OPINION

ARNOLD B. GOLDIN, J.

This appeal stems from probate proceedings in the Putnam County Probate Court. During the course of the trial proceedings, an issue arose as to the ownership of a certificate of deposit titled in the decedent's name. Following an evidentiary hearing, the trial court entered an order concluding that the certificate of deposit was, in fact, the property of the decedent's estate. On appeal, the decedent's surviving wife argues that because the funds within the certificate of deposit were derived from a joint marital account, they should have been impressed as entireties property. We agree and conclude that the funds in the certificate of deposit passed to the surviving wife upon the decedent's death. The judgment of the trial court is accordingly reversed.

Background

This case raises an interesting question regarding property classification and the manner in which a tenancy by the entirety in bank funds can be terminated. The pertinent background facts are fairly straightforward. On April 3, 2012, spouses Nelda Karene Fletcher ("Mrs. Fletcher") and Calvert Hugh Fletcher ("Mr. Fletcher") refinanced the mortgage on their home. With the proceeds from the refinancing, the Fletchers opened a joint checking account with rights of survivorship at FSG Bank in Cookeville, Tennessee. The initial deposit was over $100,000.00. According to the Fletchers' account agreement, only one owner's signature was required to make a withdrawal from the account.

In January 2013, Mr. Fletcher withdrew $100,000.00 from the FSG joint account in order to fund a certificate of deposit ("CD") issued by FSG. The CD was titled solely in Mr. Fletcher's name and was used as security for a line of credit that was also solely in his name. It is undisputed that Mr. Fletcher never drew on the line of credit secured by the CD.

In February 2013, the Fletchers' joint account at FSG was closed, and following an extended illness, Mr. Fletcher died testate on September 6, 2013. Under his last will and testament, Mrs. Fletcher was to receive all of his tangible personal property. The remainder of Mr. Fletcher's estate was to be divided equally among his four adult children ("the Fletcher Children").3 On November 22, 2013, Mrs. Fletcher filed a petition to probate her deceased husband's will in the Putnam County Probate Court. Shortly thereafter, on November 26, 2013, the trial court admitted the will into probate and appointed Mrs. Fletcher as executrix for the estate.

As the probate proceedings progressed, the classification of the CD became a point of contention. On March 25, 2014, Mrs. Fletcher filed an extensive inventory of the estate. Although the CD was listed among the assets included within the inventory, it was specifically identified as a non-estate asset. In a May 8, 2014 petition, Mrs. Fletcher contended that the CD should be treated as property that passed to her at Mr. Fletcher's death because the monies that funded the CD had been taken from a joint marital account. On February 16, 2015, the Fletcher Children filed an answer and counter-complaint to Mrs. Fletcher's May 8, 2014 petition. Therein, they denied that the CD was anything other than estate property.

On April 22, 2015, the trial court held a hearing to decide how the CD should be classified.4 In addition to receiving documentary exhibits into evidence, the trial court heard oral testimony from Mrs. Fletcher and two of the Fletcher Children. Although many topics concerning the CD were addressed at the hearing, much of the testimony related to a phone call that took place in April 2013, a time period during which Mr. Fletcher was ill with pneumonia. Because of Mr. Fletcher's illness, one of his daughters, Elaine Fletcher ("Elaine"), came to visit him and assist Mrs. Fletcher with financial issues. In pertinent part, Elaine sought to help Mrs. Fletcher find funds to pay back $10,000.00 owed on a loan to one of Mr. Fletcher's creditors. In the process of trying to locate funds for this purpose, both Elaine and Mrs. Fletcher talked to Howard Bilbrey, an officer at FSG Bank, by phone.5 Although there is no dispute that Mrs. Fletcher spoke with Mr. Bilbrey first and that Elaine spoke with him shortly thereafter, their respective testimony presents slightly different accounts of what Mr. Bilbrey related to them personally.

According to Mrs. Fletcher, Mr. Bilbrey never informed her that Mr. Fletcher had moved money from their joint account into a separate CD. She testified that she was under the impression that she could withdraw funds from the joint account as long as both she and

Mr. Fletcher signed for a withdrawal. As she explained:

After Mrs. Fletcher finished her phone call with Mr. Bilbrey, a conversation eventually ensued between Elaine and Mr. Bilbrey. As Mrs. Fletcher testified:

As is evident from the following exchange, Elaine testified that Mr. Bilbrey provided her with different information than that which was supposedly given to Mrs. Fletcher:

Elaine testified that she relayed the contents of her conversation with Mr. Bilbrey to Mrs. Fletcher after she got off the phone.

