Estate Planning Library
Our best resources to help you understand and manage your estate plan.
Looking for a quick answer? Start with our frequently asked questions.
Getting Started
New to estate planning? Start here.
Estate Planning 101
Learn the basics of planning your estate.
Without a trust, your estate goes through probate court — typically $25,000+ and 12–18 months. With a trust, most clients finish in just 2 meetings over 3 weeks.
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How to Create an Estate Plan
Three steps: make your choices, sign your plan, fund your trust. Most people already know 95% of the answers — about 3 hours total.
What We Do
We help people complete their estate plans — without getting distracted by probate or trust litigation. Trust administration is coming next year.
Key Decisions
The choices that shape your estate plan — who's in charge, and what happens when things change.
How to Pick a Trustee
Who, What & Why.
Pick the most responsible person you know and trust who is able and willing to serve. Our trust terms let them hire a professional fiduciary to help, serve from abroad, and step in and out of the role as needed.
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How to Pick a Custodial Guardian
Siblings are usually ideal; grandparents are sometimes too old. Court fights are rare — what matters is a stable, loving home, and our documents are built around that.
Divorcing? Your Spouse Can Still Inherit
Legally tricky but very doable: update your plan now, change beneficiaries once the divorce is final. A plan we did as a couple needs your spouse’s consent.
When an Adult Lives in Your Home at Death
A partner or grown child lives with you but won’t inherit the house. Your plan should say who may stay, for how long, and who enforces it. Four options, compared.
Trust Options & Protections
Different trust structures serve different families — find what fits yours.
Why Our Trusts Are Better
We do it differently.
Most trusts follow a standard template — ours don't. We include features like plain-English summaries, future-proof trustee transitions, and built-in special needs provisions that most firms simply leave out.
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Trust Protections for Children
We do this differently: separate-property trusts before distribution, an optional permanent creditor-protection trust for young beneficiaries, and flexible rules your trustee can fit to the situation.
Will Your Kids Still Inherit If Your Spouse Remarries?
For most families an inheritance agreement is the best mix: access for your spouse, protection for your kids, and the capital-gains step-up preserved.
Special Needs Trusts
Included in every plan at no extra cost. Protects SSI and Medi-Cal — and you can decide later whether it’s ever needed.
Bypass Trusts
Do I need a bypass trust? Almost certainly no. Consider our inheritance agreements instead for a better tax basis.
Will an Inheritance Affect SSI or Medi-Cal?
It can — a direct inheritance can cost someone their benefits. A special needs trust or CalABLE account lets them keep both.
Can I Use a Trust to Protect My Assets from Creditors?
No — your own trust won’t shield your own assets in California. LLCs for rentals, umbrella insurance otherwise; trusts protect what you leave to others.
Property & Assets
How your property and privacy fit into your estate plan.
LLCs and Asset Protection
Great for rental property — usually a mistake for your own home.
An LLC shields you from lawsuits tied to a rental property. Putting your own home in one costs you the tax exemption, capital-gains exclusion, and homestead protection — umbrella insurance does that job better.
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Working With Us
What it's actually like to work with Summerall Law.
Why Summerall Law
We build "easy" into everything that we do.
Our most common feedback: "That was way easier than I expected." Most clients finish in 3 hours total, sign their plan within 3 weeks, and pay around $1,000 less than at most firms.
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Client Reviews
Every review we have, in one place, with links to read them yourself.
Legal Insurance
If your employer offers ARAG, MetLife Legal or similar, your plan is likely covered — you usually pay only the notary fees ($60 per person) and deed fees ($300 primary residence, $500 for additional properties).
Advice Calls
We are just a phone call away. A few things people bring to an advice call:
- I'm not sure how to take title on the deed.
- I don't know if I need to update my estate plan.
- I'm inheriting under a trust — what's the best way to keep my inheritance safe?
Our Cybersecurity Policies: How We Protect Your Information
The ten commitments we make to keep your information safe.
Helping a Loved One With Their Estate Plan
How we work with facilitators, the family members and friends who help someone else create their estate plan, and why the client leads every call.
International Family Estate Planning
Foreign property, trustees abroad, overseas beneficiaries — our plans are built for global families.
🌈 LGBTQ+ Estate Planning in California
Durable plans for same-sex couples, transgender clients, and LGBTQ+ families — even if laws change.
After You Sign
Guides for clients who have already signed — funding your trust, informing your trustee, and staying organized over time.
Trust Maintenance Guide
Fund your trust, inform your trustee, and keep key contacts organized after signing.
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