Guns upon one's passing

[spqrzilla]

If you are a resident of Colorado, own no real estate in your individual name and your total estate (outside of pay-on-death bank accounts, IRA accounts with beneficiaries, insurance policies) is less than about $67,000 then a probate is not required in Colorado. Regardless of whether you have a will or not. Actually had an estate planning consultation recently where the person I was talking to was not going to need a probate opened until we got to listing their firearm collection which .... well, put their estate's value well north of that threshold when compared to rough estimates of value. That was a bit of a surprise to both of us.

There are times when a probate is a good idea even when the above is true. I have opened probates in some such cases, usually because a particular creditor needed to be dealt with on shorter time frame.

I am not a big fan of pushing everyone into a revocable trust, even though I make a lot more money off of drafting them than simple wills, unless there is a specific need. Probate in Colorado is not as onerous nor as expensive as such places as California.

I am also not a huge fan of beneficiary deeds for trying to avoid probate for real estate. Had too many issues with those not being done correctly and the result becoming a mess more expensive to resolve than the probate would have been.

As for distributing firearms from an estate, that can get complicated thanks to the conflicting requirements of state and federal law. Sometimes the answer changes firearm by firearm in an estate.