Selling a House in Probate in Los Angeles

Inheriting a house in Los Angeles is rarely the windfall people imagine. Between statutory fees calculated on the gross value, a property tax reassessment most heirs do not see coming, and a year or more of carrying an empty house, the gap between what the property is worth and what you actually keep can be large. This page is about the money and the mechanics of selling it. Cash Home Buyers CA buys inherited and probate property throughout Los Angeles, as-is and cleaned out.

First, Check Whether You Need Probate at All

A surprising number of Los Angeles estates never need a full probate, and finding that out early can save a year and tens of thousands of dollars.

• The house was in a living trust, held in joint tenancy, or held as community property with right of survivorship. None of these go through probate. A joint tenancy is cleared by recording an affidavit of death with a certified copy of the death record under Probate Code 210.
• Small estate affidavit, Probate Code 13100. For deaths on or after April 1, 2025, the gross value threshold is $208,850, and you must wait 40 days after death. Important limit: this affidavit moves personal property, not real estate.
• Petition to determine succession to real property, Probate Code 13151. This is the one that matters for a house. AB 2016 created a separate, much higher threshold for the decedent’s primary residence: $750,000 for deaths between April 1, 2025 and March 31, 2028, again after 40 days. Given LA County’s roughly $880,000 median single-family price in January 2026, plenty of houses fall under it, especially older ones outside the Westside.
• Affidavit for real property of small value, Probate Code 13200. $69,625, and it cannot be filed until six months after death.
• The house was supposed to be in the trust but the deed was never changed. A petition under Probate Code 850, usually called a Heggstad petition after Estate of Heggstad (1993) 16 Cal.App.4th 943, can confirm the property as a trust asset without a full probate. It works when a signed trust instrument or schedule actually identifies the property. Where no writing names it, the outcome is different, so this is not a universal fix.

One trap worth knowing: the codified text of Probate Code 13100 and 13200 still recites older, lower figures, because the amounts are adjusted by the Judicial Council under Probate Code 890 and published on Form DE-300 rather than written into the statute. If you look up the raw code section you will see a different number than the one that applies.

What Probate Actually Costs the Estate

This is the number almost nobody is told up front. Probate Code 10800 and 10810 set identical statutory compensation for the personal representative and for the attorney: 4% of the first $100,000, 3% of the next $100,000, 2% of the next $800,000, 1% of the next $9,000,000, and 0.5% of the next $15,000,000.

The critical detail is the base. Both sections compute the fee on the appraised inventory value plus gains on sales, expressly without reference to encumbrances or other obligations on estate property. The mortgage is ignored.

Take a Los Angeles house appraised at $900,000 with a $400,000 mortgage, and assume it is the only asset. The fee base is $900,000, not the $500,000 of equity. That produces $4,000 plus $3,000 plus $14,000, or $21,000 for the personal representative and another $21,000 for the attorney. Forty-two thousand dollars against $500,000 of real equity is 8.4% of what the family actually inherits, and that is before the probate referee’s commission, the filing fee, publication, bond, and any extraordinary fees the court allows on top. If the house sells above the appraised value, the gain is added to the fee base and both fees go up.

What the House Costs You While You Wait

The Judicial Council’s own self-help guidance says a formal probate typically takes 9 to 18 months and can take longer. The statutory milestones explain why: the inventory and appraisal is due within four months of letters being issued under Probate Code 8800, creditors have until the later of four months after letters or 60 days after notice to them under Probate Code 9100, and Probate Code 12200 requires a petition for final distribution or a status report within a year, or 18 months where a federal estate tax return is required.

During all of that the estate carries the house. Mortgage or reverse mortgage payments, property taxes, HOA dues, and utilities keep running, and a vacant house in Los Angeles is its own problem. Standard homeowner policies restrict coverage once a property is unoccupied, so the estate typically has to buy vacant-home coverage at a higher premium. An empty house also attracts squatters, copper theft, and code enforcement, none of which improve the eventual sale price. Twelve months of carrying costs on an $880,000 house frequently exceeds what a faster sale gives up on price.

The Proposition 19 Reassessment Most Heirs Do Not Expect

This is the single biggest financial surprise for Los Angeles heirs, and it is the reason a lot of inherited houses get sold rather than kept.

Before February 16, 2021, a child could inherit a parent’s home and keep its Proposition 13 base year value with no value cap and no requirement to live there. Proposition 19 ended that. The parent-child exclusion now applies only where the home was the parent’s principal residence and becomes the child’s principal residence, and the Board of Equalization is explicit that at least one eligible transferee must continually live there, so once it stops being your principal residence it is reassessed as of the following lien date.

For an heir who plans to sell, that means there is effectively no Proposition 13 carryover at all. The property gets a new taxable value at market. Even for an heir who does move in, the exclusion is capped: the excluded amount is the factored base year value plus $1,044,586 for transfers occurring between February 16, 2025 and February 15, 2027, with anything above that added to the new taxable value. A house a parent bought in 1978 and held at a low assessed value can go from a few thousand dollars a year in property tax to well over ten thousand overnight.

