If you have visited the website for an estate planning law firm, looking for information on filing your California probate application, the first thought that went through your mind was probably, “this is how the other half lives.” There was talk of trust funds and vacation homes; any service that uses the phrase “your wealth” on its website is probably outside of your budget. In California, lawyers have the right to charge much higher fees for providing legal services during probate than they can in most other states. The good news, though, is that California law also allows people inheriting property from small estates to bypass probate entirely. Even if you are the personal representative of an estate that needs to go through probate, California law also provides another way for you to avoid paying a lawyer a sizable portion of your inheritance. You can hire a registered legal document assistant to prepare your California probate application instead of a lawyer, and by doing so, you can save thousands of dollars.
Get help with your California Probate Application!
…or continue reading the article below to learn more about why hiring a lawyer to submit your California probate application is probably a waste of money.
What You Pay for When You Pay a Lawyer for Probate
Probate begins when you submit a California probate application to your county’s court; the application includes the Petition for Probate and the will, if there is one. You must then publish notices in the local newspaper saying that the estate is open for probate; you must also individually notify the people listed in the will. The court will officially appoint you as personal representative of the estate. You must then transfer all of the deceased person’s assets to the estate (except probate-exempt assets like transfer-on-death bank accounts) and use the money to pay the deceased person’s debts and to pay taxes on the estate.
After you accomplish those tasks, the estate is ready to settle, and you and the other heirs are ready to get your money. Rather, you are almost ready to get your money; first, you must pay your lawyer. Probate lawyers can charge 4% off the first $100,000, 3% off the next $100,000, and 2% off the next $800,000. The percentages get lower the more valuable the estate is. If the estate is valued at $200,000, just slightly above the threshold for simplified probate alternatives, you could pay $7,000 in lawyers’ fees. As you can see, using a lawyer to file a California probate application can be quite expensive!
The California Probate Application Process
Probate is a lot of tedious paperwork, but it is just paperwork. It does not involve such specialized work that only a lawyer can do it. By contrast, A People’s Choice offers full-service probate management for $3,900. That price includes the California probate application, all court filings and the publication of all the required notices as well as the preparation of any documents that your case requires. If you only need help with some aspects of probate, then less expensive document preparation packages are available.
Do Not Waste Your Inheritance Money on Legal Services With Inflated Prices
So now you know why hiring a lawyer to submit your California probate application is probably a waste of money. As you have learned, most California probate applications do not require the specialized services of a lawyer. With A People’s Choice, you only pay for the probate document preparation services you need. Call us today at 800-747-2780 to learn more about how we can help complete your probate case.
Get help with your Legal documents today!
A People’s Choice can save you hundreds of dollars by preparing your legal documents instead of an expensive attorney!
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