In an ordinary home sale, the owner signs, escrow handles most of the paperwork, and the process moves on. A probate sale needs more. The title company has to see proof that the owner has died and proof that you have legal authority to sign. Depending on your authority, the heirs may need formal notice,

You’ve found a buyer, agreed on a price, and signed a contract, and the house still isn’t sold. In some California probate sales, a judge has to approve the sale at a public hearing first. At that hearing, other buyers can walk in and bid more. The buyer you chose might not end up with

Within weeks of a death, many families start receiving letters, texts, and calls from people offering to buy the house for cash. Some are legitimate companies and investors. Some are not. Nearly all of them skip over the fact that a probate house can’t be sold like an ordinary house. A cash buyer can purchase a probate

Serving as executor or administrator means managing a court process, a house, a family, and a series of deadlines, often all at once and often from a distance. This checklist puts the whole process in one place, from the first days after a death through the final distribution of sale proceeds. Each item includes: Work

Most executors sell a probate house once in their lives. They’re usually grieving, often living far from the property, and handling a court process they’ve never seen before. Mistakes are understandable. Some are also expensive: The good news is that the same mistakes come up again and again, and nearly all of them can be

When a house goes through probate in California, many families are surprised by what it costs. The largest charges aren’t hourly bills. They’re fees set by state law as a percentage of the estate’s value, and they’re based on the house’s full value, not the equity left after the mortgage. A $900,000 house with a $600,000

Two families lose a parent in the same month. Each inherits a similar house in the same neighborhood. The difference usually isn’t the house or the family. It’s how the house was titled when the owner died. A house held in a living trust is sold by a successor trustee, generally without court involvement. A house in

You’ve walked through the house and made a list: a roof that leaks over the back bedroom, a water heater near the end of its life, carpet that needs to go, and rooms that haven’t been painted in 25 years. A real estate agent thinks some work could help the sale. The question is how

Sorting through a parent’s mail after they die, executors often find envelopes from the city: an Order to Comply, an inspection notice, a citation for an unpermitted garage conversion, or a warning about an overgrown yard. Some notices are years old. Some arrived after the death and went unopened. Yes, a probate property can be

After a parent dies, the mortgage statement keeps arriving. It usually comes addressed to someone who can no longer open it, with a due date that doesn’t pause for grief or court schedules. The mortgage doesn’t disappear when the owner dies. The loan stays attached to the house, and the estate is responsible for dealing