You work with an experienced California estate planning attorney from your first meeting to your last, by Zoom from your living room. Most plans finished in about two weeks. Flat fee, no hourly billing.
San Diego County home values have climbed for a decade. Home prices across the county regularly clear $1,000,000, and in La Jolla, Del Mar, Encinitas, Coronado, and the coastal communities, they run way past that. For a family that owns a home here, a living trust is not optional. It is the difference between your family inheriting what you built and watching a large piece of it disappear into the California probate court.
California probate applies to any asset held in your individual name without a beneficiary designation. For a San Diego homeowner, that means the house, and more. California probate takes twelve to eighteen months on a typical estate. The fees are set by California statute on the gross value of the estate, not the equity. On a San Diego home worth $1,000,000, the combined statutory attorney and executor fees pass $46,000, before court costs, appraisals, and accounting. And that's just the house. Your other assets will increase the probate fees.
A revocable living trust avoids California probate entirely. The successor trustee you name manages and distributes your assets with no court involvement, on your timeline, in private. If you own a home anywhere from Carlsbad to Chula Vista, a will alone is not enough.
Estate planning is the only thing we do. Not family law. Not real estate closings. Not criminal defense on the side. Estate planning and trust administration have been the entire practice since 1996. That focus is why we are fast and why we catch the things a general practitioner misses.
You work with an attorney, start to finish. Not a paralegal. Not a staff member. Gabi Aboujaoude handles estate planning for our San Diego clients and is the attorney your family works with, from the first meeting through the signing, and the one you call five years from now when something changes.
Done in about two weeks. Two meetings, roughly two weeks from start to finish. Most California firms take six weeks or more. We are faster because estate planning is all we do.
$3,000 single, $4,000 married for most clients. The flat fee covers the complete plan. No hourly billing, no clock running while you ask a question, no surprise invoices. Once you are a client, follow-up questions are free.
We work with San Diego families and clients across Southern California, from the coast to the inland valleys, and with clients in every region of the state by Zoom. We bring nearly thirty years of California estate planning experience to every plan.
Clark Allison has done this since 1996. We have seen what happens when families do not plan, and we have spent decades making sure our clients have a plan that holds up when their family needs it.
Most San Diego families finish their plan in two Zoom attorney meetings. We design the plan in the first meeting, then review it in the second. Then we schedule a remote online notary session. The whole process happens from your kitchen table. The same attorney handles all of it.
You tell us what you have and what you want. We answer your questions, tell you what your family actually needs, and tell you how long it will take and what it will cost. If we are a fit, we schedule your design meeting.
Design meeting: About an hour, by Zoom. We discuss your family, your assets, and build the blueprint for your estate plan.
About one to two weeks later, we review your documents to make sure everything is right and that you understand how your plan works. We schedule a short session with our remote online notary, and you sign from home on video. You'll receive the hard copies in an Estate Planning Portfolio, and we'll send you digital scans.
We work with San Diego clients the way most families now prefer: entirely by Zoom, from the first call to the signing, without leaving home. No driving, no parking. It works just as well as sitting across a table, and it fits around your schedule instead of the other way around.
The whole process, the intro call, the design meeting, the document review, and the signing with a remote online notary, happens from your living room. Same experienced attorney from start to finish. Same documents. Same flat fee.
For most California families, that is the full price. Living trust, pour-over will, durable power of attorney, advance health care directive and HIPAA, the trust transfer deed for your home, and asset protection trust provisions for your children's inheritance. No hourly billing. No clock running while you ask a question. No surprise invoices. Once you are a client, follow-up questions are free. More involved plans run higher, and we quote the flat fee before any work begins, so you know the amount going in.
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When you work with our San Diego office, Gabi Aboujaoude handles your plan. She is the attorney you meet on the first call, the one who designs it, writes it, reviews it with you, and takes your call years from now when something changes. No handoff to a paralegal or case manager.
Almost certainly yes. San Diego County home values regularly clear $1,000,000, and coastal property runs higher. A will alone sends your estate through California probate, which runs twelve to eighteen months and costs roughly $46,000 in statutory fees on a $1,000,000 home, calculated on the gross value, not your equity. A revocable living trust keeps your home and your accounts out of probate entirely. A will alone is fine for a young adult with no real estate. Most San Diego families who own a home need both: a living trust to hold the major assets and a pour-over will as the backup.
Some firms bill by the hour. Some charge fixed fees. We charge flat fees and tell you upfront what it will cost. For most families, $3,000 for a single person or $4,000 for a married couple. The flat fee covers the complete plan, including the trust transfer deed for your home. More involved plans run higher, and we quote the flat fee during your free intro call before any work begins.
About two weeks for most plans, from the design meeting to the signing. More involved plans take longer. Most California firms take six weeks or more. We are faster because estate planning is the only thing we do.
While we have an office in San Diego, we work with San Diego clients entirely by Zoom, from the first call through the signing with a remote online notary. There is no driving, no parking. Same attorney, same documents, same flat fee as an in-person plan. Virtual is how all of our San Diego clients work with us, and it is how most California families now prefer to handle their estate planning.
Gabi Aboujaoude handles estate planning for our San Diego clients. You will work with her through the whole process: from meetings to design, building, and review, and she will call you years later when something changes. No handoff to a paralegal or case manager.
All of San Diego County, including San Diego, La Jolla, Del Mar, Encinitas, Carlsbad, Oceanside, Escondido, Poway, Chula Vista, El Cajon, La Mesa, and Coronado, plus Orange County and the Inland Empire. And we serve clients throughout California by Zoom.
Yes. Estate plan updates are common as families change, tax laws change, and and older plans become outdated. We review your existing documents, walk through what should change, and quote a flat fee for the update before any work begins.
That is trust administration, not estate planning. It is the work a successor trustee handles after a death: notifying beneficiaries, valuing and managing assets, and distributing what your family member left to the people they named. We handle California trust administration throughout the state.
Sometime before you die. After that, it's too late.
You now know what a California living trust does, how the process works, what it costs, and who you'll work with. The free intro call is fifteen minutes. We'll confirm what your family needs, what it will cost, and how long it will take. From there it's your call.