Losing Someone You Love Is Hard; the Paperwork Doesn't Need to Be, with Kentucky Attorney Colleen English Balderson

0:00 You love is hard enough, the paperwork doesn't need to be with Colleen English Balderson. I love this I love that line. So let's talk a bit. How did you How did you come to that conclusion that losing one obviously hard if you've lost somebody we you know I don't you I've lost both my parents and my in-laws and other people in my life unfortunately. But the paperwork doesn't have to be. So why is the paperwork hard and what do you do to help make it easier?

0:24 So actually that came about I think that quote came about right after both my parents died in 22 within 2 months of each other. So I think the big MVP of a lot of estate planning's is power of attorneys and I know what my life would have been like without that. It would have been a disaster. I see a lot of people come in and they are so confused. Sometimes they have great plans but they don't understand a word of them. So that doesn't help out a lot either. And you know I just think that there's a real gift you can give people if they have an understanding of their documents, they know how they work. They properly use them and so then they can spend more time with their loved ones in their final days and then afterwards grieving them rather than you know losing nights sleeps wondering about credit card bills and different things like that. So.

1:17 You know in different areas of law, you know I don't know that customers or clients need to understand. If you're a litigator doing sophisticated litigation, do they need to know about the mirrors, petitions, procedures? Probably not. They need to know the facts of the case. But I think you make a great point on estate planning is I feel as a professional in my business as a real estate agent even the technical parts of probate sales with courts involved that my job is to explain things to a customer so they understand it. And if they don't understand it, I haven't really done my job and it just seems to me that estate planning you're right on that if they don't know it, how can how can they effectively give you the information you need and guide you to great to create the right plan if they don't really understand what you're talking about or what you're doing. And sometimes it's you know, we speak in English, it's not that complicated, right? And so talk a little bit about how do you know, obviously you're a businesswoman, you got to you know, be productive at the same time your clients need to understand what they need to be effective. How do you kind of manage those two sides?

2:16 So, I think that I don't know, I think I'm an educator at heart really. So, for me part of my job is not just creating a plan and creating the document, it's actually helping people understand how to use them. We see so many people come in. Just yesterday we had a very educated couple. I mean, a physician, [clears throat and cough] his wife I'm not sure what she did, but I mean very smart people and they didn't understand a word of their estate plan. So, now I'm going to go through, summarize it for them and see if that's going to work or if they need something different because how can you know if it's working with your life changes if you don't know. Now, some of the stuff is inevitable. You can't the IRS stuff is still going to always be tricky language. If you have special needs trust, sometimes that special those language people accounts, different things like that, there's going to be some language that you may not be able to you know, go and present your own estate planning seminar, but I think that understanding the gist of it because there's also a level where you can have a wonderful plan and what you're trying to do is avoid taxes or probate or anything, but if you have to pay an attorney every single time you want to look at that document or make a move, that's not cost effective. So I just think that kind of explaining people up front what you know, kind of getting a feel of what they need when they come in. So many people get their legal advice now on Instagram, different you know, Tik Tok, different things like that. And

3:42 Really? You get now you know, ChatGPT I've heard and Instagram there's legal advice? How do you How does that work? Yeah, I had a guy come in and he's like that's like this video right here. And I was like wow, okay. Doesn't really apply to what you have going on or you know, but sometimes it does and so it at least I think trying to figure out what the people's objectives are is extremely important because it's not a cookie cutter situation. What your neighbor has and what you talk to the person at work about

4:08 Right. There could be Well, first of all, you usually very rarely get the full story. Right. And secondly, sometimes nightmares if you've got people that are difficult one document's not going to let it's not going to fix it. So, you know, sometimes there's just going to be difficult situations. But the clearer you can be and the less making mistakes that somebody feels like they might be walking on a landmine. Who would want to be a trust of something if they don't understand what it says? Especially with people that are already start out agitated and angry. I mean, I would be terrified to manage something if everybody was, you know, you know, thinking that I was doing something wrong every minute. I would just say somebody else can do it. So, and sometimes that's a solution, but I think that people also need to realize that sometimes paperwork does not you can't fix everything. You can try to create as clear a path as possible, but difficult people are going to be difficult. So.

5:05 Difficult people are going to be difficult. That is a truism has major implications. I always feel like in marketing we want to try weed out the difficult people and let the other let my competitors have those people because I don't want them and if I can bog down my competitor with them, then and they want them, good for them, you know. And I think sometimes they kind of work well together. Like they get along better than they'll get along with me. So, it makes a lot of sense.

