One price for each service, stated before you hire the firm.
The documents that protect your family if something happens to you, drafted, signed, and explained in a one-page summary. Estate planning involves no court, so it is open to anyone in Washington.
The documents almost every adult should have:
Includes a signing appointment with notary and witnesses arranged, plus a PDF set and a one-page summary your family can actually follow.
Draft within 7 days, signing within 2 to 3 weeks.
The same five documents for each of you, coordinated so they work together. Married couples and registered domestic partners.
I represent you jointly, which means there are no secrets between you in this matter. If your wishes diverge in a way that puts you at odds, I will tell you and you may each need separate counsel. This is rare and almost always surfaces in the first meeting.
Draft within 7 days, signing within 2 to 3 weeks.
A Washington will, nothing else. Names your personal representative, distributes your property, nominates guardians for minor children if you have them, and asks the court for nonintervention powers so your family avoids supervised probate.
Best for someone who already has powers of attorney in place or who only needs to update how property passes. Most people should look at the Essentials package instead.
Draft within 7 days of our meeting, signing within 2 weeks.
A Washington CPA converts everything you own into community property and vests it in the survivor automatically at the first death, often avoiding probate entirely for the first spouse to die.
Not appropriate for every couple, particularly second marriages with children from a prior relationship or anyone with significant separate property they intend to keep separate. I will tell you which camp you are in during the consultation.
For clients who own real property in more than one state, want privacy, want to control distributions to a beneficiary over time, or want to avoid probate outright.
Includes the trust, a pour-over will, both powers of attorney, health care directive, disposition of remains, one deed transferring Washington real property into the trust, and a written funding checklist.
Draft within 10 days, signing within 3 to 4 weeks.
Joint or mirror trusts, the full document set for both of you, and one deed.
If you already have a trust and it was never funded, which is the most common failure I see. Includes one deed, beneficiary designation letters to your financial institutions, and a schedule of assets.
A taxable estate above the Washington exclusion, a beneficiary receiving needs-based public benefits, a closely held business needing a succession plan, or an existing dispute among your heirs. Any of these means a custom quote, and in some cases a referral. I will say so in the consultation, not after you have paid.
Everything in this section assumes the family agrees. If someone is contesting the will, challenging the personal representative, or threatening to, that is litigation and it is not on this menu.
Many Washington estates do not need probate at all. If the whole estate passes by beneficiary designation, joint ownership, a community property agreement, or falls under the small estate threshold, you may need nothing more than an affidavit. I will tell you in one call, at no charge, which of the paths below applies.
For estates under the RCW 11.62 threshold with no real property. I prepare the affidavit and the letters to the banks and institutions holding the assets. No court filing, no filing fee.
1 to 2 weeks, then a 40-day statutory wait before the affidavit can be presented.
You file and serve as PR yourself. I prepare every document, tell you exactly where and when to file, and stay available by phone through closing. You handle the trips to the courthouse and the clerk.
This saves roughly two thousand dollars and works well for an organized PR with time on their hands. It works badly for someone who is grieving, out of state, or busy. Be honest with yourself about which you are.
The full administration, start to finish, for a testate estate with cooperative heirs:
What is excluded: selling real property, tax return preparation, tracing missing assets, locating unknown heirs, and any creditor claim that has to be litigated. Each of those is quoted separately before any work starts.
Typically 6 to 9 months, driven by the statutory creditor period rather than by anything either of us controls.
Same scope as Nonintervention Probate where there is no will and the heirs agree on who serves. Requires a bond unless all heirs waive it in writing.
For a PR already appointed who wants the creditor process handled correctly, including publication, mailing to reasonably ascertainable creditors, and the proof of publication filing.
Used to clear title to real property when probate was never opened and is not needed. Prepared and recorded.
Where a CPA already exists and the surviving spouse simply needs title moved. Includes the affidavit and recording package.
Agreed matters only. For spouses and parents who have already decided the terms and want them written correctly and finalized.
