Short answer: Estate planning matters because, without one, California law decides what happens to your assets and your children, not you. If you die without a will, the intestate succession statutes control who inherits under Probate Code § 6400. If your estate is worth more than $208,850 in probate assets, it goes through court-supervised probate regardless of whether you left a will. A funded revocable living trust is the main tool that keeps your family out of that public process and lets you decide, in writing, who gets what and who raises your kids.
Does having a will keep my family out of probate?
No. A will has to be validated by the probate court before it does anything; it does not avoid probate on its own. Only a funded revocable living trust, meaning a trust where you have actually retitled your home, accounts, and other assets into the trust’s name, passes property to your beneficiaries outside of probate.
Probate is required in California for an estate with more than $208,850 in gross probate assets, for deaths on or after April 1, 2025 (Probate Code § 13100). Once an estate is in probate, both the executor and the estate’s attorney are entitled to a statutory fee calculated on the same schedule under Probate Code §§ 10800 and 10810. On a $1,000,000 estate, that schedule produces $23,000 for the executor and another $23,000 for the attorney, or $46,000 in ordinary fees before court costs or bond. That fee runs on the gross value of the estate, so a mortgage does not reduce it.
What happens if I die without a will in California?
The intestate succession statutes decide who inherits, not your wishes (Probate Code § 6400). For community and quasi-community property, a surviving spouse takes all of it, their own half plus the decedent’s half (Probate Code § 6401(a)-(b)). For separate property, the surviving spouse’s share depends on who else survives: everything if there are no surviving children, parents, or siblings; half if there is one child or no children but a surviving parent or sibling; one-third if there are two or more children (Probate Code § 6401(c)).
Stepchildren who were never legally adopted and unmarried partners generally inherit nothing under intestate succession. And dying without a will does not avoid probate. An intestate estate above the $208,850 threshold still goes through the same court-supervised process and the same statutory fee schedule as an estate with a will.
Will a trust or will lower my taxes?
California has no state estate tax and no state inheritance tax (Revenue and Taxation Code § 13301). On the federal side, the 2026 estate and gift tax exemption is $15,000,000 per person, or $30,000,000 for a married couple, made permanent by the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (IRC § 2010(c); P.L. 119-21, § 70106). For nearly every California family, that exemption is well above what they will ever leave behind, so estate tax is not the reason to plan.
A revocable living trust, by itself, does not reduce income tax, property tax, or estate tax. Its value is in avoiding probate, keeping your finances private, and controlling how and when your beneficiaries receive assets, not in cutting a tax bill that most estates will never owe.
Who decides who raises my kids, or what happens to a charitable gift, if I don’t have a plan?
If you have minor children, a will lets you name the guardian you want to raise them. Without one, a court makes that decision using its own judgment about the child’s best interest, and the person the court picks may not be who you would have chosen. Naming a guardian in writing is one of the few estate planning decisions that has nothing to do with money and everything to do with who your children live with.
The same principle applies to charitable giving. If leaving something to a cause you care about matters to you, a will or trust is where you say so specifically. Without a plan, your estate passes under the intestate succession rules above, and no portion of it goes anywhere you did not name.
Figures verified July 2026.
Do I need to update my plan after a marriage, divorce, or new baby?
Yes. A will or trust you signed ten years ago reflects the family and the assets you had then, not the ones you have now. A new child means a guardian designation that may not exist yet. A divorce means beneficiary designations and trustee choices that may still name an ex-spouse. A move to a new state, a new house, or a business you started since your last signing date can all leave gaps between what your documents say and what you actually own or intend.
None of this fixes itself. An outdated plan does not default back to the current intestate succession rules just because it is old; it stays in effect as written until you revoke or amend it. Reviewing your plan after any major life change is the only way to keep it doing what you meant it to do.
What to do next
If you do not have a will or a funded trust, or you have not looked at your plan since a marriage, divorce, birth, or move, that is the gap to close first. Talk to an estate planning attorney about whether a will or a living trust fits your situation, and make sure any trust you sign actually gets funded. You can review the basics on our estate planning page before your first conversation.
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