5:28 Yeah. So obviously, this process, the goal is the outcome, not the document, right? You're not You're not This isn't a creative writing class or you're not looking for the Pulitzer Prize for the best written estate plan. You're looking for the one that most effectuates what the client wants and needs. And it just seems to me that requires sometimes maybe finding out from client more than they even know what they need, right? Like they can go into ChatGPT or Instagram, I guess, to get their plan done. But, you know, unless the person's asking the right questions or and I also feel like some of it is like in my business it's like a gut feel like they didn't say anything, but I just had this feeling in the tonality that they're either hiding something or there's something this behind it. So, talk a bit about the difference that you experience when you meet with a client and do that, you know, in intake process. I'm sure you have forms or some sort of a clerk does some of it for you, but I don't think there's a substitute to probably you meeting the client getting your own essence of the situation.

6:30 Yeah, and sometimes just talking with people and as they're talking it might be that I think we have the best plan and then something comes up and I'm like, "Wait a second." And then it's not until 55 minutes into an hour-long consultation that we figure out, "Oh, this is really the issue."

6:44 Right. And a lot of unfortunately a lot of times people come in the reason that they come in is because they're having issues with the child. Either it's I mean, unfortunately there's a lot of substance abuse, there's people who can't manage their funds. I think sometimes people think, "Well, everything will work itself out, but I really can't have this kid making medical decisions for me." Or, you know, different things like that. So, just asking questions and I guess after you've done this for a while you know which questions to ask. Certainly if they're not being forthcoming with some things and sometimes they're embarrassed to say things that are going on and I get it. But if we don't know those things, then it sure then what we're preparing and what you're paying for might not really hit all of the all of the points. So, be up front, disclose things. There's an attorney-client privilege there. I guarantee you we've probably heard it before. You know, sometimes people are apologizing about things like oh my and it's like gosh. Really, this is like this is great this is easy for me. Like I would I would met with somebody yesterday with the same issues. You know what I mean? So there's obviously without breaking any confidentiality there but I do think that there's this there's this preconceived notion of what things are supposed to look like and people are embarrassed to admit that something else is going on.

8:09 Yeah. I have people break down in tears cuz they're you know they're taking their kid to a methadone clinic everyday and they who knows that, you know? And so you probably don't want to leave everything outright to that kid. So there's things that can be set up to you know or it's like sometimes it's you know it's like giving it's very dangerous physically and financially to leave things outright to people. So just figuring out those things and I guess you can't stop somebody from being embarrassed about those things but I guarantee you we've heard it before. I mean it's kind of like a you know pre-statement or confession like we've heard it all before, you know? We and it's it but I it's easy for me to say that on the other side of the table but truly there's no judgment. So

8:58 Yeah, I get that with you know clients who have maybe their parents left the house in really bad condition and they're really embarrassed about you know, and there've been some so I walk in after they say that and it's like this looks cleaner than my house. No offense.

9:10 Yeah. And on the other hand there are people who have you know severe you know their parents had severe problems of some sort and but I've seen I've seen some wild stuff. I mean I haven't found a house with a dead body we didn't know about. I've had a house where somebody was deceased and was there for 2 weeks before they were discovered. That's a whole I've seen some pretty gnarly and I think when you're in this business after a while it's like you brag about those problems rather than complain about them because they prove to people that you can trust me. I've seen I've seen everything. Like I'm like a doctor of real estate. I you know, but it doesn't scare me and all that. Just Yeah, but you know, in your estate plan, I imagine theoretically you could do a plan all online like via tax or form or something, but you don't because the real difference in a you know, automated semi-decent roll the dice plan and you is you, right? I mean, that's And you just said you know, it's interesting the way you described the discovery process. It was 55 minutes into it. Like if you're on ChatGPT, you're not spending 55 minutes, number one. Number two, it's not going to go with that kind of depth. So, it seems with all the talk, with all the technology and the national companies and consolidation, and it's the same thing in real estate. At the end of the day, the difference really has to be you.

10:35 Right. And I you know, we've seen people I somebody came in and had transferred their real estate in a deed to their trust. Had a trust that was decent. I mean, there was nothing really wrong with it, but they didn't have it notarized. They didn't execute properly. So, it didn't do anything. So, now the property's being held. So, then we had to go back and you know, so it's just Another thing we do a lot of, which is just those little those little like dotting the eyes and crossing the t's is that you might have a great document, but if you leave your 401k to your 10-year-old, it doesn't matter how nice your trust is. If you leave that to a minor, it's going to be a completely different situation than if you leave it to the trust.

