What is a Probate in Florida?

David: [00:00:00] All right, Jill. How are you doing?

Jill: Fabulous today, David, and yourself?

David: Excellent. So one of the questions we often get is what is probate? What does it mean? Do you want to try that?

Jill: Probate is the process of moving assets, cash, and anything that the deceased person owned to the people who will normally, I would say the people who should be getting it, but sometimes the people who shouldn’t be getting it wind up with it.

David: well, not everything is a subject

Jill: to probate, right? No, not. A lot of things aren’t subject to probate. And one thing that is the most important is the homestead, which we’re not going to discuss in this video because we can make about a seven-hour video.

David: Well, what about, let’s say a married couple who owns all their property jointly?

Jill: Well, luckily there’s something called joint tenancy with rights of entirety. [00:01:00] And so in that case, everything goes to the other person. And most joint accounts, when someone passes away, that automatically goes to the other person, regardless of who put the money in. Um, and there’s also something called a POD account, which is paid on death, which is if you put that on your account, the money automatically goes to the person who was named.

David: And they’re also revocable trusts if you properly fund them. This is correct. So

Jill: annuities, contracts, life insurance, anything that is contractual or has already been taken care of previously, generally is not subject to purpose.

David: So anything that’s owned by the decedent in their own name is subject, but anything else that doesn’t, that’s either owned jointly or as a beneficiary or is in a trust isn’t.

Jill: That’s absolutely correct, David.

David: Excellent.