0:00 [music] Who are you? And where are you going? What do you want? [music] Hello and welcome to Trust and Estates Weekly. This is our first episode of season 4 for 2026. It's nice to be back. I hope you enjoyed the holidays and are looking forward to a great year. Uh I I
0:35 am [laughter] I won't get into why you don't want to know. Uh no no just that uh you know all joking aside um you know am approaching 2026 with um um enthusiasm and uh um um I don't know whatever the other words are. And uh so for this season, fourth season of Trust and Estates Weekly, I'm really going to be working hard to do a lot more guests. And so, uh, you'll see
1:10 some, uh, some guests back who have been on the show previously and some new guests. So, you'll be getting some new perspectives. We'll be going in into greater depth uh, with uh, some of the the people who have been on before. And as always, um if you have a topic that you'd like to to see or hear covered on the show, um please uh feel free to post it in our social media. All the links will be in the show notes after the show posts or you can send me an email. My
1:45 email address is is in the will be in the show notes as well. Happy [snorts] to uh consider that and and arrange it if possible. So, the point of the show, I've had several people ask me this uh over the last few weeks as I've been lining up guests, and the the point of the show is to be educational to serve as a resource for professionals like myself who work who who uh administrate trusts and probates or handle estate planning or get involved in it at least. Um but also a resource for people who
2:20 are not professionals but may they may find themselves executive of of a of a will or something like that and they are uh you know are looking for some direction. So um by all means let me know if it's if it's something that's timely uh you know feel free to let me know that as well. I'll be happy to if I can accommodate your your time schedule. So, uh, I'm going to start out today with, uh, or or start out the year, today's show talking about five of the lesserk known responsibilities
2:56 of a personal representative. So, I think most people view probate as a process of dealing with money, and that certainly is a large part of it. There's no question that that is the case. Uh however, there are other um parts of probate uh that that um need to be dealt with and uh and and these other matters are not really financial. Um they they they're more
3:31 sort of administrative. And I realized somehow my my links got um uh got erase. I'm going to bring them back up here real real quickly. Uh, hang on one second. And oops. Yep. There we go. Okay. Sorry about that. You know,
4:06 technology is great when it works. So, I'm going to be, like I said, I'm going to be talking about these uh five topics and so you can get an idea of what some of the other issues are that should be taken care of. If you're a professional and you're working with someone like me, a professional fiduciary, the fiduciary should be handling these matters. Uh I don't know if others do. I I I know that I do. Um if if I possibly can. And uh so let's let's jump right into this. Okay. So, the the five things that I'm going to talk about are cancelling the
4:41 deceased the deedent's driver's license, cancelling the deedants's passport, cancelling the deedants's voter registration and his credit cards, and finally dealing with social media accounts. Now, I'm not saying I you notice I didn't say cancel social media accounts because that may not be the proper thing to do for any given situation. So, let's look at these uh one at a time. And
5:16 here we go. Wait a minute. Here it is. Okay. All right. So, the first one is cancelling a driver's license. Now, I'm here in the state of California, and in California, we have the Department of Noter Vehicles, the DMV. That's probably a fairly similar department in every state. And the DMV has a form. You can you should be able to see it here in front of you. Let me uh let me enlarge that. Let's see if it'll enlarge. Nope. Okay, that's that's as enlarged as it's going
5:51 to get. [laughter] Okay. Um so, uh you can see it's pretty simple. Um this is a request for cancellation or surrender of a driver's license or identification. So, you fill out the name of the person shown on the license, their address, the license number, birth date, [snorts] and and over here um you put other. You you just check other or you can you can attach it um and and you can put um that the person is deceased and then attach a
6:28 copy of the death certificate uh to this application. And then you'll uh you'll need to you know as as the uh as the administrator of the estate you would print your name administrator for the estate of the deedent sign it date it put your address. Okay. Now I always include a copy of my um letters of administration. That way the DMV knows I have the authority to do this. Anybody
7:03 could claim that, you know, they're administrating somebody's estate. Um, but um, you know, it it's I'm not sure, frankly, that the DMV really cares as long as they see a death certificate. I'm not sure they care who submits it, but in this case, I just do it to make sure that all the documentation is there. Um, it's really tough dealing with uh the Department of Motor Vehicles. Now, why do this? Well, uh, it's one of the areas of identity theft that is most prevalent is stealing
7:40 the identity of a deceased person. Okay. So we have an uh as administrators I think we have an obligation to uh protect the estate uh from uh you know from uh um Oops. Hang on. Wait. No, no, no, no. What are we doing here? I don't know [snorts] why it's doing this. Hey, there we go. This should work. Okay.
