Estate Planning and Probate Guidance for Daly City

Start with the decision in front of you

If you are planning ahead, consider how your will, any trust, financial authority and health-care decisions fit together. A will or trust is not a substitute for every other planning decision, and a plan should reflect the choices you need to make while living as well as what should happen after death.

If someone has died, first identify whether there are estate-planning documents and how relevant assets are held. Trust administration and formal probate are different processes; which applies depends on those documents and asset ownership. A family should not assume that having a trust means probate is unnecessary for every asset, or that every estate requires formal probate.

Planning during life: choose only what fits

A useful plan is built around decisions, not a checklist of every available document or trust. You may be organizing a basic will, considering a revocable living trust, naming someone to handle financial matters, expressing health-care preferences, or addressing a specific family or charitable goal. Each choice has a different purpose; adding a document without considering how it relates to the rest of the plan may leave important decisions unresolved.

The available planning topics include wills and pour-over wills; revocable living trusts; financial powers of attorney; advance health-care directives, living wills and health-care powers of attorney; and planning involving business succession, charitable giving, pets, gifts, asset protection, irrevocable trusts or special-needs trusts. These are options to explore, not a set of documents every person needs.

After a death: administration follows documents and ownership

When a trust is involved, trustee administration may be relevant. When formal probate is required, the estate proceeds through that process. The documents and ownership of assets are central to choosing between these routes; the name of a document alone does not resolve what must happen to each asset.

For a matter connected to San Mateo County, the county’s Probate Division handles decedent estates and trusts. Consult its current division and case instructions for applicable court information. That county resource is relevant to estate or trust administration, not to routine preparation of planning documents during life.

Organize the work around your situation

For planning, identify the decisions you want addressed and the people you may want to name for financial or health-care roles. For an administration matter, gather any will or trust documents you can locate and make a working list of assets and how each appears to be held. These are practical starting points, not legal prerequisites.

Then clarify the question you need answered: whether to create or update a plan, what a particular document is intended to do, or whether administration appears to involve a trust or formal probate. This helps focus the next discussion without assuming that one route fits every family.

A focused next step

Codi M. Dada Law Office P.C. serves clients virtually throughout California from its Novato office. To begin, organize your planning goals or the documents and asset information available after a death, then identify the decision you want help understanding. The appropriate next step depends on whether you are planning for the future or addressing an existing administration.