Johnston, Kinney & Zulaica LLP

Johnston, Kinney & Zulaica LLP represent beneficiaries, heirs, and executors with probate administration. We counsel you, no matter what your role in the probate process. Our lawyers work together with you throughout to ensure you achieve your objectives. For example, how the estate is administered relies on many factors. For example, the deceased's estate plan was in a will or another document? Did they have a trust, and if so, how was that trust funded? What is the complexity and extent of assets and debt claims? Probate is a court-supervised process, and it is complex. Probate consists of many steps and technical rules, frequently requiring numerous court appearances. Each state has various probate laws that set attorney fees and probate costs. If the deceased established a revocable living trust to hold their assets, the assets within the trust are not subject to probate. However, if the deceased owned real property in a state other than the state where they resided at the time of their death, ancillary estate probate may be needed. A decedent's estates that have extensive property holdings may require this, and we handle executors who have interstate or even international assets, and the probate rules in these situations can be even trickier.