Estate Planning Largo

Wills, Trusts and Probate
Most clients come to us to help them prepare a will and/or trust, and to get their estate in order in the event they pass away. Proper planning is way more involved that this. The most important element of proper planning is to make sure that you are taking care of yourself, financially and otherwise, during your lifetime. Then you should consider the question of who gets your stuff and under what conditions they are to receive it.

Your family is going to be better served by your being in a good stable position during your lifetime, so that you can help them if you need to.

Probate is the court-supervised process by which one person's assets are transferred to others following his or her death. The personal representative (executor) is the person charged with carrying out the probate process with the assistance of a probate lawyer.

Basically, the personal representative collects all the decedent's assets, pays the decedent's debts (including tax obligations), and then distributes the balance of the assets according to the terms of the decedent's last will and testament. If the decedent did not have a last will and testament, he or she is said to have died intestate, and the assets are distributed according to state law.