At the conclusion of the April 22 hearing, the trial court ruled that the CD was the property of Mr. Fletcher's estate. In pertinent part, the trial court concluded that Mrs. Fletcher had acquiesced to Mr. Fletcher's establishment of the CD. Moreover, by referencing Mays v. Brighton Bank, 832 S.W.2d 347 (Tenn. Ct. App. 1992), the trial court determined that the funds from the Fletchers' joint account at FSG ceased to be part of an estate by the entireties once Mr. Fletcher withdrew them. On June 15, 2015, the trial court entered an order memorializing its April 22 oral ruling.6 Finding that there was "no just reason for delay," the trial court certified the order as final pursuant to its authority under Rule 54.02 of the Tennessee Rules of Civil Procedure. This appeal followed.

Issues Presented

In her appellate brief, Mrs. Fletcher presents three issues for our review, restated verbatim as follows:

As stated in their appellate brief, the Fletcher Children raise the following issues:

Standard of Review

"In a civil case heard without a jury, we review the trial court's findings of fact de novo upon the record accompanied by a presumption of correctness unless the preponderance of the evidence is otherwise." Moore v. Houston Cnty. Bd. of Educ., 358 S.W.3d 612, 615 (Tenn. Ct. App. 2011) (citing Tenn. R. App. P. 13(d)). When the credibility of in-court witnesses is at issue, "considerable deference must be accorded to the factual findings of the trial court." Fritts v. Safety Nat'l Cas. Corp., 163 S.W.3d 673, 678 (Tenn. 2005) (citations omitted). In contrast, when we review the trial court's resolution on a question of law, no presumption of correctness attaches to the trial court's legal conclusions. Bowden v. Ward, 27 S.W.3d 913, 916 (Tenn. 2000).

Discussion

Although several matters are presented for our review through the parties' briefs, they all speak to one dispositive issue before us: whether the CD is the property of Mr. Fletcher's estate. Most of the facts pertaining to this issue are not in controversy. Indeed, there is no question that Mr. and Mrs. Fletcher, as husband and wife, opened a joint bank account at FSG with rights of survivorship. Moreover, there is no dispute that the funds deposited within this account were held by the Fletchers as tenants by the entirety. Nor is there any dispute that the account agreement provided both spouses with the unilateral right to withdraw funds. Additionally, it is undisputed that Mr. Fletcher withdrew $100,000.00 from the marital bank account to fund a CD titled in his name alone at FSG.

Although the above-recited facts are undisputed, the legal effect remains a point of contention. Whereas Mrs. Fletcher maintains that the funds in the CD should have passed to her outside of probate at Mr. Fletcher's death, the Fletcher Children argue that this Court should uphold the trial court's finding that the CD belongs to Mr. Fletcher's estate.

To support their position that the CD belongs to Mr. Fletcher's estate, the Fletcher Children argue, as a matter of law, that once funds are withdrawn from a marital account by one of the tenants and reduced to that tenant's separate possession, those funds cease to be a part of an estate by the entireties. Although this legal proposition is not without some basis in law, there is a lack of unanimity on such a rule across jurisdictions. Indeed, in reviewing case law from other jurisdictions, it appears that some courts have adopted it, whereas other courts have not. Compare, e.g., McEntire v. McEntire's Estate, 590 S.W.2d 241, 244 (Ark. 1979) ("An estate by the entireties in a bank account differs in one significant aspect from such an estate in real property in that the estate exists in the account only until one of the tenants withdraws such funds or dies leaving a balance in the account. Funds withdrawn or otherwise diverted from the account by one of the tenants and reduced to that tenant[`]s separate possession ceases to be a part of the estate by the entireties."), with Matter of Morrow's Estate, 570 P.2d 912, 914 (N.M. 1977) (stating that the act of withdrawing all the money from a tenancy by the entirety account does not destroy the estate by the entireties). Under existing Tennessee jurisprudence, there is an absence of consistency and clarity on the issue. There are conflicting decisions emanating from this Court on the topic, and although the Tennessee Supreme Court has referred to the issue on several occasions, it has never definitively decided it. In order to understand the unsettled nature of the question before us, an overview of Tennessee law in this area is appropriate.

