Your state’s pack. New issues arrive periodically on Mondays. Bookmark it. I built this for the Florida T&E solo who knows the Florida Probate Code (Fla. Stat. ch. 731–735) cold but still loses an afternoon a week hunting the current homestead number, the Statewide Medicaid Managed Care Long-Term Care (SMMC LTC) posture, whether the latest Florida Bar Ethics opinion changes how you scope an engagement, or whether a recent Florida District Courts of Appeal decision just moved the law on capacity, undue influence, or a trustee’s duties. What’s below is what mattered in Florida 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 several weeks that I think actually matter to a Florida 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.
Chapter 2026-54 (HB 895) creates Fla. Stat. § 736.10081, effective on becoming law — approved by the Governor and filed with the Secretary of State April 29, 2026. A trustee in substantial compliance with the § 736.0813 duty to inform and account may obtain settlement of accounts and discharge once, six months after the trustee’s acceptance, either the trust terminates or the trustee resigns or is removed. The trustee sends a trust disclosure document as defined in § 736.1008(4) to the qualified beneficiaries, any cotrustee, and the immediate successor trustee if the trust is not terminating — plus anyone else the trustee reasonably believes would be affected. It must contain the trustee’s name, mailing address, telephone number and e-mail; a plan of distribution with a schedule of assets to be distributed, the debts, expenses and taxes to be paid, and any reasonable reserve; a trust accounting for any unaccounted period unless the duty was waived; a statement that the trust terminated or the trustee resigned or was removed; and a notice in at least 12-point type warning that claims may be barred unless a written objection reaches the trustee within 60 days. Notice goes out under § 736.0109, except that § 736.0109(3) does not apply. Any written objection within 60 days switches the section off entirely, and the objection need not state grounds or take any particular form. Absent a timely objection, the trustee is discharged on completing the distributions and is released from all liability and claims arising from any matter adequately disclosed — expressly including a claim that the trustee failed to inform and account under § 736.0813 — with the same effect as a court’s final order. A waiver of the right to object counts as the 60 days expiring. The section is additive and does not replace other routes to settle accounts. It applies to trusts that are irrevocable or become irrevocable on or after the effective date.
This is the most consequential change to Florida trust administration in years, and it cuts hard in both directions. For a trustee, it converts a judicial accounting proceeding into a mailing: comply with § 736.0813, assemble a real disclosure document, run the 60 days, distribute, and the release is as good as a court order. Get the contents wrong and you get nothing — the discharge reaches only matters “adequately disclosed,” so a thin plan of distribution or a skipped accounting period is exactly where liability survives. For a beneficiary, the 60-day clock is brutal and the trap is how easy it is to miss: the objection requires no grounds and no form, so there is no excuse for silence, and silence is a full release covering even a failure-to-account claim. Calendar the deadline the day the document arrives and object in writing on any doubt; you can always develop grounds later. Two scope limits to check before relying on it: the six-month-after-acceptance condition, and that it reaches only trusts irrevocable on or after the effective date.
Ch. 2026-54, Laws of Fla. (HB 895), creating Fla. Stat. § 736.10081; approved by the Governor and filed with the Secretary of State Apr. 29, 2026; effective upon becoming a law · FLSENATE.GOV · HB 895 (2026) · chapter text at LAWS.FLRULES.ORG · Ch. 2026-54
Per the Florida Department of Children and Families, the 2026 Medicaid long-term-care income cap for a single applicant is $2,982/mo (300% of the Federal Benefit Rate, SSI/FBR-indexed), up from $2,901 in 2025. Florida is an income-cap state, so the figure applies as a hard threshold to SMMC LTC eligibility administered by AHCA and DCF.
Because Florida is an income-cap state, the $2,982 figure is a hard cutoff, not a spend-down target — a client over it cannot simply contribute the excess but needs a Qualified Income Trust (QIT/Miller Trust) to qualify. Apply the new 2026 number when screening this year, and have the QIT ready for any client whose income sits between the old and new caps or just above the threshold.
Florida DCF · 2026 Medicaid LTC income limit ($2,982/mo, single) · myflfamilies.com · income limit
Per the Florida Supreme Court, In re Amendments to Florida Probate Rules, No. SC2025-0667 (2025), amends the Florida Probate Rules (including rule 5.010 and related provisions), with the changes carrying into 2026 probate practice.
