Top Estate Planning Attorneys in Ventura, CA (2026)

Ventura has about 112,000 residents and a median home value near $880,000, higher than either Oxnard or Port Hueneme, with household incomes to match. Roughly 55-60% of residents are White and 30-35% are Hispanic. A lot of that home value sits in Downtown, Midtown, and the neighborhoods along the Avenue, where houses were bought decades before the current market took off and have been held by the same family ever since.

That combination, an older housing stock and long ownership tenure, means two things collide in a lot of Ventura estates: a property-tax basis from the 1970s, 80s, or 90s sitting on a home now worth well over triple its purchase price, and an estate plan (if one exists) that was drafted before Proposition 19 changed what happens when that home passes to the kids.

There’s also a piece of local irony worth knowing before you need it. Ventura has its own county courthouse, right downtown at 800 S. Victoria Avenue. It does not handle probate. Every probate matter in Ventura County, including one arising from a house three blocks from that courthouse, is filed and heard in Oxnard. An attorney who doesn’t know that isn’t paying attention to the basics.

Below are estate planning attorneys who serve Ventura, with verifiable credentials. This is not a ranking. It is a starting point for doing your own homework.

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How to vet an estate planning attorney

The California State Bar certifies attorneys as Legal Specialists in Estate Planning, Trust and Probate Law. Fewer than 1% of California attorneys hold this credential. It requires a written exam, substantial documented experience, and peer review. You can verify any attorney’s specialist status at calbar.ca.gov.

Beyond certification, look for:

• A practice focused on estate planning, not a general practice that also handles trusts on the side.
• Direct access to the attorney, not a paralegal-driven process that hands you a binder to sign.
• Flat, disclosed fees, quoted before you engage.
• Knowledge of where Ventura probate is actually heard. It is not the Ventura County Superior Court’s main courthouse at 800 S. Victoria Avenue. It is the Juvenile and Probate Division at 4353 E. Vineyard Avenue in Oxnard. Any attorney who tells you otherwise, or who seems surprised by the question, doesn’t handle enough of these to be your first call.

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Estate planning attorneys serving Ventura

Ridley Law

Eric D. Ridley has practiced estate planning in Ventura County since 2010, working with families across Ventura, Port Hueneme, and the surrounding area. The firm handles living trusts, wills, powers of attorney, advance healthcare directives, trust administration, and probate. Flat-fee pricing, disclosed before engagement. Free 30-minute initial consultation by phone or video.

567 W. Channel Islands Boulevard, Suite 210, Port Hueneme, CA 93041. (805) 244-5291.

Ferguson Case Orr Paterson LLP

John Mark Andersen (State Bar #162930) was admitted to the California Bar in 1993 and has been a Certified Specialist in Estate Planning, Trust and Probate Law since 2008. He holds a JD from UC Hastings. The firm is based in Ventura and is one of the few genuinely local firms with an established trust, estate, and probate group.

1050 S. Kimball Road, Ventura, CA 93004. (805) 654-0100.

Edsall Law, A Professional Law Corporation

Katherine Edsall Wells (State Bar #252789) is a Certified Specialist in Estate Planning, Trust and Probate Law, with a JD from Stanford Law. She joined her family’s firm after practicing complex litigation at O’Melveny & Myers. The firm handles estate planning, probate, trust administration, and related matters, and regularly serves Ventura clients from its Camarillo office.

400 Camarillo Ranch Road, Suite 102, Camarillo, CA 93012. (805) 633-5140.

Law Offices of Gregory M. Hultgren

Gregory Hultgren (State Bar #100910) was admitted to the California Bar in 1981 and is a Certified Specialist in Estate Planning, Trust and Probate Law, with over four decades of practice. The firm handles trusts, wills, probate, and trust administration for clients throughout Ventura County.

2820 Camino Dos Rios, Suite 301, Newbury Park, CA 91320. (805) 375-7300.

Law Office of Robert M. Baskin

Robert Baskin (State Bar #65149) was admitted to the California Bar in 1975 and maintains a Ventura office. His is a general practice rather than one limited to estate planning, handling trusts and probate alongside other civil matters.

1849 Knoll Drive, Ventura, CA 93003. (805) 658-1000.

Botti & Morison

Christopher Botti (State Bar #150071) was admitted to the California Bar in 1990 and is a Certified Specialist in Estate Planning, Trust and Probate Law. The firm is based in Westlake Village with a Ventura office and handles estate planning, trust administration, and probate matters, including trust and probate litigation when disputes arise.

2625 Townsgate Road, Suite 330, Westlake Village, CA 91361. Verify current phone number at calbar.ca.gov or the firm’s own listing before contacting.

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What Ventura families actually deal with

Downtown, Midtown, and the Avenue: old basis, high value

A large share of Ventura’s housing stock near downtown, in Midtown, and along the Avenue corridor was purchased decades ago at a small fraction of today’s prices. A home bought in the 1970s or 1980s for $60,000 to $120,000 now regularly sells for $800,000 to $1 million or more. Families who have held these properties across a generation or two are sitting on substantial unrealized value, and often on an estate plan, if one exists at all, that predates Proposition 19 and doesn’t reflect what actually happens to that low tax basis when the kids inherit.

Prop 19 and what the children actually pay

Before Proposition 19 took effect in February 2021, a child who inherited a parent’s home kept the parent’s original property-tax basis, no matter the home’s current value. That is no longer automatic. Under Prop 19, a child who inherits a parent’s primary residence and moves in within one year gets a partial exclusion: the first $1,044,586 of reassessed value above the prior taxable value is excluded, and anything above that is reassessed to market value. A child who doesn’t move in gets no exclusion at all, and the home is reassessed in full.

On a Ventura home assessed at $120,000 with a current market value of $880,000, a full reassessment can move the annual property tax bill from roughly $1,500 to close to $9,000. If the plan assumes the kids will simply keep the family home, the plan needs to account for whether they can carry that tax bill.

The Thomas Fire’s long tail

The Thomas Fire burned through the Ventura hillsides and parts of the eastern city in December 2017, destroying homes and displacing families. Many of those homes have since been rebuilt, often larger or more valuable than the originals, financed through a mix of insurance proceeds and out-of-pocket cost. A rebuild changes the numbers an old estate plan was built around, and it’s common for a new or rebuilt structure to never get retitled into the family trust after construction closes out. If your home was rebuilt after 2017 and you’re not certain the new deed and the trust match, that’s worth confirming before it becomes a probate problem instead of a paperwork fix.

The probate math on a Ventura home

Probate fees in California are set by statute (Probate Code §§ 10810 and 10800), calculated on the gross value of the estate, not the equity net of any mortgage. On a Ventura home at the city’s median value of $880,000, the statutory fee works out to $20,600 for the attorney and $20,600 for the executor, or $41,200 in statutory fees alone, before court costs, appraisal fees, or any petition for extraordinary compensation.

A funded living trust avoids this entirely, at a fraction of that cost, and keeps the estate out of a public court file. The alternative is that your family pays $41,200 or more, and drives to Oxnard to do it.

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Credentials listed are drawn from the firms’ own public information, the State Bar of California, and public court records. This page is not a ranking and is not an endorsement. Ridley Law is listed first because we publish this page, not because of any ranking; we are included because we serve Ventura. We wrote this page, and we think you should know that. Verify any attorney’s license status and specialist certification at calbar.ca.gov.