A "[t]enancy by the entirety is a form of property ownership unique to married persons." Catt v. Catt, 866 S.W.2d 570, 573 (Tenn. Ct. App. 1993). Under this form of ownership, "each party owns the whole, and on death of one of the parties, the survivor takes no new title or estate because the survivor is in possession of the whole from its inception." Id. (citation omitted). "[I]t is well-settled in Tennessee that personal property, as well as realty, may be owned by spouses by the entirety." Id. (citations omitted). Moreover, this Court has previously noted that once a tenancy by the entirety is created, it can only be terminated when "both [spouses] convey, when one spouse dies and the survivor becomes owner of the whole, or when the survivorship is dissolved by divorce and the parties become tenants in common in the property." White v. Watson, 571 S.W.2d 493, 495 (Tenn. Ct. App. 1978).

Although it is now a common legal understanding that spouses may hold bank funds as tenants by the entirety, that question was not definitively decided in Tennessee until our Supreme Court's decision in Sloan v. Jones, 241 S.W.2d 506 (Tenn. 1951). In that case, the Tennessee Supreme Court expressly held, for the first time, that a tenancy by the entirety could be created "in a deposit in a bank." Sloan v. Jones, 241 S.W.2d 506, 507 (Tenn. 1951). In the course of its discussion, the Sloan court referenced a decision from the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, Madden v. Gosztonyi Savings & Trust Co., 200 A. 624 (Pa. 1938). Although our Supreme Court appeared to reference Madden for the sole purpose of supporting the conclusion that funds within a bank account could be held by the entireties, it also quoted language from Madden that is directly relevant to the issue before us. In pertinent part, the Sloan court stated as follows:

Sloan, 241 S.W.2d at 508-09 (emphasis added).

At issue in Madden was the ability of a husband and wife to recover the balance of a savings account at a bank. Although the husband in that case had entered into a waiver with the bank whereby he agreed to waive a portion of the parties' deposit incident to the bank's plan of reorganization, he and his wife later argued that this release was ineffective based on the wife's failure to join personally in the agreement. Madden, 200 A. at 625. Although the trial court agreed with the position advanced by the husband and wife and entered a judgment in their favor, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court reversed. Id. at 632. The Pennsylvania Supreme Court concluded that the trial court had "overlooked the power granted under the agency expressed in the creation of the account." Id. at 631. In pertinent part, it stated as follows: "Certainly the power to withdraw all of the funds includes within it the power to preserve or protect the fund and to consent to a reorganization of a `closed' bank for that purpose[.]" Id. Although the Pennsylvania Supreme Court accordingly denied the husband and wife recourse against the bank, it also noted that the immunity of the bank "in no way affect[ed] the rights as between the husband and wife." Id. (citations omitted).

With regard to the bank account at issue in Madden, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court was emphatic that the funds within it represented entireties property. Id. at 631-32. In the process of explaining that entireties ownership was not negated by the ability of one spouse to act authoritatively for both, the Madden court stated as follows:

Id. at 630. In continuing its analysis, the Madden court went on to pronounce the language that our Supreme Court quoted in Sloan:

Id. at 630-31 (italics in original).

The Madden rule, which states that money withdrawn from a marital account remains entireties property, was referenced again by our Supreme Court in Griffin v. Prince, 632 S.W.2d 532 (Tenn. 1982). Like Sloan, the facts in Griffin did not specifically call for application of the Madden rule. At issue in Griffin was whether an individual creditor of a husband could garnish deposits in two joint bank accounts. Id. at 533. Although the trial court had ruled that the entire proceeds of both accounts were subject to garnishment, our Supreme Court reversed upon concluding that the bank accounts at issue were owned by the husband and wife as tenants by the entirety. Id. In the course of explaining why the bank accounts were owned as tenants by the entirety, the Griffin court dismissed the creditor's contention that use of the word "or" between the names of the spouses on the bank accounts prevented entireties ownership:

Id. at 536. The Griffin court then proceeded to quote from the prior Sloan decision, including its reference to the Madden rule. Id.