11:17 Right. So, we see a lot of people who they have documents, they don't have beneficiaries named correctly for the situation that they have, and it negates what's going on. And so then, you know, perhaps your you know, especially if you're in your early 30s, you got some term life policy that's a million dollars. Might be the biggest asset that you own when you die. If you just name little Billy who's two, then it's going to be held I mean, basically by the court, you know, without permission. I

11:51 How could that go wrong? Yeah, right? And I've been in I've been in probate court where somebody was getting permission to get a girl a prom dress. So, that's not really what that's not the situation that you would want to have. So, even if with wonderful documents, if they're not utilized correctly, then they're only as good as you know, as good as what goes in them, basically.

12:14 I was in a in a court one day a case before me was exactly this guardianship where the money was left to the child, minor child, and the they were arguing they had the court-appointed attorney, and then you had the guardian attorney, and that the caregiver or whoever the person who is the I guess the guardian, you know, had taken the What's the term for the person who's being guarded? The child to lunch at like McDonald's and was expensing two hamburgers, two fries, and two Cokes, not one. And the argument is, well, if I'm taking them and I'm there for an hour with them, aren't I allowed to eat something? Like, don't employees get paid something? Like, you're arguing over eight bucks. You have attorneys fees at like 400 bucks an hour times two, and the judge is pissed. And the whole thing is over, you know, $10 worth of McDonald's. That's what happens when you don't plan ahead, I think, and people think about that. The thing I've noticed in your in your industry, I think like all industries, is that it's becoming more competitive. I think the technology is, you know, making bad attorneys look not as bad, making, you know, below-average attorneys maybe look average, maybe even look maybe assisting average attorneys to give them more breadth of information to make them look better. And obviously great attorneys to leverage themselves.

13:36 But the I think the challenge of all that is that you can't keep doing the same service you did 10 years ago. That some of the edge case services become now normal in our stream of my business. So for example, you talk about the documents. You know, I 10 years ago I don't think attorneys generally executed real estate deeds with their clients. I think that was very common. They would just give the customer maybe a prepared deed to say, "Okay, you know, get this notarized, get it recorded. Good luck. And we'll see you next time." Now it seems like attorneys almost all prepare them and some of them go so far as to record it and verify that. Talk a bit about how that fits into your practice. I know you know, you're a 40 under 40. So you're top person. You're younger for this industry than the average. Talk a bit about how maybe the offering to the client the service will have to change I think to be competitive but also to be effective.

14:29 So I not only have a law firm that does estate planning and probate, but I also have a title company. Cuz I just feel like it goes it goes hand-in-hand. So we have seen so many just as exactly as you're saying. We have seen people who are married and maybe they own a piece of This has happened so many times lately. They own a piece of property. We even had a title company tell somebody that incorrectly how their title was, which I don't know how you fix that if you're relying on a professional, but so you know, anyway, the spouse dies. The other spouse was not on the title. And so now they own it with step kids. Or in one case it they owned it with their father-in-law. So there's different you know, every state has different things that happen if you don't have documents together. Addressing those documents, it's so important to get that done. When someone's doing your estate plan, they really should look at your deed and they should see how you hold title. It's extremely important if you're doing a trust, and it's a revocable trust, if you are going to be wanting to avoid probate, you've got to move things into it. I think you said this one time a year maybe a year ago or so I was on here, and you said it's kind of trust is like having a lock box. If you don't put anything in it's not in it. You can stick your jewelry on top of it, but it doesn't a safe. It doesn't it doesn't do anything. So, we see a lot of times where people don't do that final step, and that is the difference. It's probated estate versus non-probated estate. Every state has different rules to not disinherit a spouse, and inevitably if you just rely on statutes, it's probably not going to go the way that you want it. We always look and we make sure in Kentucky you have to have specific language for survivorship. In Indiana, you don't. If you're married and you take a deed together, you're automatically. So, every state has different rules. It's really important that you talk to an attorney licensed in that state. A lot of title companies are outsourcing, and they've got somebody in

