paperwork and they blame, you know, the bureaucracy. The reality is it does provide important service, allows us to transact with strangers or out of country and such. So, I imagine there are cases that you look at and go, "What a knucklehead. Why didn't they just do this? Why didn't they fill out this piece of paper ahead of time to protect themselves rather than subject themselves?" So, what are one or two examples of easily preventable things that people could do that end up not being done and as a result create work for you or litigation for your company?

9:15 Sure. a couple of things that and this is more like I said on the [unclear] of things.

9:24 I'm sorry I need to get your closure microphone again. I'm sorry. Sorry. all of 2020 you know as far as kind of looking back and seeing what been done. I mean unfortunately by the time that we get it usually the mistake of inadvertent mistake kind of has already happened but some things that you can kind of do to code events if is obviously you know I would say you know just go through if you're a either first-time home buyer or something like that just make sure you do first of all get a title insurance policy just that's kind of just a point of fact Another thing is also be communication with your title insurance company as you go through the process. there are certain things that you do need additional endorsements for. like I said, sometimes you need to buy as you're going through the process additional coverage. I think certain things such as boundary disputes, you do eventually need to purchase an additional endorsement and get a survey just to confirm the boundary lines at the outset. so some things like that that can be done in the you know on the front end.

10:47 Additionally, also when you're signing the closing docs, I mean I get this all the time. make sure you take a look at it, you know, I mean obviously I get it. It's a bunch of paper, right? When you're sitting down at a closing, but I mean make sure a couple of things like your name's right on the deed. the legal description of the assessor's parcel number. Little things like that can potentially, you know, kind of alleviate issues down the line. Definitely. Another thing is obviously it's okay to communicate with their title company and about something that doesn't necessarily pass the mail test, so to speak. Like if there's an issue, a change of title and you get the preliminary title report and you see, okay, this deed was, you know, signed two years after or two years before it was reported. Why is there something that takes so long? You know what I'm saying? And like little things like that little things like that you can do to kind of prevent issues down the I would say. I had a case where we had a probate and out of the blue somebody lodged objection with a will purported by the decedent and it turned out the will was dated or no I'm sorry a grant deed signed by the decedent purportedly well out of out of the country and the date of the deed was two years after he died. [laughter] So the [unclear]

12:25 Doesn't pass the smell test. Sure. Right. It was interesting that I got towel companies who would not insure it and I had to change it to a third, you know, second and a third title company to say, "Look, here's the desert. Here's the grant deed. The signatures. We got a lowriced non, you know, probably standard person to verify the signature because it was obvious it wasn't a signature and also the date. And yet the title company said, you know, we need the court to verify that. And the court wasn't going to do anything. They're not they're not in the business of invalidating deeds. They just, you know, have a will. So we actually had to get different tile companies. So these are things where sometimes working ahead of time, you can avoid that. Now, I guess the worst would have been had we sold a property, they could have come back later, made a claim, and now you have a problem. And so the whole key is to get these things done in advance. I have to say that most of the good account executives at your companies, at your family companies are open to getting a prelim file probate because let's get let's get the work done while we can ahead of time.

13:29 I'm sorry. What happens to kind of things at the very beginning and make sure

13:45 Hold on something's happened to audio game where it just seems to have disappeared. Do you hear me? Okay. Yes, I can hear you. I mean, I can I hear the words you're saying, but somehow it's very faint. Then if you just step back one an inch, it seems like it disappears entirely. let's see. Is it I hate to do

14:02 This better? Yes. Okay. I apologize. My audio was off before. There you go. It was on Zoom and here we are on Streamyard. I understand that. Do that all day. [laughter]

14:12 Okay. So, this should be better now. Much better. And so, we take a lot of pride in our prelims and just making sure that, things are, you know, quote unquote tightened right at the very beginning. and part of that is making sure if there are issues with title, that we get things like for example, a probate order or make sure all that stuff is recorded in the chain of title to make sure things are on the up and up.