8:12 >> [snorts]
8:12 >> um we we have an obligation to prevent the estate from you know the repercussions of the deedence identity being stolen. I think we also have an obligation to our fellow uh citizens and community members uh to to take such action. Okay. So
8:33 >> [snorts]
8:33 >> um that's that's number one is uh cancel the deedants um driver's license. very simple to do and will take you you know 10 or 15 minutes including and then plus you know then going to the post office and mailing the form. Okay. Next cancel the uh deedence uh voter registration. [snorts] So this is another form uh that needs and now again this is whereas the driver's license is state by state uh voter registration is county by county
9:10 or if you live in Louisiana I assume it's parish by parish. So this is just a a again a very simple form. You fill out the person's name. Um the registered uh residential address, date of birth, reason would here be death. Okay. And then give your telephone number, signature. Again, sign it as the administrator, personal representative of the estate or executive, whatever you want to put there. Okay. And date it. [snorts] And in the case of LA County, it can be faxed. That's that's usually uh what I
9:45 do. It's the most um efficient way. Actually, it can be I think it can be emailed as well. Um, I don't see the email address on here, but it it occurs to me I that I I email these in. And uh, and there, you know, there's no there's you don't get any response. You can file the documents um, you could follow up and check the voter roles um to see if the person has been removed. Um but but the um LA County uh and at least with the LA County uh registar recorder um
10:21 you're not going to get any response. Um presumably they do it and and that's sort of the end of it. Now why be concerned about cancelling the person's um voter registration? Well, um because again, we all have an interest in protecting the integrity of elections and uh especially in a state like California where absentee ballots are sent to everyone on the voter roles. If someone
10:56 is deceased, they'll still send a ballot out. Someone can get a hold of that ballot. They could vote twice. And and that is is damaging to the integrity of elections. And so it's an obligation I think that we owe a deedent to make sure that their uh their vote is not essentially being stolen from them. And it's an obligation that we owe our fellow citizens to help protect uh the integrity of elections. Again, very short thing to do, 10 minutes, including
11:32 the time to email it if you can email it. If you have to mail it, okay, maybe another 15 20 minutes to go to the post office and mail it. By the way, I do I always when whenever I mail something related to the administration of an estate, I always send it uh certified mail. That way I can track it and make sure that it got to the intended destination. Okay. So, uh second is to um cancel the deedants voter registration. Okay. Next is the deedence
12:07 passport. So there is no form for cancelling a deedence passport. Okay. So uh I've just drafted a letter. You can see here I've redacted uh you know who you know for whom this uh cancellation was made. But you send it to the uh US Department of State counselor lost and stolen property unit and the address. Okay. And I put you know cancellation of deedants passport to whom it may concerned and closed.
