Stockbroker Mark Bannister and his TV reporter/anchorwoman wife Jessie are a successful yuppie couple with an idyllic California life, aside from a toilet with a faulty handle. It is interrupted when Mark's timid cousin Fred, and his pregnant wife Bernice fly in from New Jersey. The first days are slightly chaotic thanks to Bernice's cat Scruffy. Mark gives them $300 to spend in the city, but his alone time with Jessie is interrupted when her gold-digger sister Claudia arrives after a fight with her rich Middle Eastern husband Kaddir, whom she divorces after he cancels her credit cards. Fred and Bernice's visit, meant to last only five days, is extended when Bernice falls on the way to the car. She is instructed by her doctor, Dr. Penix, to stay put until the baby is born.