Who Inherits My Assets If I Don't Have an Estate Plan?

It’s always a good idea to have an estate plan — after all, it’s your way of making sure that your wishes are respected when you’re no longer around or able to share them.

If you don’t have an estate plan, then your assets will be subject to a process called “intestate succession,” in which your assets will be distributed to what the state considers your legal heirs — and they might not be who you think!

Here’s how intestate succession works in California:

If you’re not married and don’t have children:

They’ll start with your parents. If your parents are still alive, then they’ll get all your assets. If your parents are no longer alive, then your assets will go to any siblings you have, and if you don’t have siblings, then they’ll start working their way down the list, looking for someone alive who can claim the assets, starting with grandparents, then aunts and uncles, then cousins.

If you’re not married and do have children:

Then your assets are equally divided among your children. This includes both biological and adopted children and, in a weird little twist, it also includes any children who were conceived before your death but born after it.

If you’re married, then your property is divided into two categories: community property and separate property.

Community property is any assets you acquired from your labor during your marriage together. When one spouse dies, their half of the community property goes to the other spouse.

Separate property is any assets you owned before your marriage, and any assets you receive as a gift or inheritance during your marriage. When one spouse dies, half of their separate property goes to the other spouse, and the other half goes to their children, parents, then siblings, then grandparents, then aunts and uncles, then cousins.

Why this all matters in the context of a trust:

If you name your “heirs” as contingent beneficiaries under your trust, then your trustee will follow the intestate succession rules noted above if all of your core beneficiaries are deceased. Your trustee will be legally responsible for finding your heirs and there are companies that specialize in searching for heirs. If they work all the way down through all those levels and find that there are no children, parents, siblings, grandparents, aunts and uncles, or cousins living, then your property will go to the state, but this is very rare. The way the laws are set up, if anyone is remotely related to you, they’ll get your assets before the state does.

All that being said, it may be easier to name charities as your contingent beneficiaries instead of “heirs” to make your future trustee’s job simpler.