14:47 Granted, I mean, there are things that you can't stop. There are various nefarious people that end up, you know, forging signatures like the example that you just gave. things of that nature which isn't obviously we have to deal with those kind of subsequently those come out of the woodwork. but at the end of the day and to be honest there is only so much a title insurance company can do right you know if something looks good on its face and there's a presumption that it's a notarized document it was duly recorded obviously we're entitled to rely on that. and then you know if and that's why in truth I have a job. if subsequently there are issues arising from that or you know issues with title that need to be resolved invariably that gets routed to you know someone like me to help resolve. So

15:45 Seems to me that I've been in business now for about 40 years. obviously our population is getting older. the percentage of property owned by older people is getting older. I think you know different forms of dementia and Alzheimer's are becoming more we're more aware of it. I presume it's more common but also for sure we're all more aware of it. But in real estate transactions I see I see much more common fraud, attempted fraud. and so to me it seems you know some of the solutions are worse than some of the problems. I see, you know, people promoting title lock, which I don't think really provides any real benefit from these types of things. I just encourage family members to check the title on your family property, you know, every 30 days. Doesn't cost anything to check and if nothing's being done, you're probably okay. What are what type of frauds do you see happening or litigation cases, I guess, arising for fraud, do you see happening? And what are one or two things you might suggest to family members or friends to protect themselves?

16:43 Absolutely. So, some things that I see that are fairly common, especially kind of in this probate world, and you kind of hit on it, as well in just your previous statement, is a lot of forgery. and what most people don't realize is that, you know, and these are issues that we end up having to deal with. Let's say there was a forgery and it conveyed title or there was you know obviously again we're the title insurance company we can only do so much we relied on this didn't know you know it on its face it didn't look like a forgery and then subsequently obviously we ensure even a subsequent owner who wasn't even a party to that deed and then there's an outlying claim as Well, there's an outlying claim. and most people don't realize this that obviously we're a subsequent purchaser. There's the benefit of having what's called bona fide purchaser status if you paid full value of the property without any previous knowledge of the claim. Then you actually can argue that you have superior title. Ultimately, it would be up for probably a court to decide. but that's a, you know, under the law, that's a pretty good, affirmative defense. Now, most people don't realize that, if there was a forgery, a prior forgery, what happens is that bona fide purchaser argument is unavailable and the deed is void rather than voidable. So, some things that you can kind of do to I guess prevent that just kind of for family member and friends is you made a good suggestion. Just occasionally check title to the property. Make sure nothing's been, you know, recorded. You can go down to the county recorder's office. There's a lot of online services that you can use that I think some are even free that you can kind of pull deeds to the property and things like

18:46 That. friendly Fidelity National Title Rep for example, there's an app you guys give us that we can check title, get cops names out of Yep. absolutely. So that's also communication with your family members directly if they're elderly or in let's say some type of assisted living or something like that. regular contact and communication because like you said undue influence kind of is very prevalent. and sometimes that goes in handinhand with the forgery issue. If you have kind of a one specific family member kind of that you know is influencing an elderly person or potentially taking advantage of this elderly person. helpful to check in with them again and make sure you know and another huge kind of thing to help protect oneself from things like this such as you know fraud, forgery, things of that nature is proper estate planning. That's a huge thing that you could definitely do. and I am a huge advocate of proper estate planning because what that does is most people think estate planning just avoids probate, which in and of itself is a huge benefit, right?

20:10 [clears throat] The time and the cost you save from doing an estate plan is just a benefit in itself rather than go through probate. And most people don't realize that that probate fees are actually set by statute. and most people don't realize that, that, the fees are actually set by the California Probate Code and they're set by the value of the estate. so the attorney is going to get paid what they're going to get paid by assisting you with this probate. And that's just written in the statute. and an estate plan comparably is a lot cheaper and you get to kind of have that kind of peace of mind as to not going through a lengthy court process. The other benefit of an estate plan is you get to plan for your incapacity and things that happen if you, let's say, do get diagnosed with a cognitive disorder such as dementia, Alzheimer's, things like that. you have something in place that designates your wishes when you're not able to speak them. And that's also a huge benefit to estate plan and to having an estate plan. And what that does is that helps kind of cut down on these title issues, right? You have everything set and things like that. So those are some things that you can kind of do to prevent you know any type of forgery or fraud related to title to your property

