In Caceres v. Kerri Grahamas Dependent Adm’r of the Property of Alicia Maribel Procell, decedent was survived by a minor baby and her property was bancrupt. No. 14-18-00826-CV, 2020 Tex. App. LEXIS 4198 (Tex. App.—Houston [14th Dist.] Might 28, 2020, no pet. historical past). The trial courtroom appointed a dependent administrator and permitted the administrator’s stock, appraisement, and listing of claims. The administrator had included the decedent’s homestead on the property’s stock and represented that the property had a declare for the rental revenue from the homestead. The trial courtroom overruled the objections of two of the youngsters to the stock, appraisement, and listing of claims, and granted the administrator’s movement to terminate the property’s homestead safety and to topic it, and the revenue it generated, to the dependent administration.
On enchantment, the appellate courtroom disagreed with the trial courtroom as a result of one of many decedent’s youngsters was a minor when her mom died. The courtroom held that the homestead stays exempt as a matter of regulation from the claims of the property’s collectors and isn’t topic to administration. The courtroom additionally held that title to the homestead vested within the decedent’s 4 youngsters upon her loss of life; thus, hire due after her loss of life belongs to the property. The courtroom mentioned the regulation governing homestead and a decedent’s minor youngsters:
[A]n utility by an individual licensed to behave on the minor’s behalf, the courtroom should “put aside . . . the homestead for the use and advantage of . . . the minor youngsters.” Which means that, with just a few slim exceptions not offered right here, the homestead is just not chargeable for the fee of any of the property’s money owed. Until one of many categorical exceptions applies, the homestead is just not topic to administration. As an alternative, the decedent’s youngsters share “absolute title” to the homestead. Second, a trial courtroom has discretion to allow a minor’s guardian to “to make use of and occupy” the homestead beneath a courtroom order. Third, the homestead will not be partitioned among the many decedent’s heirs for as long as the trial courtroom permits the guardian of the decedent’s minor youngsters “to make use of and occupy” the homestead.
Id. The courtroom held that the truth that the administrator included the homestead property within the stock didn’t imply that it was presumptively homestead:
Though there may be case regulation holding that inclusion of actual property within the administrator’s stock is prima facie proof that the property is just not a homestead, and thus, a homestead shouldn’t be included on the stock, we can’t say that the inclusion of homestead property within the administrator’s stock is per se inaccurate, as a result of the Texas Property Code seems to allow its inclusion. “Property” is statutorily outlined to incorporate all of a decedent’s property, and the homestead falls inside that broad definition.
Id.
The courtroom additionally disagreed with the trial courtroom’s conclusion that the minor’s homestead’s rights ought to have been terminated when she turned eighteen. The courtroom held: “the homestead handed freed from claims by or towards the property to the decedent’s youngsters upon their mom’s loss of life, and it continues to be exempt homestead property despite the fact that Jennifer is now not a minor.” Id. The courtroom reversed the trial courtroom’s orders and remanded for additional proceedings.
