FAQs

An estate plan is a set of customizable documents that serve to protect you and your family during your lifetime and after you pass and ensure your assets are distributed efficiently to your loved ones and favorite charities. Your estate plan will often include a trust, will, durable power of attorney, health care directive, and other documents that outline your wishes and empower trusted individuals to make financial and health care decisions on your behalf if you are unable to make them yourself.

We all need an estate plan. At a bare minimum, every adult should have basic emergency documents in place once they turn 18. If you have minor children, you should nominate guardians to care for your children in the event you are unable to do so for a period of time.

Most families in California will benefit from creating a revocable living trust as part of their estate plan. If you have assets worth more than $166,250, trusts allow you to avoid California’s cumbersome court-supervised probate process and transfer assets efficiently and privately to your desired beneficiaries. Trusts also allow you to protect your beneficiaries’ inheritances from divorces, lawsuits, and even bankruptcy judgments. The proper use of trusts can also protect special needs beneficiaries’ access to invaluable governmental benefits.

1. Protect Yourself and Your Family
   An estate plan allows you to control the management of your estate during your life and the ultimate distribution of your estate upon your death. Without an estate plan, California law will control the administration and distribution of your estate. With a quality estate plan in place, you choose how your personal items are distributed, how your loved ones are cared for, who you trust to make important decisions that pertain to your finances or health, and ultimately how your assets are distributed to your beneficiaries.

2. Efficiently Transfer Your Assets
   With an estate plan, your estate can be administered without going through the court-supervised probate system. This will allow your loved ones to avoid a costly, and often time-consuming, process that may result in familial contention or strife amid an already difficult time.

Creating a quality estate plan is faster, cheaper, more private, and offers your loved ones clarity and peace of mind when they need it most.

1. You schedule an appointment with Montecito Law Group and provide us with basic information through a secure online client information form.
2. You meet with one of our attorneys to discuss your estate planning goals and design a plan to meet your family’s unique needs. We also review your assets and formulate a plan for each asset.
3. Approximately one to two weeks after your initial meeting, you return to our office to review, sign, and notarize your estate planning documents.
4. After your documents are signed, we scan them into our digital files, record any real property deeds, and return the original documents to you in your estate planning binder (along with a flash drive containing digital copies). Most clients choose to store their original wills in our office for safekeeping.
5. The estate planning process typically takes two to three weeks from start to finish and can be accelerated for emergency situations.
6. We stay in touch with each other periodically and modify your plan if necessary to meet your goals as life evolves.

*Complex tax planning generally takes longer.

Please bring any existing estate planning documents you have created, if any (including trusts, wills, and related documents), as well as recent statements for any financial accounts or copies of deeds to real property you own.

Pricing depends on the complexity of your individual plan, the number of properties and businesses involved, and your unique goals. Do you want a simple plan that will avoid probate? Do you have any loved ones with special needs? Are you seeking asset protection for yourself or your beneficiaries? Are your beneficiaries responsible or do they need help making financial decisions?

Our office is located at 559 San Ysidro Road, Suite J in the first floor of a two-story white office building with a Spanish tile roof. From Highway 101, take the San Ysidro exit and drive one mile toward the mountains (north). After you cross East Valley Road, we are approximately 100 yards (one football field) on the left side of San Ysidro Road. There are guest parking spaces in front of the building and a wheelchair ramp.

If you reach the fire department or water district, you have gone too far up San Ysidro Road. Note: We are not located in the Upper Village shopping circle; our office is on San Ysidro Road.

Please see this map for precise location details.

A will is a legal document that specifies how you would like your assets to be distributed upon your death. The creator of a will can control how all personally held assets are disposed of (separate rules apply to the disposition of jointly owned assets).

A will is simpler to create compared to a trust, but does not offer the same level of control over assets after death (or during life) that a trust provides.

A will does not take effect until the creator has passed away. A will can be amended or revoked during the creator’s lifetime.

A trust is a fiduciary arrangement that enables the creator to place their assets in the control of a third party for the benefit of a named beneficiary or beneficiaries. The creator can prescribe the terms of the trust and personalize it to their current needs, if the trust is created for their own benefit, or for the projected needs of a designated beneficiary, such as a dependent.

A trust enables the creator to outline specific terms and conditions for how the trust assets will be distributed and provides for more control than a standard will. A trust enables the creator to avoid probate. A trust is private.

There are different types of trusts, each suitable to the particular circumstance or need of the individual creator: inter vivos (living trust), testamentary trust (in a will), irrevocable trust, and charitable trust.

A power of attorney gives a named person the legal authorization to act for another person. They might be given limited or broad legal authority to make decisions about property, finances, or medical care on behalf of another.

The power of attorney is frequently used in the event of illness or disability.

A healthcare directive, also called a durable power of attorney for health care, legally designates a health care proxy – someone to make medical decisions for you at times when you are unable to do so.

Your health care proxy should be familiar with your values and wishes so that they are able to make treatment decisions on your behalf if necessary.

A HIPAA waiver allows a designated person to receive healthcare information that might be useful to the designated person when making healthcare decisions.

The waiver does not authorize decision-making, but allows for the disclosure of sensitive healthcare information.

Which documents comprise your estate plan depends on your individual needs and circumstances. When considering putting together an estate plan, we take into account the following:

Are you a parent?

Do you have dependents?

Are you a property owner?

Do you have significant financial assets?

Do you or your dependents have long-term medical needs or special needs?

Are your dependents financially responsible?

Do you wish to protect your assets from creditors, lawsuits, divorce, bankruptcy, etc.?