21:43 And also I think provides some additional defense against fraud. I've seen a case where the decedent had this whole or not I guess in this case it was a conservatee had this whole estate plan done because he wanted the estate distributed a certain way. Then you had this kind of wild deed to his caregiver/new girlfriend/quasi-wife and that gave everything to her and you know they tried to argue it was a forgery or he was incapacitated but one of the proofs was well when he was of sound mind he had this whole elaborate plan and that he had that was witnessed and everybody knew about it and in the dark of the night this deed shows up and so you know the court has to work through you know there's other legal issues but at least one piece of evidence supporting that this looked bad was he had an estate plan. He had paid money to do it. Involved numerous family members and the fact that he would do a deed and just cut everybody out seemed unlikely. Again, there's a legal process that to go through, but it just was one more piece of evidence. And it's just amazing how outlandish some of these attempts are. I mean, you must you I mean, I see this occasionally. This must be your world. You must see this all the time. And you need to talk to this person who, you know, they ripped off the person and they're try in court trying to defend themselves of being the victim of course, right?

22:59 Yep. Absolutely. There are certain cases that I've had where it's clear that, you know, again, the deed or the conveyance doesn't necessarily pass the smell test, but at the end of the day, there's a person kind of defending it to the hilt. And ultimately, like you said, it does need to go through for those type of cases. We kind of know it's going to go through the court process and we're going to have to litigate this thing. But like I it [clears throat] and it's it's also unfortunate to see like when especially elder people you know are taken advantage of and you know it's unfortunate to see and unfortunately that does happen more you know more often than people would want to realize. and so again, I feel like the courts do a pretty good job of sussing that out, and are able to kind of, you know, able to kind of, you know, parse these issues out. another, you know, another thing that, you know, a lot of cases don't necessarily go to trial, even with title issues. and so ultimately there's some type of resolution to the litigation if we need to file some type of legal action or defend some type of legal action. you know invariably settlement is always explored at some juncture during the litigation. And the benefit to that as well is kind of both parties kind of know the result and there's an actual kind of resolution. and you don't necessarily let the court decide and it could go either way. Usually in court there's a winner and a loser. whereas if you reach a settlement, maybe both parties are able to reach some type of agreement that they can live with, right? and I always joke that a good

25:04 Settlement is one where both parties aren't happy, like they feel like they left something on the table. but you know if cases like you know certain cases get litigated you know it's ultimately up to usually a judge and most people don't realize that that especially if you're in the probate world dealing with title issues which invariably come up and kind of what my focus is is there's no jury in probate. there's no entitlement to a jury. So it's ultimately up to the bench officer to decide these issues of fact and invariably like I said there's a winner and a loser.

25:46 So I think the other thing that your clients or you know the general public doesn't understand is judges today particularly in LA County have huge case loads at least you know you can argue whether it's true or not. but what's not in doubt is they feel incredible pressure to move the case loads and towards resolution as many as possible and they feel and again that you know you can argue it but certainly they almost every single time I'm ever in court the judge will say how busy they are how full their case load is and how overwhelmed they are and so you have to be sensitive to that to realize the judge wants it resolved I mean you feel like you're in a train going downhill he just wants this thing done or G regardless male or female, they just want it done. And it's almost like if you have legitimate cause for litigation, you're somewhat at a disadvantage because, you know, it's tough to prove enough, let alone you have a judge who really wants this disposed and yet sometimes you can't get the other party to agree. So, talk a little bit about how do you know, and I deal with customers who are in the same situation, right? there's objections and there's you know other parties who are trying to sue for different things and you know the judge seems so rushed so hurried and the customer you know once and there's times to be heard and times not to be meaning it's not in even not in a hearing stage but in the daily calendar people want to plead their case and the judge is like look I'm just going through the procedures right now that's not the right time we'll deal with it so talk a little bit how do you balance between you know getting attention for your client and I guess in your case mostly the company and at the same time u you know not upsetting the judge and meeting their needs for efficiency.

