Your state’s pack. New issues arrive periodically on Mondays. Bookmark it. I built this for the Alabama T&E solo who knows Title 43, Ch. 8 (Alabama’s own Probate Code) cold but still loses an afternoon a week hunting the current homestead-allowance number, the Medicaid (Alabama Medicaid Agency) LTC-waiver posture, whether the latest Alabama State Bar ethics opinion changes how you scope an engagement, or whether a recent Alabama Court of Civil Appeals decision just moved the law on capacity, undue influence, or a trustee’s duties. What’s below is what mattered in Alabama lately — the week’s developments and the recent rulings from the bench.
For licensed attorneys. This pack is general legal information and professional commentary for practicing attorneys — it is not legal advice, does not apply to any specific matter, and creates no attorney-client relationship. Verify every authority against the cited primary source before relying on it with a client. Published by Mike Moss, a Utah-admitted attorney, as an AI-enablement information product; it is not an offer of legal services and is not a representation that the author is admitted to practice in your jurisdiction.
Three developments from the last seven days that I think actually matter to a Alabama T&E solo. Each one has a read that lands on your practice specifically — and each one comes with the citation so you can verify the detail yourself before you use it with a client.
The State Treasurer’s Ala. Code §43-8-116 CPI table now carries the July 1, 2026 triennial adjustment: homestead allowance $18,800 → $20,475; family allowance $18,800 → $20,475; exempt personal property $9,400 → $10,225. Because HB164’s small-estate summary-distribution ceiling floats on the combined allowances, that cap moves with it (combined base $47,000 → $51,175). Under the last cycle’s mechanics each adjustment applied to claims arising on or after April 1 of the following year — the Treasurer’s page does not restate that gloss, so confirm the application date before relying on the new figure for a claim filed today.
Every Alabama small-estate intake this year turns on which figure is operative. Update your templates and client worksheets with both numbers — the posted $20,475/$10,225 cycle and the prior $18,800/$9,400 cycle — and flag the April-1 application question in any summary-distribution filing near the boundary.
Ala. Code §43-8-116 CPI adjustments, Alabama State Treasurer (posted eff. July 1, 2026) · treasury.alabama.gov
Per the enrolled bill, SB41 (2026; effective Oct. 1, 2026) amends Ala. Code § 43-8-253 so a person convicted of elder abuse, neglect, or financial exploitation of the decedent is treated as having predeceased the decedent — cut off from taking under a will, by intestacy, by right of survivorship, or by beneficiary designation.
For an Alabama solo, this is a new tool and a new diligence point. When a contest or administration involves a caregiver-beneficiary with an abuse or exploitation conviction tied to the decedent, the bar operates like the slayer rule — the conviction, not a separate civil finding, drives disqualification across will, intestacy, survivorship, and beneficiary-designation channels. Flag the conviction question at intake on contested estates, because it can reorder who takes.
Ala. SB41 (2026 Reg. Sess.), enrolled · amending Ala. Code § 43-8-253 · alison.legislature.state.al.us · SB41-enr
Per the opinion, Alabama State Bar Formal Opinion 2026-01 (May 2026) is the state’s first formal ethics opinion on generative AI. It imposes no new duties but recontextualizes existing ones — competence (including technological competence), confidentiality, supervision, candor, reasonable fees, and client communication — for AI-assisted work, endorses ABA Formal Opinion 512, and confirms the lawyer remains fully responsible for AI work product.
For an Alabama solo using AI-assisted drafting or research, this is the controlling in-state ethics frame: you are fully accountable for AI output, so verification, confidentiality screening of inputs, and a fee basis you can explain are now the diligence baseline. If you have adopted any AI tool, read FO 2026-01 against your current intake, confidentiality, and billing practices and close any gap before it surfaces in a matter.
Ala. State Bar Formal Opinion 2026-01 (May 2026) · alabar.org · FO 2026-01
Decisions that bind a Alabama practitioner — Alabama’s appellate courts and the federal courts covering Alabama, including the U.S. Eleventh Circuit — read for what actually changes how you draft, advise, and plan. Trusts and estates broadly, not Medicaid alone: wills and capacity, undue influence, fiduciary duty, trust construction, and estate recovery. One read, the holding, and the official cite.
This lane reads each new opinion from Alabama’s appellate courts and the federal courts covering Alabama (Eleventh Circuit) before anything lands here, and reads-and-discards matters that aren’t trusts-and-estates — criminal, family, commercial/LLC fiduciary, tax, and cases where an estate or trust is only a party. For this period’s trailing window, no new verified trusts-and-estates or estate-recovery decision from those courts was identified in the sources reviewed.
Nothing to re-paper from the bench this period; controlling authority is unchanged. When the next verified T&E ruling issues, it lands here with the holding and the official cite.
Controlling authority unchanged · Alabama appellate courts · U.S. Eleventh Circuit.
This week in Alabama for the T&E solo with Alabama Medicaid clients: the developments from the Alabama State Bar and the Alabama Medicaid Agency that actually moved your practice this period — each one primary-source verified.
Bar and Medicaid changes land on different schedules and aren't indexed by practice focus. Every item here was checked against its primary source, with the link, so you can verify before relying on it.