As the successor trustee of a trust, executor of a will, or the administrator of an intestate estate (ie. no will or trust), one of your duties will be to pay all taxes due the federal government and the state of California. Personal Income Tax Returns Once someone has died,…
A family member has died and you have to open a probate estate (if he died with a will or with no estate plan) or administer the decedent’s trust (if he had created a revocable living trust). In what county do you open the estate? The county where an estate…
If you are the Successor Trustee of a trust, you have a job with a lot of responsibility. You need to give notice to the trust beneficiaries, inventory and appraise the the trust assets, possibly create sub-trusts, prepare an accounting, file taxes, and make distributions. Administering a trust can be…
A fiduciary is an individual who acts in a position of trust such as acting as a guardian of estates,conservator of estates, personal representative of estates, or as an agent under powers of attorney. A fiduciary as a trustee of a trust has the responsibility of administering the trust as…
Acting as a trustee is a very important job and choosing your trustee can be a difficult decision. In addition to this person handling your estate upon your death, you also have to think about the possibility that this individual may have to take over the management of your affairs…
At Scott C. Soady, A Professional Corporation, many of our cases are trust administration. When an individual has died with a trust, the successor trustee has to inventory all of the assets and value them before they are distributed to the named beneficiaries. Asset valuation can take some time to…
Being a trustee of a trust is an important job and requires a high degree of honesty, trustworthiness, and ethics. Trustees are fiduciaries and have a number of duties under the California Probate Code. Trustees have the duty of loyalty (Probate Code 16002), the duty to deal impartially with the…
If you do not have a will, or better yet, a trust, your estate will be distributed according to the laws of “intestacy” set forth in the Probate Code. There may be a difference between how your estate is distributed according to your wishes and how it will be distributed…
After the death of a loved one, the individual named in the decedent’s trust who will administer the trust and distribute the trust assets is the successor trustee. A successor trustee has a number of fiduciary duties. Some of these duties are the duty of loyalty, duty to avoid conflicts…
Many people ask whether as family members they can be responsible for a loved one’s debts. Often debts can rapidly accumulate especially if a decedent has had a long illness. If the decedent left an estate that is solvent, the estate will pay the expenses of a last illness and…