27:29 Absolutely. and I think the biggest thing like I mean to your point Absolutely. I totally agree that judges have hugely impacted calendars. you know in any county and so in a hearing you could be one of maybe 35 to 40 on the calendar, right? like you're you're the judge is is hearing in their morning calendar. so what I like to practice in order is is to be efficient and efficiently move the case along is be as prepared as possible for the hearing. obviously I've kind of understood the procedure. I've I've been practicing for over 10 years now and so specifically in probate for going on six to seven. So, I've kind of seen different things in probate. So, I pretty much am able to anticipate, you know, depending on what it's on calendar for, what's either going to happen and things like that. And try to be prepared as prepared as possible. so that's one point that I can say for any either client or attorney that's listening to this, you know, be prepared as prepared as possible. Additionally, like you said, there are certain junctures where you are able to offer argument or kind of things argument evidence to support your position. and typically the process is you go through these hearings if you're objecting to a petition you file your written objections first. You do discovery. Again, that's just a way of being prepared, exchanging information, and then invariably the court sets what's called an evidentiary hearing. and what that does is that is the that's essentially in probate, essentially the trial. that's where the judge hears the evidence. So, obviously, the judge in any other hearing isn't really going to hear any type of argument. They may say, "Hey,

29:34 What's going on with discovery?" or talk to you about a specific issue at the hearing. But the time where you really want to present your argument is obviously at this evidentiary hearing. And typically, if a matter is being contested in probate, the court will eventually set an evidentiary hearing. but there are certain benchmarks that you need to do to kind of get to that point. Like I said, you know, obviously, file written objections. Most people don't realize this. you can actually go to a probate hearing and orally object to something and that is allowable procedurally, but what the court will then do likely when you show up initially, and I've had to do this just because we've just gotten into the case and haven't really gotten a chance to, you know, formulate our written objections, show up, object to the hearing, and then what the court will likely do is set a deadline for you to file your written objections. and so again, just preparing those, being as prepared as possible. and then that just alerts the court that this is a contested matter that likely needs to be set for an evidentiary hearing. Then you do your discovery. And in probate, discovery follows the same model as the, you know, a regular civil case. You can do, you know, the regular forms of discovery, written discovery, depositions, exchange experts if you need to. you know a lot of things that come up going back to the forgery issue. Obviously people both parties would likely need to get a handwriting analysis or from a handwriting expert. so you do some expert discovery and all that takes place to help you prepare and then the court will invariably set a like I said an evidentiary hearing and that's your opportunity to call your witnesses, present your evidence and like you said the court is really impacted. So luckily that's not going to happen really anytime soon like right when you file the case. but eventually you

31:37 Will get your day in court if it goes that route. it does take a long process, but to your point, Bill, usually a lot doesn't happen at these procedural hearings. The court kind of just checks in and set certain control dates where things need to be done, certain deadlines, and you follow those and you follow the process.

31:59 You know, I'm at a case now that there's objection lurking, and they told on the prior hearing, they told the judge in court they're going to object. they didn't make the objection. They didn't announce it. They just in passing discussed the objection. And so my client said, "Well, when do they have to file?" And I said, "I'm not an attorney, but the code says up until the next up till the hearing, they can object to this particular petition." They could walk in the door and just verbally object. The problem is the court hates that because you could you plenty of time to file your objections, then you'd have a date, then you just file for continuance to that date. The judge doesn't have to see you till you show up and they're happy. But if you show up and then you object, you know what he wants to ask or she wants to ask the question, why didn't you just do it ahead of time? Why did you make us reschedule here in public with all these people, there's 50 people waiting. and so I think there's the there's the legal side and there's the business side. And I think you really hit on the head, which is be prepared, follow the rules, know the rules, anticipate the judge, and I just feel like there's some very great attorneys know the law. They went to great law schools, they win all kinds of other cases, but probate court, man, you better know those procedures because it seems different. One of the questions I want to ask you is I know you're based in LA. What percentage of work is LA County versus what percentage of work is other counties?

