What is probate?

Probate is a court supervised proceeding in California to transfer ownership of the assets of the decedent to his or her heirs or beneficiaries. Heirs inherit if there is no will. Beneficiaries inherit if there is a will. In other words, you need a court order to transfer whatever property your loved one owned out of your loved one's name, and into the name of whoever is supposed to inherit the property.

The way you know whether you have to probate or not does not depend simply on whether your loved one had a trust or a will. You know you have to do probate if you need your deceased loved ones signature in order to transfer their property. Let me give you an example. If your mother died and she owned her home in her own name then you would have to put her home through probate in order to transfer it. Another example would be where your father had a bank account or a brokerage account in his name alone. If your father did not designated beneficiary for the account in the account will have to go through probate so that the bank or the brokerage would the brokerage knows where the funds go.

The probate of the estate must take place in the county in which the decedent resided at the time he or she died. For example, if Mary lived in Ontario, California then the probate of her estate will occur in San Bernardino County. San Bernardino County's probate court is in Redlands so the probate will take place at the Redlands probate court.

The Grossman Law Firm, A.P.C. are San Bernardino, California probate lawyers.  We help probate estates in San Bernardino County, California.  We appear in the Redlands probate court for cases from Rancho Cucamonga, Ontario, Fontana, Rialto, San Bernardino, Victorville, Hesperia, Apple Valley, Loma Linda and Redlands, California. If you  would like more information on probate and trust administration then order our free book The Insider's Guide to California Probate and Trust Administration as well as our free DVD Probate a Will or Administer a Trust After the Death of a Loved One.