16:32 Minnesota that's doing closings for Georgia or whatever. But you need to make sure that it's somebody in your state's looked at it to make to if it's supposed to be in survivorship, does it meet that requirement? If it's supposed to be in your trust, has it been transferred? Because just saying it's in your trust doesn't do it. So, those things are what we go through with people. We have a I think one thing a gift you can give everybody that you leave behind is a detailed list of your assets. You don't want somebody chasing after a life insurance policy that you had in the '80s and you quit paying it, and now that company's been sold three times, and they waste an hour trying to see if that's legit or not. Nobody gets mail anymore. You know, try to connect Try to you connect the you know, to connect the as much as you can. It seems simple and it is, but it's really not simple if you're trying to figure out what someone has. And I had somebody in my office yesterday that said we know that he had a bank account on this street. It's one of the biggest streets in Louisville. It's like okay, you guys all going to go together and check it out because there's probably 20 different banks on that, you know. So

17:41 Right. That And the banks change names and they get bought and they switch and you know, of course and they're they don't want to give any information if they have the account they're not going to tell you. That's a whole 'nother nightmare process getting it.

17:54 Yeah. So I think it's just like those things to answer your question, just making sure that you look at the deed, making sure that if you have a trust you've moved things, making sure that you have information on how to name beneficiaries. I've had people call me years after doing their estate plan and they've just gotten a new job and they're like I'm sitting here with my HR person. How was I supposed to do that again? I'm like, yes, that's fantastic. I'm so glad you called because you remember you don't You know, half the battle is knowing who to call, but there are significant differences when you're when you're doing that. A lot of people also don't understand that if you get divorced, your beneficiaries don't change. You have to change them. So we've done probates for people who have left things to ex-wives and husbands unintentionally so. Those things are just, you know, asking those questions, making sure that people get those things done and knowing that they need to.

18:46 And then the kids find out that the $100,000 bank account or $500,000 IRA goes to the ex-wife who they hate cuz that was that wasn't their mom, that was the ex-wife or whatever, their stepmom or their or the new wife, yeah. The new wife finds out. I mean it is it is a situation that's the nightmare scenario is that case with the prior spouse getting half or prior child getting half and yeah, I had I had one where the man had a child out of wedlock. And he but in California by law and then he remarried and had a child and his wife passed, his new wife. So he had this one child out of wedlock and he had this other child from his new wife. And in California law it turns out that they each inherit half. You can imagine the daughter who you know her father had a child out of wedlock would be upset. And it turned out this woman who was born you know was out of wedlock went on some severe psychological problems and was into drugs and you know she was just but I mean it wasn't really her fault. I mean she was born kind of in this weird situation, right? So on one hand I'm sympathetic and on the other hand the step sister is not it was just a civil war trying to get this home sold and they're both getting money out of it and had the now maybe the father would have wanted that way could have put it in a will or could have put it in an estate plan or maybe he wanted all to go to the new daughter and could have done that. But because he didn't take the time to answer that, he's left these two women to kill each other. I killed but you know yelling at each other is

20:16 Well and we've seen where somebody hasn't, you know, grandpa left a property to my dad. Well, grandpa's been dead for 20 years no one's done anything.

20:26 Right. And dad's one of nine. Okay, well now in Kentucky you can't probate a will or can't probate anything after 10 years.

20:34 Oh. So now it's going to all 10 kids, six of which are dead. Did they have wills? Did they not have a will? People think that you know if they're the kid whose parents died, they don't want to be erased from the family tree. But if you're the one who's in that generation they're like wait a second. They're dead that guy's not here anymore. Now I got to share it with my nieces and nephews. If and every state has different rules about that. Typically you don't get deleted just cuz your parent predeceased. So you might be owning an you know 50,000 piece of property vacant you know maybe a vacant land in the middle of nowhere.

21:09 Right. That you all own a 1/26 share of. Right. Is that worth it? You know, so there's just those you know, a lot of times that's you know, delivering bad news to people who have waited a little bit. I don't know that I always tell people that you know, you don't need to meet me before you go to the funeral home. You don't need to meet me before the person has you know, you've done all of those things.

21:32 But don't wait years cuz that just that doesn't help out either. Yeah. Yeah. I think well, you know, look, sometimes the property's vacant. I live in Los Angeles where, you know, you leave the house vacant for 30, 60 days, you may lose it. I mean, there's squatters going to move in and it is you can't get them out. Ooh, I'm sorry. You can't get them out with a crowbar and so to obviously, you have to grieve and you have to go through the process, but I try to get people to get started at least get control of the asset if you're going to you know, want to sell it, make money out of it.