Approximately a decade after our Supreme Court's decision in Griffin, this Court issued its opinion in Mays v. Brighton Bank, 832 S.W.2d 347 (Tenn. Ct. App. 1992). Although the ultimate issue in Mays concerned the validity of a bank's security interest in a trailer that the bank had repossessed, the case also provided an occasion for this Court to address the status of funds that had been withdrawn from a husband and wife's bank account. After stating that no Tennessee case had directly addressed the question as to how the character of such withdrawals should be treated, we acknowledged that there was a split of authority among other jurisdictions on the issue. Id. at 350. We noted that some courts held that a withdrawal of funds from a tenancy by the entirety account ended the other party's interest in the funds; however, we also observed that other courts held that entireties ownership continued notwithstanding a removal of funds. Id. Holding the former position to be the "better view," id., we concluded that the wife's withdrawal of funds from a joint account eliminated the entireties nature of the money withdrawn. Id. at 351.

Although the rule adopted in Mays has not yet been overturned by the Tennessee Supreme Court, its validity has been cast into doubt on two occasions. The first criticism of Mays comes from our Supreme Court's 1998 decision in Grahl v. Davis, 971 S.W.2d 373 (Tenn. 1998). At issue in that case was whether a conservator had breached her fiduciary duty to her conservatee by allowing the conservatee's husband to "transact four certificates of deposit in which the conservatee had an interest and reinvest the funds into certificates of deposit held either solely in the name of [the conservatee's husband] or jointly in the name of [the conservatee's husband and conservator]." Id. at 373-74. Because the Supreme Court ordered that the amounts redeemed from the original certificates of deposit be restored to the conservatorship estate based on its conclusion that the conservator breached her fiduciary duties, it did not need to specifically resolve the question of whether funds withdrawn from an entireties account remain impressed with an entireties provision. The Supreme Court did, however, openly question whether the rule articulated in Mays represented sound law:

Id. at 379 n.3.

The continuing validity of Mays was also cast into doubt by this Court's decision in In re Estate of Grass, No. M2005-00641-COA-R3-CV, 2008 WL 2343068 (Tenn. Ct. App. June 4, 2008), perm. app. denied (Tenn. Jan. 20, 2009). Although the appeal in Grass involved a variety of issues related to the probate of a will, of note to our present discussion is the Grass court's analysis of two withdrawals from a joint bank account held by the decedent and her husband. Before the decedent in Grass passed away, the joint bank account had a balance of $260,000.00. Id. at *2. Whereas the decedent withdrew $160,000.00 from the account and placed the money into two pay on death accounts payable to her children, the husband withdrew $100,000.00 from the account and gave the money to his children from a prior marriage. Id.

For various reasons pertinent to the probate proceedings, the validity of these withdrawals was placed into issue. Although we ultimately remanded the case to the trial court to first determine whether or not the bank account at issue was held as tenants by the entirety, we concluded that if the bank account had been held as tenants by the entirety, the amounts withdrawn should be deemed to be impressed with an entirety provision. For example, with regard to the $160,000.00 withdrawn by the decedent, we stated as follows:

Id. at *14. Moreover, with respect to the $100,000.00 withdrawn by the husband, we noted:

Id. at *32.

In reaching these conclusions, it is evident that we declined to follow the rule we articulated in Mays but instead followed the rule pronounced by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court in Madden. We observed that the Madden rule had been quoted with approval by our Supreme Court in Sloan and also noted that it had been quoted in the Griffin decision. Id. at *13-14. Further, we observed that the Grahl court had highlighted the discrepancy that existed between Mays and the Sloan line of cases. Id. at *14. Because we found Mays to be inconsistent with the Supreme Court's prior decisions, we concluded that money withdrawn from an entireties bank account remains impressed with the entirety provision. Id. We also explained that "anyone who receives the property knowing it is impressed with an entirety provision takes subject to the provision." Id. at *32 (citation omitted).

On appeal, the Fletcher Children characterize the rule from Grass as a "legal fiction." They argue that an entireties provision does not attach to funds withdrawn from a marital bank account and accordingly urge us to apply the rule we previously articulated in Mays. Although the trial court concluded that Mays remains good law in light of the fact that it has not been overturned by our Supreme Court, we think that our position in Grass is the correct one. It is unclear to us why one spouse's withdrawal of funds from a marital bank account should automatically divest the other spouse of an ownership interest in the funds withdrawn. Again, "once a tenancy by the entirety is created, it can be terminated only when both [spouses] convey, when one spouse dies and the survivor becomes owner of the whole, or when the survivorship is dissolved by divorce and the parties become tenants in common in the property." Watson, 571 S.W.2d at 495. In our opinion, absent evidence of some agreement by the non-withdrawing spouse that his or her interest in the funds is to cease, we fail to see how one spouse's withdrawal of money from a martial bank account could effectively destroy the entireties character of the funds. In a tenancy by the entirety, "each party owns the whole." Catt, 866 S.W.2d at 573. That ownership interest should not suddenly cease because one spouse has withdrawn funds from a bank account. Nor should account agreements like the one at issue, which provides either spouse with the right to withdraw funds, be generally construed as evidencing advance consent that either spouse may terminate entireties ownership through a unilateral withdrawal. As a practical matter, such a notion would seem to be an affront to the marital expectations that spouses have. As the Pennsylvania Supreme Court stated in Madden:

Madden, 200 A. at 630 (emphasis added). Although the rule from Mays has not been specifically rejected by our Supreme Court, we find that the rule laid down in Grass is more consistent with the character of entireties ownership and the expectations incident thereto. Accordingly, we reject the principle from Mays that entireties ownership ceases when one spouse withdraws money from a marital account and reduces those funds to his or her separate possession. As a general proposition, absent an agreement from the non-withdrawing spouse that his or her ownership interest in the funds is to cease, the funds withdrawn should remain impressed with an entirety provision.

In connection with its conclusion that the CD belonged to the estate of Mr. Fletcher, the trial court incorporated oral findings from the April 22, 2015 hearing. As is evident from the incorporated ruling, there appear to be two bases for the trial court's classification of the CD. First, the trial court appears to have determined, as a matter of law, that the funds withdrawn from the Fletchers' marital account ceased to be entireties property once they were withdrawn. Indeed, in referencing the Mays decision, the trial court remarked as follows:

To the extent the trial court's classification of the CD was predicated on the Mays case, we conclude that it erred. As we have emphasized, as a general proposition, funds withdrawn from a marital account remain impressed as entireties property and anyone receiving such property "knowing it is impressed with an entirety provision takes subject to the provision." In re Estate of Grass, 2008 WL 2343068, at *32 (citing Sloan, 241 S.W.2d at 508-09). See also Madden, 200 A. at 631 ("[T]he money thus withdrawn is impressed with the entirety provision that it is the property of both, and any one dealing with such specific property as severalty, knowing it belongs to both, must submit to the consequences.").

The trial court's oral ruling, however, does not appear to be limited to a simple application of the rule from Mays. The trial court also made findings that Mrs. Fletcher "acquiesce[d] to the CD."7 In pertinent part, it stated as follows: "Since Mrs. Fletcher knew or should have known by the simplest of inquiries that the $100,000 was in Mr. Fletcher's individual name [but did not do anything about it for several months], that she did acquiesce to the CD." (emphasis added).

Having reviewed the trial court's findings, we conclude that they fail to demonstrate that Mrs. Fletcher ever agreed to give up her entireties interest in the funds withdrawn from the marital account. Although the trial court ultimately concluded that Mrs. Fletcher "acquiesced" to the CD, its oral ruling does not even definitively conclude that she knew the CD had been titled in her husband's name. At several points, the trial court simply referred to what she "should have known." For example, the trial court stated as follows in connection with its finding of acquiescence: "Since Mrs. Fletcher knew or should have known by the simplest of inquiries that the $100,000 was in Mr. Fletcher's individual name, she did acquiesce to the CD." (emphasis added) Although we would not dispute that a spouse could agree to give up his or her interest in entireties funds, there is insufficient evidence in this case that Mrs. Fletcher ever agreed to do so. As noted, the trial court did not even definitively conclude that Mrs. Fletcher knew about separate ownership of the CD.8 The findings of the trial court thus do not present a proper basis for concluding that Mrs. Fletcher ever waived any claim of ownership in the disputed funds. Accordingly, the trial court's determination that the funds in the CD belong to Mr. Fletcher's estate is hereby reversed. Because the funds were entireties property at Mr. Fletcher's death, they now belong solely to Mrs. Fletcher.

Conclusion

We hereby reverse the trial court's determination that the CD belongs to the estate of Mr. Fletcher. The funds in the CD constituted entireties property at Mr. Fletcher's death and accordingly belong to Mrs. Fletcher. Costs of this appeal are assessed jointly and severally against the Appellees, Janet L. Fletcher Brady, Elaine Fletcher, Richard H. Fletcher, and Peter J. Fletcher, for which execution may issue if necessary. This cause is remanded to the trial court for the collection of costs, enforcement of the judgment, and for such further proceedings as may be necessary and are consistent with this Opinion.