12:42 Please find the following. The valid passport of the deedent a certified copy of the death certificate for the person and a copy of letters of in this case I was I was still the special administrator. uh what it could be copies of letters of special administration or just of regular administration appointing me to handle matters of the estate of whatever the person's name is and then I say please cancel and return the enclosed passport thank you for your assistance sign it okay and with it I include uh the documents um that I mentioned and I'm not going to
13:19 show you the other documents they're not relevant uh they are in fact u you know private to the person. Now, in the case of the State Department, um in this case, it was about two weeks later, I got a letter back. Dear Mr. Bemel, this letter is to inform you that the US that US passport number, whatever it was for the number issued to the deedent was cancelled by the Department of State Consular Law Stolen Passport Unit as requested. So, um I I you know, my hat is off to the State Department. Number
13:55 one, they let me know u you know that the passport was cancelled and they did it pretty quickly, right? So, I'm if you recall, the letter was dated March 14th. Here it is 15 days later and they've already sent a letter letting me know that they've taken care of it. So, you know, pretty pretty efficient, don't don't you think? Okay, so that's uh the third one. Now, why cancel a passport? Well, same thing. Prevent identity theft. Uh not good to have a document like that out there. Passports can be
14:31 used to open bank accounts. Uh they can be used, you know, for obviously for travel. Um and and it's just not good to have something like that out there. And so, uh best to cancel it. Let's take a quick break. We'll come back and talk about two more. When life brings unexpected changes, managing inherited property shouldn't add to your stress. Magnum Properties specializes in probate and trust real estate management. We handle the complexities while you focus on what
15:07 matters most. From property maintenance to tenant relations, from legal compliance to maximizing value, we're your trusted partner through every step. Magnum Properties, Inc., turning property challenges into peace of mind. Call us today at 213-264-4396 or visit magnumprops.com. Okay, so this is Trustin Estates Weekly. I'm your host Kevin Bemel talking about five of the lessernown responsibilities
15:43 of a personal representative. And these are all kind of administrative um uh matters um that that don't really relate to the finances of the estate per se, but they are designed to uh protect um the the deedent and by extension kind of the estate uh you know against uh identity theft and and any fallout that might come as a result. Now obviously if someone uses the identity of a deedent
16:20 and is caught the death certificate is going to prove that the deedent was not alive. But you know why deal with the hassle? um better to just you know cancel these identifying documents uh or in the case of voter registration cancel the voter registration for the sake of u making sure that you know we each do our little part for to keep uh elections uh integral. Okay. So those those are the three I talked about for the break. Now I'm going to talk about two others. Uh the next one is uh
16:57 cancelling the deedants credit cards. Now there is no set form for this either like with a passport. Okay. Uh but um you know first of all you've got to know which credit cards a deedent had and that that you know that in of itself can be a challenge. Okay, that's kind of up there with what are called marshalling assets and debts. In other words, figuring out what assets did the deedent have, what debts did he have. Okay? And
17:34 u you may need to go through the deedent's records. Um hopefully he kept some records. Maybe he kept paper records. Maybe he kept his records online. So now you got to get access to his computer. That may be a challenge. Okay, maybe you you found his wallet and the credit cards are in his wallet. Okay, great. So, once you have your letters of administration, um first of all, any credit card company is going to need to get a a not um notice to creditors so that if they if there is a balance outstanding, they can
18:09 file a creditor's claim. I talked about filing creditors claims u last year maybe I don't know a month or two ago and and if so if if you know if you are concerned about that I I invite you to go check out that episode. Okay. But beyond that okay the credit card companies need to be called and told that the person has died so they can lock the account. Okay. And that's that should be done as soon after the deedent passes away as
18:47 possible. Now sometimes a family member will take care of it. That's good. Okay. But other times they may not. They may not realize it needs to be done or you know unfortunately not all family members are honest. they may be intending to use the deedence credit cards to buy some stuff um and kind of get it before the credit card gets cancelled, before the credit card company is notified that their card holder has died. Okay? So, it's something that the personal
19:22 representative at least needs to verify that it's been done. Okay? And generally speaking, uh when when you call the credit card company, they're not going to give information about balances or any of that stuff until they can verify that indeed you are the courtappointed representative for an estate. However, they will take the information that the deedent has died and they will they will, you know, lock the account. Okay, it, you know, look,