I handle agreed divorces only. Before I open your file, you and your spouse need to have already decided how to divide property and debt, whether anyone pays support, and what the parenting schedule looks like. You will sign a plain-English term sheet confirming it. No term sheet, no engagement.
This is not a technicality. It is why these prices are what they are. A divorce where the two of you are still negotiating through lawyers costs three to five times these numbers and I am not the right lawyer for it.
I can only represent one of you. Your spouse remains unrepresented and I will tell them in writing that I do not represent them and cannot give them advice. They are free to have their own attorney review anything I draft, and honestly, that is a good idea.
Ninety minutes. We walk through your situation, I tell you which package fits, what the 90-day waiting period means for your timeline, and what the parenting plan and support numbers will realistically look like. You leave with a written roadmap and a forms checklist.
I prepare every document: Petition, Summons, confidential information forms, Findings and Conclusions, Final Divorce Order, and the required Pierce County forms. You file them and present the finals yourself.
Documents ready in 2 weeks. The court cannot finalize any divorce until 90 days after filing and service. That wait is statutory and no lawyer can shorten it.
Everything in the package above, plus the Parenting Plan, Child Support Order, and the Washington State Child Support Worksheets with the calculations done correctly. The worksheets are where most self-prepared divorces go wrong and get rejected.
Everything drafted, filed, and finalized. I file through the court's electronic system, handle service, and present your final orders to the court myself.
In Pierce County, an attorney can present agreed final orders on the ex parte calendar. A self-represented person generally has to show up. If the thought of standing in front of a judge is part of what has you putting this off, this is the package.
Identical documents, process, and pricing as the divorce packages, with a different final order. Some clients choose this for religious reasons, for health insurance continuation, or because they are not ready to be divorced. It can be converted to a dissolution later.
Any protection order or domestic violence history in the relationship, a business either of you owns, separate property that needs tracing, a planned relocation with children, a spouse who has not yet seen the actual numbers, or a spouse who has already hired counsel. Each one means this is no longer an agreed case, whatever the two of you are telling each other right now.
If that describes your situation, the $350 consultation is still worth your time. I will tell you what you are actually facing and who to call.
A minor guardianship gives a non-parent legal authority to raise a child, enroll them in school, consent to medical care, and make the daily decisions a parent makes. The typical client is a grandparent, aunt, uncle, or family friend already raising a child whose parents cannot.
Most guardianships I handle are by consent. Under RCW 11.130.185, a court can appoint a guardian when every legal parent signs a consent after being told what the guardianship means. Those cases are predictable, which is why they carry a flat fee.
Before I open a consent guardianship, I need signed consents from every legal parent in hand. I will help you understand what to ask for. I will not file and hope. If a parent objects, that is a contested case and it belongs with a family law litigator.
One hour. We determine whether you need a guardianship at all, since a power of attorney or a parental delegation under RCW 11.130.145 solves many situations faster and cheaper. If guardianship is the answer, I will tell you exactly which consents I need and from whom.
A parental delegation, nomination of guardian, or authorization letters for school and medical care. Appropriate when a parent is deployed, hospitalized, in treatment, or temporarily unable to parent and everyone expects them back.
Many people who call about guardianship actually need this. It takes days instead of months and involves no court.
The complete petition through appointment:
What is excluded: any contest by a parent or interested party, an Indian Child Welfare Act case, and concurrent dependency proceedings.
Typically 8 to 12 weeks from signed consents to Letters.
Under RCW 11.130.220, a parent names who takes over if they become unable to care for their child. Common for parents facing serious illness, deployment, or an uncertain immigration situation. Signed now, effective when the triggering event happens.
Where a child has inherited money or received a settlement and someone must manage it until they turn eighteen. Includes the petition, the court trust forms Pierce County requires, and the bond arrangements.
When a child faces immediate risk and there is no time for the standard process, the court can appoint an emergency guardian on short notice under RCW 11.130.200. No two emergencies look alike, so these are quoted individually once I understand the situation.
Call as soon as the situation arises. Timing matters more here than anywhere else on this menu.
Contested petitions, adult guardianships and conservatorships, and dependency cases. Call and I will point you somewhere useful.