By Bill Gross, The LA Probate Expert — California broker (DRE #01022275) since 1986. This page is for families and heirs. It is not legal, tax, or lending advice.
Short answer
You do not sell the house on day one, and you do not write checks from your personal account. You secure the property, get the documents, tell the people the trust requires you to tell, and keep a list of what the trust owns and what it owes. The estate attorney confirms the deadlines for your trust. The dates below are the usual California rules. Have counsel confirm them before you rely on them.
The order
- 1. Read the trust and see what it lets you do. Your authority comes from the trust, not from being the oldest child. Get a certification of trust the bank and the title company will accept. If the trust is silent or the family is already fighting, stop and call the attorney before you list the house.
- 2. Secure the house. Change the locks if you have the right to. Confirm insurance still covers a vacant house. Leave utilities on. Do not start a remodel to "get it ready." Take photos of the condition as you found it.
- 3. Get death certificates. Order more than you think you need. Banks, the county, and the insurer will each ask for one.
- 4. Tell the beneficiaries. When a revocable trust becomes irrevocable at death, California usually requires the trustee to serve a specific notice. The common window is 60 days from when you became trustee. Beneficiaries then have a window, commonly 120 days from when they receive that notice, to contest the trust. Missing the notice does not erase the trust. It does make a fight more expensive. Confirm both dates with the attorney. See Probate Code section 16061.7.
- 5. Get a tax ID and a trust bank account. The trust needs its own employer identification number and its own account. Do not deposit trust money into your personal account, and do not pay the gardener from yours and "sort it out later." Mixing funds is the mistake that follows trustees into court.
- 6. Make an inventory. For each asset, write what it is, where it is, and what it was worth on the date of death. The house needs a real value, not a website estimate you argue about at the kitchen table. Use a value check, then an appraisal if the attorney or the buyout requires one. Columns that are enough: description, location, date-of-death value, loan balance.
- 7. Pay what the trust owes. Funeral costs, the last bills, property taxes, insurance, and any loan on the house. Do not hand out shares until you know the bills. A reverse mortgage does not vanish at death. See reverse mortgages after death.
- 8. Decide what happens to the house. Sell, one person buys the others out, someone moves in, or the trust holds it. If people disagree, get the same numbers in front of everyone before the argument becomes about fairness. See when heirs disagree and when a trustee can sell without every heir's approval.
- 9. Distribute and close. Deeds, final tax returns, and a simple accounting the beneficiaries can read. If the job is bigger than you can carry, a private professional fiduciary can take the administration. You can still be part of the decisions.
This is not the seller checklist
The probate seller checklist is for the weeks before a sign goes up: Letters, court confirmation, liens, and the overbid. Use that when you are ready to list. Use this page when you just found out you are the trustee.
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