Plan Your Estate to: 1. Provide Stability For Your Family It is common for one spouse to end up managing most of the family’s financial affairs. In the event that spouse is the first to die, the surviving spouse can be left unaware of how to carry on the family’s financial affairs. This can lead … Continue reading Top 10 Reasons to Plan Your Estate
Russell Stanaland talks about California Trusts (video).
The Gizmodo Field Guide has a great summary post addressing your options available to give control to your digital life at death. There are many interesting idea here to consider. Some, such as the Facebook option that I tweeted about previously, are quick and easy, so go ahead and take care of that one! How … Continue reading How to Leave All Your Accounts to Someone Else When You Die
Basic Court Fees Let’s get the boring things out of the way first. For the most straight forward probate, there largest filing fees are incurred at the beginning and end of the process. The 2015 fee charged to file a probate petition is $450. There will be a $435 filing fee to file the petition … Continue reading California Probate: How Much Does It Cost?
We have encountered a few situations where clients believe to have missed their opportunity to take advantage of the surviving spouse’s “portability” election to transfer a deceased spouse’s unused estate tax exclusion to the surviving spouse. The IRS is simplifying the process to remedy the situation. Note that this development can be especially advantageous to … Continue reading Extended Time to Make Estate Tax Portability Election
California Probate: What’s the Purpose? Probate. You’ve heard the word, but what is it? Here is a brief overview to let you know what triggers the probate process and what is involved to complete the journey. In general, probate is the court supervised collection of assets, payment of debts and expenses with the net amount being … Continue reading California Probate: What's the Purpose?
Assets Subject to California Probate Following a death, you may find yourself looking for guidance about how to deal with all of the “stuff,” all of the estate assets. Sometimes it is easy to deal with the small things. Your daughter gets dad’s guitar and your son gets dad’s carved mahogany bar, done and done. But who … Continue reading Assets Subject to California Probate
October 17-23, 2011 is National Estate Planning Awareness Week! Did you know that over 140,000,000 people in the U.S. do not have up-to-date plans to protect themselves or their families in the event of sickness, accidents, or untimely death? Do you need some planning to care for your family? Call October 17-23 and ask about our … Continue reading National Estate Planning Awareness Week!
The drama continues – AOC Agrees to Advocate for Local Revenue Solutions, Restoration of Trial Court Funding SAN FRANCISCO — An emergency funding compromise reached with the Administrative Office of the Courts (AOC) would significantly reduce the San Francisco Superior Court’s staff layoffs from 177 to 75 and allow the Court to keep 11 civil … Continue reading UPDATE – Additional San Francisco Superior Court Funding
Massive layoffs face the San Francisco Superior Court and it appears Clerks and Commissioners will be hit very hard. I first related Ari Burack’s article on the Dire situation forecast for San Francisco Superior Court here. I then passed on the Court’s press release on this matter here. In what is becoming an unexpected series on this … Continue reading San Francisco Court Update: Source Indicates All Commissioners and 100 Clerks to be Laid Off