Legal Question in Wills and Trusts in California
community property
My wife of 20 plus years recently received (in a living trust from her mother) a home valved well over $500,000. Is it true that inheritance now becomes community property in our marriage --???????????????????
The property is here in California and we live here in California.
2 Answers from Attorneys
Re: community property
Married people in California hold property either as community or private property. Property obtained before the marriage, income earned from private property, inheritances are all private property. They are not assets created by either spouse during the marriage. But the one getting the property can state it will be considered community property or it can be so mixed into community property [comingling]that i;t becomes community property. The house that was inherited is clearly your wife's private property, but if all payments made on it are from community funds and it is treated as though it were community property, a court might find that it had become community property.