Myers v. Myers: Executor may not run estate as his personal business

The Georgia Supreme Court handed down the probate case of Myers, Executor v. Myers, today. 

In some ways, the case is an unremarkable example of an executor using an estate as a cash cow for his personal expenditures and, among other things, granting himself 

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$53,000 in executor's fees while so doing. 

The case books are littered with such fact patterns. Perhaps the most important take-away from Myers is the holding that an executor may not continue to run a single-member-LLC business in the estate, when that LLC's operating agreement calls for its dissolution upon the death of a member. 

This is particularly useful information for the estate practitioner, because nearly all form operating agreement forms call for exactly this. Yet, it is common enough for an executor to continue to run and fund an estate business for months after a decedent's death. According to the Supreme Court today, so doing may be grounds for the executor's removal.  

Full text of the opinion follows after the "read more" break. 

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