19:58 [clears throat] different credit card companies handle things differently. Um, they can be easy to deal with. They can be a pain in the neck to deal with. That just comes with uh the territory. Um, what I would recommend is that when you do this, you keep a record of the telephone calls that you made, any emails you sent, uh, any, you know, regular conventional mail that you sent. Okay, keep a record of all of that. So, if the credit card company, for example, tries to claim later, oh,
20:33 they weren't informed that, you know, the the their car holder had died and they're seeking to hold the estate liable for charges made after the deedent's death. Well, so you you want to have a record of your communications in order to dispute what the credit card company is saying. Okay. Uh so you know these days I don't know I know for myself I don't carry very many credit cards. I carry one personal
21:08 credit card um and and two business credit cards and then I carry a personal debit card. That's it. And by the way, debit cards, credit cards, I should be saying both. Um if if someone's carrying a debit card, it has the same kind of exposure as a credit card only that it you know the exposure is to the extent that there are funds in the account to which the debit card applies. So, um, you know, make sure that these accounts get locked down as quickly as possible. If you know that you're the if
21:44 you have a copy of a will and it shows that you've been you're you're, you know, going to be appointed as the executive of the estate, but you haven't gotten letters of administration yet, that's okay. Go ahead and call them. If they, you know, ask you, well, you know, who are you? who can say, "Well, [snorts] I'm the, you know, child of your card, deceased card holder. I'm I'm nominated as the executive under the deedants's will." Um, and if they said, "Do you have letters of administration?" Not yet, but I want to make sure that this is locked down so that there's, you
22:21 know, not an accumulation of balance now that your card holder is dead. That's probably going to be fine. uh you know if they give you any trouble just you know make a notation of it and and you know make a written record of it and then if there's a problem down the road you can say to the court you know uh your honor I rejected this creditor claim because it includes charges that were made after the deedent died. I contacted the credit card company or the debit card company on such and such a
22:56 date to notify them. they refused to lock the account down. There's no reason that the estate should be held responsible for this debt. Uh this was the the the the credit card company's mismanagement and and and that should be, you know, their problem kind of thing. Okay. So, credit cards and debit cards. Now, of course, with a debit card, the money is being extracted out of the account. Um, so you might have to apply to the court to get the money returned um by the uh you know by the
23:31 institution um if they refuse to lock down a debit card. But it's it's essentially the same thing only that instead of having to pay them the money, you're going to have to get the money back. Okay? But I wouldn't hesitate to do that uh in in in the face of a card issuing company refusing to recognize you know the death of the deedent. Now they may say we need a copy of the death certificate. So then get an email address to which you can email it. I know some of them will say we don't accept such evidence by email. It has you have to go to a branch and show them
24:07 there or you have to you know send it by conventional mail. If so, I would overnight mail it to make sure they get it as quickly as possible. You know, those kinds of things. That's part of the frankly the hassle of administrating an estate. But, you know, it is what it is. And so, that's what needs to be done. Okay, let's take a another quick break and I'll talk about the fifth one. Probate and Trust TV, your curated source for the most useful and insightful content on estate planning
24:42 and trust and probate administration, featuring standout professionals like Bill Gross, Paul Bralet, James Cunningham, and yours truly. Whether you're a lawyer, accountant, real estate professional, or working on your own succession plan, this channel helps you quickly find the clearest, most practical content YouTube has to offer. Subscribe now to Probate and Trust TV. Spend more time learning, less time searching. Okay. And this again, this is um uh
25:19 Trust State and Trust TV. uh at state and trust weekly I mean and I'm the host Kevin Bemel we're talking about five of the lesserk known responsibilities of a personal representative all of them administrative in nature as opposed to financial uh okay the credit cards are you know kind of maybe financial but they're more in the in the uh category of protecting the estate from a loss as opposed to you know gathering the assets and paying the debts and distributing the money to the
25:54 heirs which is I think what most people think the you know the the administration process is about. Okay. The last um of the five lesserk known items entails dealing with the deedants social media accounts. Now I did an entire show on this uh a ways back. So you you know if you go to my YouTube channel you can watch that show. Uh I'm so but I'm just going to touch upon it again today um because I think
26:31 it it is important and and hit a couple of the the key issues. Okay. So number one [snorts] uh social media accounts are considered to be a digital asset. Okay. And as such, they fall under a law that most states have adopted that require the personal representative to have specific authorization in a will or trust to handle those digital assets including the social