22:07 And lock it up. If that if that I mean, I was talking to somebody one time and there was people that went and stole things while they were at the funeral home because they knew that's when that funeral's happening. So, the people went in and they like ransacked this you got to you got to secure it. For 100% secure it.

22:27 Yeah. But you know, and if it's and I have also had people that call because they're losing sleep over it. They just need to get some answers.

22:37 Right. And that's And then that then my goodness, get your answers, but they're you know, don't wait 20 years cuz Yeah, well, for sure. There's a lot of reasons that The reason they wait, I think, that I would get involved with is one child There's like three kids and one child's living there for free, basically, and he would just assume live there forever. He knows he only owns 1/3. So, if they probate and sell it, he's going to get 1/3 and have to move somewhere, which he really can't afford to do in the love of cases. And so and they'll say, "I'll get to it. I'll get to it." And they just stall out as long as they can. So, I see that case regularly. That's why I advise the other children, "Listen, just file in California from a business point of view. I can't give legal advice. I'm not an attorney, but from a business point of view, just you have the right to file to administer the estate. If the other brother steps ahead of you, great. But at least start the process. There's no reason to wait 20 years to lose your property.

23:32 Well, and you can even evict people, too. So Well, now let's say in this is it is really got I won't say can't, but it is

23:41 Oh, well, can't Yeah, it is extremely difficult. COVID changed some of that. It is very hard to be a landlord and have to get somebody out. But there's a legal process for it. There's no legal process and you have no standing if you haven't opened up probate.

23:55 Yes, true. That's for sure That's even for sure true. But even with I mean, literally, I have I have listen, I just gave back to the states and just said, "I don't think you're going to control the property. It's going to foreclose long before you ever get control. And it's going to be a year or two before you get them out. And they're going to live there for free. And it's cheaper for them to pay an attorney." It's interesting now. It used to be that the squatters didn't have attorneys. Then there was the squatters all got paid for attorneys by the city or county or state in here in California. So, they all had taxpayer-paid for attorneys. Now, the squatters know, "Well, I need a better attorney than that." So, they're It's actually cheaper to pay the attorney's fees than it is to pay rent. So, they'll pay two 3,000 a month to an attorney to stay for 2 years. And so, the sophistication of the eviction process here in LA today is completely different than it was just 2 years ago.

24:43 Yeah, and then there's a bad It gets a bad rap on the media cuz you're this horrible scary landlord, but then, you know, you have a mortgage payment, too. So

24:52 Well, and often that horrible that horrible scary landlord is just a very average person who their income and wealth is either in you know inheriting this property. I had a lady who's living in a medical which is like not like Medicaid like the low income medical nursing home. I mean it was just a nightmare disgusting place that you don't want to end up there. If you're impoverished, this is the level nursing home that you live in. She had an interest in she had $800,000 waiting to be inherited but for this squatter that we had. It took it took about 6 months to get out. And so I'm sure in the in the news they'll say, "Oh, this lady's rich. She's got an $800,000 house." Yeah, she's living literally in poverty in this disgusting rat-infested nursing home in Pennsylvania hoping to get the money so she can be moved out and be with her family and get proper medical care. And her husband was a war hero who you know and her husband father was a war hero who I'm sure has scrimped and saved and had this house and paid it off and so they're not bad people necessarily the landlords. They're just often times just people who worked hard and saved money and that part of our business and here in Los Angeles especially is just gotten completely out of control. Now in I know that you mentioned you have a title company as well. I imagine that's because so much of the business both in terms of estate planning avoiding problems and probate administration and trust administration is dealing with or fixing problems is related to title. So is that because those two overlap that you have that other business?

26:25 Well, I don't know. My dad started them all both in the '80s. So Okay. You'll have to ask him but they do very nicely overlap. There's I get so many phone calls from agents

