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Our Probate Practice

Probate

Probate is a legal procedure overseen by the probate court system that determines the validity of a will and identifies a decedent’s assets so that the estate can be administered, inheritances distributed to beneficiaries, creditors and taxes paid, and so forth.

At Rego & Rego, we assist clients through representation in probate matters and also litigate claims against the estate such as contested wills, alleged breaches of fiduciary duty, alleged abuses of power of attorney, pay on death disputes, protection of beneficiary rights and trust litigation, to name a few.

As probate lawyers, we provide legal assistance to executors, conservators and trustees in relation to their administrative duties as well as offer representation for individuals and corporate entities in their claims against estates.

Legal benefits:

The tools involved in estate planning include the will, various types of trusts, beneficiary designations, powers of appointment, various forms of property ownership (Joint tenancy with rights of survivorship, tenancy in common, tenancy by the entirety, etc), gifting, and power of attorney, specifically the durable financial power of attorney and the durable medical power of attorney. After widespread litigation and media coverage surrounding the Terri Schiavo case, virtually all estate planning attorneys now advise their clients to also create a living will. Note that many people (and even some attorneys) confuse a living will with a durable medical power of attorney. The former controls solely those decisions that must be made at the end of the patient's life, while the latter is used to give decision-making authority to someone else (usually a family member or close friend). This person, the attorney-in-act, then makes all medical decisions leading up to the person's death, but has no such power to make end of life decisions for the patient. Those decisions are made by the patient in the living will; in the absence of a living will, and where the patient is incapable of making end-of-life decisions for him or herself, such choices are left to family members.