Unreported / Non-Citable
Background
Tabetha and Brian Hinman married in 2005 and separated in 2019. Before marriage they executed a premarital agreement (PMA) keeping premarital assets separate while employment earnings and jointly titled assets were community property. Section 6.1 required jointly owned checking, savings, and/or brokerage accounts for joint expenses, required all community earnings to be deposited there, and provided that separate property funds deposited into those accounts became community property not subject to reimbursement. The parties opened two joint checking accounts, into which Brian deposited millions of dollars of separate property; he also used those funds for his separate real estate holdings and child support obligations from a prior marriage.
In the first appeal (Hinman I), the court held that under section 6.1 Brian's separate-property deposits into the two joint checking accounts became community property upon deposit, obligating him to reimburse the community for using those funds for separate expenses, and remanded for an amount determination. The parties then stipulated that Brian owed about $5.2 million for separate real property expenses and $319,879 for child support payments from the joint accounts, subject to Brian's claims that he had already reimbursed the community and that the child support claim was time-barred under Family Code section 920.
At the February 2025 trial on remand, Brian argued his deposits were reimbursements rather than contributions, that the child support claim was time-barred, and that five brokerage accounts held in the parties' living trust were not section 6.1 joint accounts. The trial court rejected all three arguments, ordered Brian to reimburse Tabetha $2,760,540 with interest, and divided the brokerage accounts equally. Brian appealed.
The Court’s Holding
The Court of Appeal affirmed the determination that Brian's deposits were contributions, not reimbursements. Because Hinman I established that deposits into these accounts were automatically transmuted to community property, Brian bore the burden of proving specific deposits were reimbursements and identified no basis for that finding: his testimony showed he deposited funds to cover expenses without expecting reimbursement, the QuickBooks records labeled no deposits as reimbursements, and the amounts did not correspond to debts owed. The court rejected his reliance on Bare v. Bare, which involved no premarital agreement.
The court reversed the child support reimbursement award. Section 6.3 of the PMA, which specifically preserved only reimbursement rights 'allowed by California law,' controlled over the general provisions of sections 5.8 and 13.3, so the PMA did not waive Family Code section 920's three-year limitations period. Brian's final payment was in May 2014, so Tabetha's claim was due by 2017. The court declined to consider Tabetha's new Family Code section 1617 theory because it would deprive Brian of the chance to develop facts on laches and estoppel, and rejected equitable tolling for lack of evidence of its required elements.
The court also reversed the brokerage account ruling. Unlike the individually held checking accounts, the brokerage accounts were held by the parties as trustees of their revocable living trust, so trustee title did not establish individual joint ownership, and the record showed the accounts were used for investment, not to receive earnings or pay joint expenses. The parties' conduct and beliefs could not modify the PMA absent a signed writing under sections 13.3 and 13.4. The accounts therefore fell outside section 6.1, Brian's transferred assets retained separate character under section 5.11.4, and the court remanded for proper division of the accounts on a limited scope.
Key Takeaways
- Where a PMA automatically transmutes separate-property deposits into community property, the depositor bears the burden of proving with contemporaneous evidence that later deposits were reimbursements rather than contributions.
- A PMA's specific child-support reimbursement provision controls over general non-waiver language, so Family Code section 920's three-year limitations period applies.
- Equitable tolling requires evidence of timely notice, lack of prejudice, and good-faith conduct; a marital-harmony policy argument cannot override a statutory limitations period.
- Accounts held as trustees of a revocable trust are not individually 'jointly owned,' and trustee title alone does not bring them within a PMA joint-account provision.
- Conduct or subjective beliefs cannot amend a premarital agreement that requires a signed writing, and assets in accounts outside the transmutation provision keep their separate character.
Why It Matters
The decision shows that automatic-transmutation clauses in premarital agreements place a heavy evidentiary burden on the depositing spouse to prove reimbursement, and that retrospective accounting theories cannot substitute for contemporaneous intent. It also confirms that specific PMA provisions govern over general ones when statute-of-limitations waivers are at issue.
The brokerage-account analysis clarifies that trust-held accounts are not joint accounts merely because the spouses are trustees, and that parties cannot alter property character through conduct when the PMA demands a signed writing. The narrow remand, barring new theories, underscores the court's push for finality in long-running dissolution litigation.