26:39 Because there's a listing that they're taking and they need to make sure that this person has the power to sell or they just inherited a piece of property and two of the heirs are have guardianships that they need to get it you know, different things. So, in Kentucky you're supposed to be an attorney, but the reality is there's it's kind of it's kind of gotten away from that. So, it is really important to have people a pair of eyes on there to see. And again, also you a friend of mine came in, she girl I went to high school with, she and her husband have been on the same deed for like 20 years or something since they've been married and he owned the property for him. Well, some title company that worked with this bank that was out of state, it wasn't in survivorship. Luckily, nothing happened and so we fixed it, but there are those things that if you look at it and you can be like, "Hey, is this how you guys meant it?" Cuz maybe it is. May- maybe there's different compelling reasons. Blended families, there's all kinds of reasons to do things different ways. But, it does it does lend itself well because they're both transactional. I don't sue anybody. I that's not that's not my jam, but I would say we're kind of like the triage rather than we're preventative care rather than triage. So, we try to make sure that the documents are in order, but there are a lot of things that come across on title on the title end that people don't know. And, you know, they're refinancing and they don't realize that they're signing something cuz they're signing a you know, but they don't In Kentucky, you have to spouses have to sign additional things and all this kind of stuff, so it's very confusing.

28:17 They're like, "Well, I was there. I signed something." It's like, "Well, you don't I signed a thousand pages, didn't include that in But, you didn't you didn't you don't own the property, so now

28:26 Yeah. Yeah, so now you're you got to pay your stepkids out and, you know, it's just it Yeah. So, a lot And people will ask during closings like, "Hey, should I put this in an LLC? Should I do this?"

28:39 At the close. Yeah. You're at the close. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, let me show that. Now, when you say just a cliffhanger, you say title company cuz here in California, it's done a little different. We have title companies that primarily do the title investigation work and the title insurance policy, and then we have escrow companies that do the closing. But, when you say title company, you're referring to one that really does both, right? You do the

29:00 It's both. It's one in the same. Right. So, you're And so, you contract out to through some of those national title companies as far as the insurance part of it, and they give you the resources to do the research and the preliminary title report, but you're also the one that handles the contract and then the clearing of conditions and the closing process.

29:17 That's different in Kentucky and in Indiana, we usually meet at the same time sitting at the same table, which just blows the mind of people in California usually. But,

29:28 How can you get the buyer and seller at the same table? I can't even imagine. It is something. It is just Do they come strapped? Yeah, it is. We it can be a scheduling nightmare, but we do we handle the funds. The agents usually have the contract already prepared. Sometimes we'll help with for sale by owners with documents there. But, you know, we get it after the contract's there. And usually, both parties don't have representation. It's just one representation to make sure that the terms of the contract are met and that the mortgage company is first in line as far as that goes. And then, yes, we outsource to different underwriters, national outfits that do the title. But, we're kind of like the we're the agent of the title company. But, yeah. And in Kentucky, we don't even have any licensing laws to be an a title insurance producer. So, to sell Yeah, it's crazy. So, to sell life insurance and homeowners insurance, you have to have a license, but not in Kentucky. It's kind of kind of nuts.

30:28 Wow. Kentucky, who would think? Well, yeah. I mean, but maybe. Maybe you would. It's all the bourbon you guys have in that state, probably. Can't imagine what it's like in your state capital.

30:37 Throw a dart and hope it sticks. Yeah. And so, I know that in part of your business development or part of your promotion, you do classes for real estate agents on this platform. About 7% of our audience are real estate agents. What's the number one question that you get from Realtors®? I mean, I'm hoping they're asking you good questions and doing them depth I cuz you obviously are a tremendous resource and just the breadth of your knowledge and the things that we deal with. What's the most common question you get from real estate agents?

31:03 There's a lot. But I think the question that I love to get from the listing agent is who's supposed to sign this contract? I wish everybody would ask me that.

31:14 Because then you're looking at the deed, you're making sure who's on the title. Sometimes you're not dealing you're dealing with a trust. You should you're talking you should be talking to with the daughter instead of the dad.

31:25 Sometimes there's a power of attorney. How should they sign it? People have power of attorneys that we had somebody who the dad was moving across the country and the daughter's signing and when I looked at the deed or when I looked at the power of attorney, it said that you had to have two letters from physician saying that he was in It was a triggering power of attorney. It only became effective upon his incapacity.

31:47 Right. So, I called and the daughter's like, "Well, no, dad's fine." Well, then they really didn't even have a binding contract because dad should have signed it. The daughter didn't have any capacity to bind him to anything cuz he she needed those two letters. So, I love it when listing agents call me and say, "Hey, how is somebody supposed to sign this?" I will give you if it's an LLC, you should cuz if we get something back and it doesn't match, is the person dead? Do are we missing a deed somewhere in the transaction? There's so many questions that can be answered by the way that you sign a document. I really wish that cuz we've had agents that have power of attorneys. For those of you don't know, a power of attorney does not work after someone passed away.

