## Facts

- Halvard L. Heggstad executed a will and a revocable living trust, naming himself trustee and his son, Glen P. Heggstad, successor trustee.
- The trust included an attached “Schedule A” identifying the property intended to be held in the trust.
- Schedule A listed Halvard’s 34.78% interest in real property at 100 Independence Drive, Menlo Park, California, but inaccurately described the interest as a “partnership interest”; in fact, Halvard held a tenant-in-common interest.
- Unlike other listed real property, no grant deed was executed transferring the Menlo Park interest from Halvard individually to Halvard as trustee; record title remained in Halvard’s individual name.
- About one month after executing the will and trust, Halvard married Nancy Rhodes Heggstad; neither document provided for her, and she qualified as an omitted spouse entitled to an intestate share of the probate estate.
- After Halvard’s death, Glen (as successor trustee and executor) petitioned the probate court for instructions on whether the Menlo Park interest was trust property or part of the probate estate.
- Nancy objected, arguing the Menlo Park interest was not in the trust because it was never deeded to the trustee and raising a conflict-of-interest concern due to Glen’s roles.

## Issues

1. Whether a settlor’s written declaration, reflected in a trust instrument and attached schedule, is sufficient to place the settlor’s real property into a revocable trust without a separate deed when the settlor is also the trustee.
2. Whether the Menlo Park property description error on Schedule A prevented the property from being treated as identified trust property.
3. Whether the probate court properly ordered the Menlo Park interest treated as trust property rather than a probate asset.

## Decision

- The Court of Appeal affirmed the probate court’s order.
- The court held the settlor’s written declaration that he held the Menlo Park interest as trustee, as shown by the trust instrument and Schedule A, was sufficient to create a trust interest in that property without a separate deed.
- The court concluded the Schedule A listing adequately identified the property despite the mislabeling of the form of ownership.
- The court upheld the decree vesting the Menlo Park interest in Glen as successor trustee and excluding it from the probate estate.

## Legal Principles

- A trust in real property may be created when the property owner declares in writing that the owner holds identified property as trustee; no conveyance is required when settlor and trustee are the same person.
- Trust property must be identified with reasonable certainty; an imprecise description of the owner’s type of interest does not defeat funding where the property and the owner’s interest are otherwise undisputed.
- Property validly held in a revocable trust at death is not part of the probate estate, even if record title remained in the decedent’s individual name.

## Conclusion

The court treated the trust instrument and attached schedule as a sufficient written declaration to place the decedent’s identified real property interest into the revocable trust, despite the absence of a deed retitling the property to the trustee, and affirmed the order excluding the property from the probate estate.


Estate of Heggstad, 16 Cal. App. 4th 943 (Cal. Ct. App. 1993)