Deadlines, if you are claiming the exclusion: the homeowners’ exemption must be filed within one year of the date of death or transfer, and Form BOE-19-P must be filed within three years of death or before the property is transferred to a third party, whichever comes first.

You Have to Tell the Assessor Someone Died

Separately from anything the court requires, Revenue and Taxation Code 480(b) requires a Change in Ownership Statement, Death of Real Property Owner, on Form BOE-502-D, filed with the county recorder or assessor in every county where the decedent owned real property. In a probated estate the personal representative files it before or at the same time as the inventory and appraisal. Where the property passed outside probate, through a trust or otherwise, the trustee or transferee files it within 150 days of death.

If it is not filed within 90 days of a written request from the assessor, the penalty is the greater of $100 or 10% of the taxes on the new base year value, capped at $5,000 if the property qualifies for the homeowners’ exemption and $20,000 if it does not, where the failure was not willful.

The Good News: Capital Gains Are Usually Small

Under IRC Section 1014 the basis of inherited property is stepped up to its fair market value at the date of death, or at the alternate valuation date if the estate elects it. Sell reasonably soon after death and the gain, and therefore the tax, is often close to nothing, because your basis is roughly the sale price.

California is a community property state, which makes this better for a surviving spouse. Under IRC 1014(b)(6), when one spouse dies the entire community property interest, including the survivor’s own half, generally takes a new basis. That is the double step-up, and it is a meaningful advantage over separate property states. California conforms, because Revenue and Taxation Code 18031 adopts Subchapter O of the Internal Revenue Code, where Section 1014 sits. Talk to a CPA about your own numbers before relying on this.

You Do Not Have to Repair, Clean, or Disclose

Civil Code 1102.2(d) exempts sales or transfers by a fiduciary in the course of administering a decedent’s estate from the Transfer Disclosure Statement requirement. A personal representative who never lived in the house is not expected to describe a property they do not know. (The exemption has a carve-out for a natural-person trustee of a revocable trust who formerly owned or recently occupied the property.)

Practically, that removes the biggest obstacle to selling an inherited Los Angeles house. Most of them come with forty years of belongings, a roof at the end of its life, galvanized plumbing, knob-and-tube wiring, and at least one unpermitted addition somebody’s uncle built in 1974. We buy as-is, we do not ask for repair credits, and we handle the cleanout. Take the photographs and the things that matter to the family; everything else can stay where it is.

If Someone Is Living in the House

Two versions of this come up constantly in LA. If an heir has been living in the house, that is a family and a court question, not a real estate one, and it needs to be settled before a sale closes. If there is a paying tenant, the tenancy survives the sale and transfers to the buyer, and depending on the parcel the unit may be covered by the City of Los Angeles Rent Stabilization Ordinance or by state just cause under Civil Code 1946.2. We buy occupied, so a tenant is not a reason a probate sale cannot close. Our page on selling with tenants in Los Angeles covers the notice and deposit mechanics.

Full Authority, Limited Authority, and the Court Calendar

Whether you can sell quickly depends mostly on one thing: whether the personal representative holds full or limited authority under the Independent Administration of Estates Act. With full authority, Probate Code 10511 allows a sale of real property without court confirmation, after a Notice of Proposed Action served at least 15 days ahead under Probate Code 10586. With limited authority the sale goes to a confirmation hearing with overbidding, and the timeline is set by the court’s calendar rather than yours. We have written the court mechanics up separately in Probate Court in Los Angeles County, including the local rules, the required LASC forms, and the overbid formula.

How We Work Around a Probate Timeline

• We will make an offer before letters are issued, so the paperwork and the sale move in parallel rather than in sequence.
• No financing contingency, which matters because an offer that can die at underwriting after a hearing has already happened is worth very little to an estate.
• We can hold escrow open across a continued hearing without a rate lock expiring.
• If the sale needs confirmation, a clean written offer sets a solid floor for the bidding.
• Title companies want certified Letters before they will insure. We know what your title officer will ask for and when.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can I sell before probate is finished?
Yes. Most probate sales close during administration, not after distribution. What varies is whether the court has to confirm it.

Do all the heirs have to agree?
The personal representative sells, not the heirs collectively, but heirs and devisees whose interests are affected get notice and can object. An objection under Probate Code 10589 pushes the sale into court supervision rather than killing it.

What if the house has a reverse mortgage?
Common in Los Angeles and manageable. The balance is paid through escrow like any other lien, but these have their own deadlines after the borrower’s death, so move early.

What if it is full of belongings?
Leave them. Cleanout is on us, and it is one of the most common reasons families call rather than list.

Will I owe capital gains tax?
Usually very little, because of the stepped-up basis under IRC 1014. Confirm with a CPA.

Should I just keep it and rent it out?
Run the Proposition 19 numbers first. A reassessed property tax bill changes the math on a rental far more than most people expect.

This page is general information about California probate, tax and disclosure rules, not legal or tax advice. Thresholds and adjusted amounts change, and two Los Angeles probate rules changed in 2026 alone. Confirm anything time-sensitive with a California probate attorney and a CPA.

Get a free, no-obligation cash offer from Cash Home Buyers CA today.