32:29 Well, that's a common one. I have I have the power of attorney for who? For my dad, but he passed. You can't You have a piece of scrap paper now. So,

32:38 But I got on ChatGPT and said it was going to work. Yeah, but this is I'm the power of attorney. You're like, I don't know if you're using that term right. Sometimes they're the executor and they just don't know what to call themselves, but

32:48 Correct. I think it's ex- you really want to have a binding contract. Especially if you're an agent, you don't want to waste your time. Right. If you're dealing if you should be dealing with the adult daughter who's the trustee and her best friend's an agent, why are you wasting your time? You know, so, that is that is imperative to know who your client is. I mean, that's a that's a minimal. It seems like a pretty low bar, but you would be surprised how often it is misunderstood who is the client. And also, if you are dealing with a power of attorney, your client is actually the homeowner. And you need to know that as well. So,

33:28 Yeah, I guess it's difficult sometimes because you have multiple heirs and the one that's yelling the most, you know, once you treat them like they're the client and the answers are And I have to say sometimes, you're really not the client. The estate is. You're one of the beneficiaries and my job's to serve the estate.

33:43 So, last question cuz obviously you're just a wealth of knowledge. I could ask a lot cuz I've built a nice business in probate real estate here in LA, but the laws are different by state and you practice in Kentucky and Indiana. I'm in California. And I know the procedures and processes also vary by county. And so, imagine somebody was local to you in Louisville wanting to be a great probate real estate agent. I My recommendation always is rather than buy data and cold call or send out mailers or flyers, my advice spend an hour a day learning about the unique aspects of probate and the how the title interacts with it. In California here in LA, I recommend go to the courthouse cuz we have such a high volume, you can see so much. We have a good website for our county. I recommend that quite a bit. If somebody were to I don't know Louisville at all, I've been there. If you were to if you were a real estate agent and you really wanted to learn about the probate process as a real estate agent, what are what's a resource that you might recommend them to go to learn? Is it Is the courthouse house available for people to go to hearings? Is it the court website? What would you recommend for them to learn not just how to get business, which is great marketing, but how to actually be productive and help your customer?

34:56 So, I would say getting to know a probate attorney because that's going to be someone who I mean on the business side they could they could send you leads, but I've had people say, "Hey, I've gotten this certification. Now send me leads." I'm like, "I don't know cuz you're not understanding you're not using your terminology correctly." You need to learn the terminology because there's a difference between an executor, a power of attorney, an administrator. There's different roles, there's different rules, especially state to state. Get to know see if you can sit in on some classes. I think sit in on the same class more than once. And sit in on some docket hours. Just listen to what's happening because you might be lost on a lot of it, but some of it's like, "Oh, I wonder what happened there." You know, and you can kind of pick up some things. And sometimes that I think it just shows you also what kind of questions you might want to be answer asking and if you are taking a listing and someone has passed away contact the probate attorney. Make sure like for one it's a it's a just a courtesy. It's going to save you a lot of time. Just introduce yourself like, "Hey, I'm going to be listing this property. Is there anything that I should know? Is there a special like anything in the MLS notes that I should put down?" One, nobody ever does that. I mean, that would be fantastic if somebody did that.

36:17 Two, that's going to like if you need an order to sell or if there's a lot of creditors and there's something crazy going on, you really should know ahead of time and put

36:26 Your buyers on alert that it might take a minute longer because I think expectations are the number one That's the number one rule of the game in real estate. You can fix almost anything, but is somebody going to stick around to see it? So, if you know that it's going to take a little longer to get this to closing, and everybody knows it, then no one's going to be mad. But, if you don't find out until after you've done the inspections and you've done this and now you've got the pregnant wife who can't move in and it's, you know, and she's somebody's getting documents signed at the delivery room, which I've done, you know, you That communication is key. So, go to the classes, get the certifications, but the certifications are good. Don't get me wrong, they're very good. But, to have some probate attorney that you can call and ask a question to, you may think that it's one way and this has some nuance that's different. And if you have somebody you can ask and then reach out to the attorney who's representing the clients because that is so important to make sure it's smooth.