Procedural rule changes are the quiet ones that trip up a busy probate practice: a form or checklist built on the prior version of the Florida Probate Rules can produce a defective filing. Read the SC2025-0667 opinion against your current probate forms and calendaring, and update any rule-5 citations or procedures that the amendments touched before your next filing.
Florida Supreme Court · In re Amendments to Florida Probate Rules, No. SC2025-0667 (2025) · flcourts.gov · SC2025-0667
Decisions that bind a Florida practitioner — Florida’s appellate courts and the federal courts covering Florida, 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.
A mother executed a durable power of attorney, a healthcare-surrogate designation, and trust and will provisions naming one daughter to manage her affairs and letting that daughter stay in the family home rent-free — and reaffirmed those choices on video in 2020 and in sworn testimony in 2021. On a second incapacity petition brought by the other siblings, the circuit court found incapacity, appointed a professional plenary guardian from its registry, made no findings on the validity or viability of the preneed directives, and told the designee she could seek a separate hearing later if she wanted to act under them. The guardian then sold the ward’s home to the petitioning siblings for $700,000 in an acknowledged non-arm’s-length sale against an $825,000–$855,000 market range. At the 2024 rehearing the court excluded all evidence after October 2022. The Fourth District reversed on every point: the ward’s death did not moot the appeal; § 744.331(6)(b) sequencing was inverted; the presumption in favor of the ward’s expressed wishes was never overcome by contemporaneous findings; the evidentiary cutoff denied due process; and the sale and fee orders fall as derivative of an invalid appointment.
This is the strongest Florida statement in years that preneed directives are not advisory. Three things to carry into practice. First, the finding must be contemporaneous — a court cannot appoint first and paper the justification into a later rehearing order, and an appellate court will not cull the record to supply what the trial judge omitted. Second, “unorthodox” is not “disqualified”: the court held that unconventional financial strategies and an existing property interest in the ward’s home are not a per se conflict. Third, if you are contesting a professional guardian’s appointment on rehearing, post-appointment conduct is admissible — how the guardian actually handled the property speaks directly to whether that guardianship was the least restrictive alternative. On the drafting side, the video affirmation and the sworn testimony are what made this record. That is a cheap, repeatable step for any client whose designation you expect to be fought.
Alicia Frank v. Guardianship of Muriel Frank, an alleged incapacitated person, Howard Frank, and Anthony Romano, No. 4D2024-1073 (Fla. 4th DCA Aug. 19, 2026) — reversed and remanded; not final until disposition of any timely rehearing motion. · FLCOURTS-MEDIA.FLCOURTS.GOV · official opinion
A decedent’s widow and children moved to dismiss a Florida ancillary administration for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction, arguing there were no Florida assets under section 734.102(1). Without holding an evidentiary hearing on that jurisdictional challenge, the trial court denied the motion, opened the ancillary administration, appointed a curator with full authority to marshal estate assets, and ordered the widow to deposit $50,000 toward the curator’s costs. The Third District reversed and remanded: failing to hold a full evidentiary hearing on the subject-matter-jurisdiction challenge before opening the administration was error requiring reversal, with instructions to hold that hearing.
For Florida probate litigators: when a party challenges subject-matter jurisdiction over an ancillary administration — for example, disputing the existence of Florida assets — the court must hold an evidentiary hearing on that issue before the estate is opened and a curator is empowered. And note the appellate hook: orders giving a curator authority over assets, or requiring a cost deposit, are immediately appealable non-final orders under Fla. R. App. P. 9.130(a)(3)(C)(ii) because they determine the right to immediate possession of property.
De Souza v. Estate of de Oliveira, No. 3D25-1344 (Fla. 3d DCA June 24, 2026) (non-final until disposition of any timely rehearing motion) — official Florida Third District Court of Appeal opinion. · FLCOURTS-MEDIA.FLCOURTS.GOV · official opinion
This slot holds the next significant trusts-and-estates or estate-recovery decision from Florida’s appellate courts or the federal courts covering Florida. The lane reads each opinion before it lands here, and reads-and-discards criminal, family, commercial/LLC-fiduciary, and tax matters as not T&E. When the trailing window has no further ruling, this row says so plainly rather than inventing one.
Nothing further to re-paper from the bench this period; controlling authority unchanged.
Official reporter · court · date — populated when the next verified ruling lands.
This week in Florida for the T&E solo with Florida Medicaid (SMMC LTC) clients: the developments from The Florida Bar (RPPTL Section) and the Agency for Health Care Administration 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.