27:08 media accounts. It's the digital assets act I believe something like that. I don't recall the exact name. Now this is unknown even to a lot of people involved in trust and estate administration. Um you know the reality is I I don't think I I think it's enforced in the breach as they say. So uh you know but it's you know in in order to do things properly you know compliance with the digital act
27:43 needs to take place and so the easiest way to deal with it is would be for estate planning attorneys uh to routinely include this authorization in the estate planning documents so that it's clear that The deedent's intent was for his personal representative to have the authorization to do among other things deal with his social media accounts. Now why do I talk about this as dealing with as opposed to
28:19 cancelling? Well, because cancelling may not be what the deedent wants. Okay? And the various social media companies do not require cancellation of the of the of a social media account of someone who has passed away. I'll give you an example. So way back when I was in high school, okay, back in the uh mid to late 1970s, okay, um I had a choir teacher um by the
28:55 name of Larry Mason. And now of course there was no Facebook back then, but Larry was a he was one of the most beloved teachers at San Marcus High School. Uh part of it was because you know everybody you know people who were into choir we loved singing in the choir. That was part of it. The second part of it was Larry was Mr. Mason. Really I never I I would never have called him Larry. We didn't do such things in those days. Um Mr. Mason was
29:31 as far as I know he was single his whole life. He he drove a motorcycle. He was kind of a dashing kind of guy. Um, the girls just loved him. The boys admired him. Um, but he he but you know, he wasn't like he he wasn't all I don't know stuck up dashing. He was he was like it's a real cool guy, you know, that we got to sing with and and he was quite a good-looking man to boo. So, um, by the time he passed away many years later, he had a Facebook page. And I
30:06 know I I used to post a a happy birthday message to Mr. Mason every year uh because I would get notifications. And one year I posted um such a message and I got a private message back letting me know that that Mr. Mason had died. And I was oh my gosh, you know, I felt terrible that, you know, wishing happy birthday to someone who's no longer living. Uh and and I I happened to be on Facebook uh last week and I h I just, you know, sort of going through a couple of things. I
30:41 came upon Mr. Mason's Facebook page. It is still up. And I I learned from I believe it was his daughter, but I I could be wrong on that. That their intention is to leave up that page as a memorial to Mr. Mason for all of the um you know students and and fellow teachers and such that so adored him. So it's a place to go and and and you know kind of indulge in memories of of Larry Mason and and all of that. Now that's what his family decided to do. Perfectly
31:16 legitimate decision and Facebook supports that kind of decision. Okay. So I mean they could have decided to take it down. That's another thing. But whatever is going to be done needs to be done. It shouldn't just sort of not, you know, happen by default. Okay. So, uh in in a in a situation like this, it may involve uh consulting with family members to find out what they want done. Okay. Perhaps the deedent left some kind
31:53 of letter of instructions saying what the deedent wanted done with respect to his social media accounts. If so, that's what as an administrator, that's what would guide me in dealing with that. Okay? And again, as as part of a complete estate plan, I think estate planning attorneys should address this issue. Maybe not, you know, in a will or a trust. Okay, fine. I get it. But they should encourage their clients to draft a letter of instruction, social media or about social media, whatever,
32:28 and and and explain how they want their social um how they want their social media presence dealt with after they pass away, right? And that way there's no guesswork. The the uh family members and and the personal representative know what the person wants done. And so then it can just be done and and and that's you know makes things very simple right in the end that's what an estate plan is for it's to simplify the process of settling the deedence estate and dealing
33:04 with social media accounts is one part of that. Okay. So again the the the five lesserk known responsibilities of of a personal representative. Number one, cancel the deedent's driver's license. Number two, cancel his uh voter registration. Number three, cancel his passport. Number four, uh cancel credit and debit cards. And number five, uh resolve social media accounts. So, none of these are particularly difficult to do. they just need they they need to be attended to and and and they are part of
33:43 the obligation of a a an administrator or an executive personal representative. So um if you have any questions, comments, criticisms, um mention again all my social media, all the social media links for the show will be in the show notes after it posts on YouTube. uh happy to respond to those. And then tomorrow at 10:00 a.m. Pacific time is my show, Business Lessons from the Military. Embarking on season 4 of that show. And then on Wednesday at 10:00
34:19 Pacific time, we I am starting season 7 of People Making Money. people making money is kind of the the is is the outgrowth of the original uh way to wow shows which launched in 2020. Wow. I've been doing this in one form or another for seven years. So I thank you very much for joining me today. Wish you a wonderful rest of the day and signing off as I always do. Marie darling, you are your my bell. You are my bell, not your bell. I'm your bow. You're my bell.
34:55 Courage at all times, my