Probate

This is the standard Florida probate case. The court appoints a personal representative and issues letters of administration, the authority a bank, a title company, or an insurer asks to see before anyone can act. It is the path when the estate is larger than the summary limit, or when assets, creditors, or disputes need active management. Orange and Osceola cases are filed in the Ninth Judicial Circuit.

Without it:Without an appointed personal representative, no one can legally sell the house, close the accounts, or answer a creditor.

Summary administration skips the appointment of a personal representative. The court reviews a petition and enters an order handing specific property to the people entitled to it. Since July 1, 2026 it is available when the estate subject to administration, less property exempt from creditors' claims, does not exceed $150,000, raised from $75,000. It is also available when the person died more than two years ago.

Without it:If the estate does not qualify, the same property still transfers, but through the longer formal route, and the family waits.

When someone who lived in another state dies owning Florida real estate, the case opened back home does not move Florida title. A Florida ancillary proceeding does. It comes up with the condo, the vacation house, or the lot bought decades ago and half forgotten.

Without it:Without it, the property stays in a deceased owner's name and cannot be cleanly sold, refinanced, or insured.

Even when a trust avoids probate, the successor trustee still has a job with deadlines: filing the notice of trust with the court, inventorying and valuing assets, paying legitimate debts and taxes, funding any subtrusts, and accounting to the beneficiaries. Florida holds trustees personally responsible for getting it wrong.

Without it:A trustee who distributes early and by instinct can end up personally liable when a creditor or a tax bill arrives.

Disputes come in a few shapes: capacity at the signing, undue influence by someone close, a later document that surfaces, an accounting a beneficiary does not accept. We represent personal representatives defending an estate and beneficiaries who believe something is wrong. Florida's objection deadlines are short and unforgiving.

Without it:Miss the statutory window and a valid objection is barred, no matter how right it was.

Florida charges no estate tax and no inheritance tax, and the federal estate tax reaches only very large estates. What still needs handling is the paperwork: the final personal income tax return, the estate's own return when it has income, and the basis step up your beneficiaries will rely on later. We coordinate that with your CPA.

Without it:Missed filings surface as penalties a year later, usually after the estate has already been distributed.