Category: Estate Planning & Probate

Digital assets estate plan Arizona families build often leaves out an entire category of property. Email accounts, cloud photo libraries, cryptocurrency wallets, social media profiles, and online banking logins all count. Without clear legal authority, a fiduciary can get locked out of these accounts. The same terms-of-service agreements meant to protect the original owner’s privacy…

ALTCS Medicaid planning Arizona families face often starts with a single, urgent worry: a parent needs nursing home care now, and the cost threatens to consume everything the family has. Arizona’s long-term care Medicaid program, ALTCS, can cover that cost. But it only pays out after passing a strict asset test. The timing of any…

In a beneficiary designation vs will Arizona dispute, the beneficiary designation almost always wins. That’s true even when the will was signed more recently and says something completely different. A life insurance policy, a 401(k), an IRA, or a payable-on-death bank account transfers directly to whoever is named on the account’s own beneficiary form. The…

A small estate affidavit Arizona law allows can let a family skip probate entirely. But the dollar thresholds that qualify an estate changed recently. A lot of the advice circulating online still cites the old numbers. Under A.R.S. § 14-3971, as increased effective September 26, 2025, an estate can use the affidavit process if personal…

A revocable living trust Arizona residents set up doesn’t protect assets from creditors. It doesn’t reduce estate taxes for most families. It doesn’t eliminate the need for a will either. Those are three of the most common myths surrounding trusts, and all three misunderstand what the tool is actually designed to do. A revocable trust’s…

Disagreeing with what a will says isn’t grounds for a will contest Arizona courts will consider. A contestant has to prove one of a specific, limited set of legal defects. The will simply distributing property in a way someone finds unfair changes nothing. Under A.R.S. § 14-3407, the person challenging a will carries the burden…

Guardianship and conservatorship in Arizona sound interchangeable, but a court treats them as two separate appointments. They answer two separate questions. Guardianship addresses a person’s body and daily care. Conservatorship addresses their money and property. A family can need one without the other. Understanding which one actually fits the situation matters before anyone files a…

A power of attorney Arizona resident signs for their finances does not let that same agent make a single medical decision. Arizona treats financial authority and health care authority as two completely separate legal instruments. Two different statutes govern them, and signing one does nothing for the other. Whichever document you sign, the harder call…

Intestate succession Arizona law surprises a lot of surviving spouses, because most people assume a spouse automatically inherits everything. That’s only true in some cases. Under A.R.S. § 14-2102, whether a spouse gets the whole estate or only a slice of it depends on one specific fact: whether the deceased person had children from a…

The Arizona probate process doesn’t start automatically the moment someone dies. It starts when someone files an application with the court. For a stage-by-stage view that applies in any state, see how probate works and how long it usually takes. Until that happens, no one has legal authority to touch the deceased person’s bank accounts,…