37:28 Okay, I have one last question. Because this one's pressing me now. So, in California, in some regards, we're very lucky in that we have a great forms package through our association of Realtors® for probate. We have a listing addendum, we have a purchase addendum and advisories. They really lay out the code really well, protect, I believe, both sides and the agents and the brokers kind of by laying it all out up front in a very defined process. To my knowledge, no other state, or at least I believe I'm aware of and I've asked agents, attorneys in most states, no other state has a customized form, which to me then says, well, don't you then need some sort of a addendum that the attorney prepares? I mean, if I was selling a property and you're the probate attorney for that estate, and let's say we it is complicated. We have multiple heirs, there was objectors, there's creditors, litigation of some sort. Is a an addendum that you would require or is it just I live in California and we're so litigious that we need this but you don't need that in other states?

38:28 We don't have anything like that. It does sound wonderful. There is language that I always suggest people use but it's different. It's they're all different. So sometimes you need an order to sell but in Kentucky if you have an order to sell you have to wait 30 days to close after that order. So I'm always like this needs to be part of the contract. And you can put it in the MLS notes but if you get an offer and it doesn't have this language you need to counter with this language because this provision needs to say this so that no one can say, "Hey, we aren't waiting around for that." Because that could if it takes you a couple weeks to get in front of a judge to get this order signed cuz everybody's fighting.

39:04 Right. And then and then you got to wait another 30 days. I mean that could you could be out people could have walked their interest rate and now they're mad about lock dates, lock extensions and all kinds of things. So those are we don't have forms for that. There's always you know there are a lot of addendums that people don't use but I'm not aware of any kind of a form like that in Kentucky or in Indiana. So that's kind of a wild west that you hope you have the right language and That's why that's why reaching out to an attorney is super important to have that language in there.

39:41 That's a question. What language should I put in my listing contract? What should I put in the MLS and what should I put in the in the purchase contract? And I think it as a Realtor® at least asking that question and documenting it that you asked it with an email and getting a reply at least protects you as best you can and hopefully your client and hopefully the good attorney is going to reply with, "Well, here's what we need for this case." and give you some verbage. So

40:01 And say and one other thing. Can I can I Yeah. If you have a listing and the heirs cuz there's different ways. It could go through the estate. It might be after an estate. It might be that you take the property out of the estate by doing different things. If the heirs are going to sign off sometimes their liens will attach. Not always, but sometimes. And so, I think it's really important that you understand with the probate attorney how you're going to go about doing that, cuz sometimes they're like, "Oh, you just sign You know, you can just go to the side over here, and then you don't have to do this, and then the estate's not selling it, and so it's people individually." Well, we've seen that, and then we've also seen all of the heirs paying off all of the liens for a great nephew because he never paid his bills. So, then that's cutting into everybody's portion. So, you know, it's really important before you try to sideline things and do different things that you know that you've done a prelim title search, and you realize, "Okay, well, are we going to have to pay off, you know, Chase Bank credit card of this one heir because we went about it a different way?" So, I think having somebody that understands the ins and outs of all those things because it's going to make a huge impact. And you talk about Thanksgiving and Christmas getting kind of weird. You know, I don't think anybody wanted to invite that great nephew after that one cuz they were mad. And it really did eat into everybody else's.

41:24 So, Wow. That's It's kind of a nuanced thing, but there are every state And don't assume that one state to the next That is one area of law that is extremely area specific is real estate and estate planning and probate. Every state has different rules. So, what happens in one state 10 miles over in the other could be a completely different story. So, don't assume anything.

41:49 Well, a great resource in both Kentucky and Indiana, which I learned is a thing near Louisville. I knew other nearby cities and states, but next spring Kentucky and Indiana is Colleen Ballerson, and she is a partner. I guess your father was the founder of the firm at Colleen at English Law Group, and the website is englishlawgroup.com. If you want more information, there's the website and our contact information down below. Colleen, thank you so much for today for teaching us so much about real estate law and probate and trust administration. We appreciate your time today and hope anybody in Kentucky, Indiana, real estate agents will reach out to you hopefully and work with you as a title company as well as an attorney on probate and administration.

42:33 Thank you so much. It's always a pleasure talking to you and I feel like after talking to you, I have even more things to talk to people about, so. We'll do it again. I mean, we had you for a while. We'll do it again. I'll reach out to you. Thank you so much.

42:42 Sounds good. Thank you so much. And for the rest of you, this is Probate Weekly. We get together every week and we don't often have an attorney that helpful, but obviously she's tied into both the real estate side with title and the probate side. So, it was a great lesson I thought today. Let me know what you think though. You like this? Subscribe to it. Give me some comments or reach out if I can help in any way at Bill Gross Probate in social media. As always, make today your best day ever.