33:10 So I work in the LA office of like I said Fidelity's IHL team and so we actually handle all basically a large part of Southern California. So any type of thing but I would say most of my cases are ba based in probably one of three counties primarily being LA County. I do practice a lot in San Bernardino or Riverside as well. I would say those are probably my kind of three main counties. I do have certain cases up in Ventura County, some in Santa Barbara. So, those things and then we do actually have an Irvine office that handles primarily San Diego and Orange County cases, but I do have a couple of those sprinkled in as well. But I would say my three biggest counties that I practice in would be LA, San Bernardino, and Riverside. And

34:05 Yeah, go ahead. And the other counties because they often include items from LA County or is it just that your workload covers as well San Bernardino only matters and Riverside only matters or is it only because LA might have a property in San Bernardino or might or might have a property in Riverside? Yeah, it's a combination of things. Like I, you know, some of them are kind of one-offs in like I said, Kern County, Ventura County, you know, things like that. So, it just depends on where the claim is, I feel like. And then also, you know, our manager obviously assigns the case load. So if he attempts to be my manager attempts to be geographically cognizant of kind of where certain offices they're easier to get to and things like that. So it does depend.

34:56 Seems to me that the b the business of probate court law is so different in each county. It's almost a completely different experience. Orange County, you know, I go there occasionally on a sale. The judge greets everybody. Hey, how you guys doing? Nice to see you all. you know, I go on to training classes in probate real estate and they'll say, "Oh, yeah, go up and meet the court, you know, clerk and say hi to them and maybe offer to bring them out to lunch." I'm like, "I'm in LA County, man. There's bulletproof glass. You don't talk to anybody. You don't get near the judge. Maybe talk to the bailiff ahead of time and say, you know, good morning. Otherwise, just sit in your chair and stay out of trouble." It's just so different from county to county. it seems to me that if I was hiring an attorney on a matter, I'd really want to make sure that I knew that they were being in the primary county. I understand why in your case, you have multiple counties and it's a it's a business that has to support these other areas, but I would think my advice to people is if you're going to hire an attorney, make sure that's the county, they know, not just the state law, the local rules, and probably the personalities, who the other trial bar members are and who the other who the judges are or the bench officers. Is that for advice?

36:04 Absolutely. That is great advice, Bill. And then just piggybacking on that great advice is a lot of times if you are looking for an attorney to represent you in a probate or regular civil matter relating to title to your property, a good thing to do rather than kind of a just a random Google search and things like that is reach out to the local bar association. so if you're in San Bernardino County, reach out to the San Bernardino County Bar Association. A lot of them do have attorney referral services that are either free or charges a very nominal fee. And by nominal, I mean maybe between 40 to 50 bucks. and they provide they can provide you with attorney referrals and you can meet with them. And most attorneys do give in private practice. Like I said, I'm in house litigation, so I don't really take outside work. But just if you are looking for an attorney to represent you in either a probate matter or you know, civil matter related to you know, title to your property that's not covered under a title insurance policy. definitely looking at the local bar associations because it is a great kind of first step because of the fact that these attorneys that are active in the bar association and I am active in LA County, San Bernardino County and Riverside County Bar Associations attend continuing education classes at these county events. these attorneys are active in the county and again probably like you said know kind of the scope of you know the judges even temperament the judges you know certain judges temperament or at least how the process is you know and they always say probate is a very small world so I do know a lot of people that practice in probate in like I said San Bernardino LA and Riverside counties and you know it's a small world and so you

38:07 Want to get that type of representation that you know that just gives you a little bit of an edge I feel like absolutely yeah I know that I know the bar also has a specialization and so they'll usually refer somebody who has that specialization in trust and probate.

