Rubin on Probate Litigation

Keul v. Hodges Blvd. Presbyterian Church , 180 So.3d 1074 (Fla. 1st DCA 2015) This decision deals with whether a POD designation can be invalidated for undue influence , as well as the right of a probate court to require a party to return POD funds to an estate instead of entering a money judgment against the party for the amount of the funds.   The decedent's 2009 will provided that at her death, her entire estate would go to Hodges Boulevard Presbyterian Church.  A few days before she died, the decedent's neighbor/friend/caregiver/attorney in fact/health care surrogate claimed the decedent asked her to help her get a POD form to change her beneficiary designation to leave all of her assets to the neighbor and her family.   Following the decedent's death, the church objected to the inventory and sought to remove the neighbor as personal representative, arguing that the neighbor had failed to include the POD account in the inventory.  The trial court ult...

Brown v. Brown , 39 Fla. L. Weekly D.1949a In this case, the circuit court relied on the report of a magistrate regarding the ownership of certain joint and pay-on-death ("POD") accounts of a decedent.  The circuit court held that both the joint and POD accounts were includable in the decedent's estate, to be distributed pursuant to the terms of the will.  The Appellate Court affirmed the order as to the joint accounts, but reversed as to the POD accounts, pointing to the differing statutes governing the ownership of these types of accounts in making its distinction.  The Court held that the magistrate was correct to rely on F.S. 655.79 as to the joint accounts, and upheld the magistrate's holding that F.S. 655.79 creates a presumption that title to a joint deposit account vests in the surviving owners, but that presumption may be overcome with clear and convincing proof of contrary intent.  Since the magistrate found that there was clear and convincing evid...