Opinion ID: 1159129
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The state probate homestead law.

Text: Upon Mrs. Johnson's application in 1965, the probate court had a mandatory duty to set aside for her a probate homestead. [3] The selection of the homestead and its boundaries were up to the sound discretion of the trial court, considering the value of the homestead, the financial condition of the estate and the rights of creditors, and subject to the paramount demands of the family. ( Estate of Claussenius (1950) 96 Cal. App.2d 600, 611 [216 P.2d 485].) State law has vested the probate court with this broad discretion incident to its exclusive occupation of the field of probate law for the purpose of protecting the surviving family of a decedent against the greed of creditors or its own improvidence ( Estate of Adams (1900) 128 Cal. 380, 383 [57 P. 569, 60 P. 965]). Probate Code section 664 [4] has codified this principle, and the Law Revision Commission comment to it notes that [t]he court is not limited to existing lots or parcels, but must set apart only so much of the property as is reasonable under the circumstances of the case. The order setting the homestead apart had the effect of vesting title in Mrs. Johnson. (Former Prob. Code, § 667, repealed by Stats. 1980, ch. 119, § 15; Otto v. Long (1904) 144 Cal. 144 [77 P. 885].) [5]