38:20 Absolutely. And there is so again I am a certified specialist by the state of California bar in probate trust and estate planning. and so is Sam Price who we talked about earlier. He's also

38:34 He's beyond a specialist. Yeah. Yeah. And then so what you could do as well is the state bar website actually where all the attorney roles are listed does have that designation and you could actually specifically look up certified specialists in the respective counties as well.

38:54 And also if it'll show on the calbar.org or website if they have any pending or pre previous enforcement. Yeah. Previous discipline. Interesting. I had I had somebody who was threatening me with a lawsuit and they got the letter from the attorney and I looked up online. The guy was himself under criminal prosecution for something like, "Wow, that's your attorney. That's that's impressive."

39:14 And the thing that I always tell customers why it's important to get the right attorney is because I'm in the marketing side, I pull all the cases that are filed in LA County. 90% of filings are probate filings are by attorneys who've done one case in the last 12 months or less. Meaning it's either their first case and only one or maybe it's their second versus you talk to there's some attorneys who are doing cases all the time. Now no litigation is different, right? Because typically you file the case, maybe you're coming in midstream, not you, but I'm saying the litigation attorneys. and so again, you want a specialist who knows the other attorneys and who knows the judges and knows the rules. So again, I find that to be the biggest mistake people make is they have an attorney help them with a DUI or their business or corporation. That's not the right attorney for probate and certainly not right for probate litigation. You want you want a cold stone killer if you're going to be litigating, I think. So

40:06 Yeah, exactly. Or someone that someone that zealously advocates for you and is assertive. you know, again, it's always good to look up, any attorney that either you're referred to or something to the state bar. It, you know, that's a great resource. Just verify first of all that they're even licensed, right? Like,

40:27 Yeah, their license is active, how long they've been lic. When I see a license issue before 1980, it's like, okay, you probably have a problem here because this guy's been around a long time or gal. And so,

40:37 Exactly. Yeah. well, and I say on the call local LA County, also feel free to reach out to me. I'd be more glad to interview. I've seen a lot of great attorneys, a lot of bad ones, and I'll I'll send you to the right one. Courtney, she seems really nice on the phone now, but she's litigation attorney. That tells you that in court, the horns pop up, the fangs come out, she's got big steel claws. she's very pleasant on the phone to us, but I assure you, [laughter] you can't have that job and not be really tough.

41:01 Right. Absolutely. and tough and prepared assertive, you know, and there's been you know, litigation is inherently contentious, right? Like absolutely. So you're the other side the other side that you're kind of dealing with obviously has a completely opposite position than you.

41:22 So obviously there's a modicum of civility that you have to kind of you know adhere to, but at the end of the day you represent your client, right? at the end of the day. and you want an attorney, like you said, that can zealously advocate. and again, protect your interest, which is, you know, you want that you want that attorney, especially if you're involved in litigation, you know, in a contested matter. Absolutely.

41:52 Well, Courtney, I know we've kept it a little longer than I originally planned on. I just want to thank you so much for taking time to educate us and to help us understand the business as it goes overall. if you want to get more information from Courtney, she is at Fidelity National Title. And again, they have a whole umbrella of companies. I happen to use regularly Lawyers Title Insurance Company, [unclear]. They're one of the Fidelity National Companies. So, their policies are run by them and Courtney supports them litigation wise. So, again, you want to work with a company that has all those resources. Courtney, thank you so much for joining us today. Thank you so much for sharing with us the information, helping us be more effective in our business.

42:27 Absolutely, Bill. Such a pleasure. And for the rest of you, this is Probate Weekly. We get together every week, usually with a probate attorney that you might use for probate or probate administration litigation. This case, I think it was great to kind of see the other side litigation from the title company side who's meant to protect us as real estate transactions, realtors and or buyers and sellers. we do this new episode every week. If I can help in any way, reach out to at Bill Gross Probate. Put your comments in, like, share, subscribe if you like this. As always, make today your best day ever.