A: Unfortunately not; California does not recognize common-law marriages between long-term, cohabitating partners. The only way for your partner to protect you in the event of his untimely death is for him to put together a well-designed estate plan. If you have any...
A: There are three main options for California property owners that have low property tax bases who want to leave the properties to their children. 1: Do nothing. This allows your children to inherit the property and receive a stepped-up basis as of the date of death...
A: The law giveth, and the law taketh. Fortunately, if the original deed triggered a reassessment, we can use a “Rescission Deed” to return ownership to the previous owners (as if the previous deed had NEVER existed!). However, there are two CRITICAL...
A: One common example of a transfer that causes reassessment is when one sibling buys out another after inheriting a piece of property from their parents. Although the initial transfer from the parents to the children does not result in reassessment...
A: Under Prop 13, property taxes can only be increased a MAXIMUM of 2% annually (until the property is transferred). In practice, this law is so critical because property values in California have historically increased by far more than 2% per year,...
