Probate Lawyer Located in Honolulu HI.

Probate is a court-supervised process for administering an estate after a person’s death. With proper estate planning, many estates can avoid probate altogether, but that is not always possible. Many issues can arise in probate that requires a local Honolulu probate lawyer’s help. At Holcomb Law, LLLC, we have helped personal representatives, disappointed heirs, and creditors in various probate proceedings involving large and small estates. Contact our firm to find out if we can help.

A Closer Look at Probate

Probate might seem like a hassle, but it serves a useful purpose. Probate results in the orderly transfer of a deceased person’s assets to other people. It also ensures that creditors who are owed money are paid out of the estate before the assets get distributed to beneficiaries and heirs.

Probate is necessary regardless of whether there was a will or not. However, if there is a will, then family members can view it and possibly challenge its validity. For example, they might claim the deceased signed the will under duress or because of fraud, or that it is invalid for another reason. If the probate judge agrees the will isn’t valid, he or she sets it aside.

The personal representative plays a key role in probate. Most wills nominate someone to serve. The representative is tasked with gathering estate assets, keeping them safe, and publishing a notice to creditors. The representative also must review all claims and pay the ones that are valid. The final steps in probate are distributing what’s left of the estate to the people named in the will or, if there was no will, according to Hawaii’s intestacy laws. Then the personal representative pays or files taxes and closes the estate.

Why You Might Need Legal Help

Holcomb Law can assist anyone involved in probate:

• Disappointed heirs who want to contest the validity of the will.
• Personal representatives who need legal advice about how to keep property safe or how to determine which claims to pay. The estate also might be sued, and the representative is charged with defending it.
• Beneficiaries upset that the personal representative wasted property or engaged in self-dealing.
• Creditors who want to challenge the rejection of their claim.

In short, we can help anyone with a question about the probate process. To learn more, please contact us to review your concerns. You might want to bring a proceeding in the probate court, or you might only need advice. It is best to know your options ahead of time.

Probate Alternatives

Not all estates need to pass through the full probate process. There are alternatives:

• Affidavit for Collection of Personal Property. This option is available if the deceased had no real estate and only $100,000 or less in personal property.
• Small Estates. This option is available for those estates that have real estate but are still worth $100,000 or less.
• Informal Probate. This is a fast probate when all beneficiaries are cooperative.

With one of the above, you can open and close the probate much faster than with formal or supervised probate.

Contact Our Hawaii Probate Lawyer

We can answer any questions you have in a consultation. Contact us today.