Last wills will not be admitted by a court unless the following criteria are met: you must be of sound mind, you must be acting of your own free will without undue influence or duress from others, and the will must be signed and witnessed according to the applicable laws of your state.

Probate is the legal process through which the court oversees how an estate will be distributed. If you signed a last will, your estate passes to the beneficiaries named. If not, your estate passes to relatives based on state law. Generally, a formal probate action is required if an estate includes real property. But in many states, probate isn't required and other legal remedies are available if the estate is of minimal value.

You can leave anyone out of your last will, subject to certain limitations. Many laws have been enacted to protect spouses and minor children. If you wish to disinherit one of your children or to give one child less than another, you should clearly state that intention in your last will.

You can revoke a last will any time before death by making a new last will that states that all prior last wills are no longer valid. To revoke a last will without making a new one, all you have to do is intentionally tear it up, deface it, burn it, or destroy it. If this is done accidentally, the last will is not revoked. What happens if you make a new last will (which revokes all prior last wills) and then decide that you like your old last will better? You need to make an entirely new last will that replaces the new one and mimics the old one.

The old last will is invalid and cannot be revived after it has been revoked. One way to make changes to a last will, without revoking it entirely, is to make a codicil, which is an amendment to a last will.

However, a codicil must be signed and witnessed just like a last will, so it may be easier to make an entirely new last will. Be sure not to make changes to your last will after it has been witnessed and signed. If you cross out a person's name or add clauses to a last will that has already been signed, you risk making the whole last will invalid.

After you sign your last will, you should keep it in a safe, easily accessible place. Be sure that the person whom you have appointed as your executor knows exactly where you stored your last will. You do not have to file it with the court or place it in the public record. However, some courts may permit you to deposit your last will with them, depending on how busy or crowded they are.

The general rule is that all debts must be paid before any assets are distributed. Your outstanding credit card balances, for instance, are generally paid before any money or gifts are distributed to your heirs.

An exception to this general rule is for "secured debts," that is, debts that allow the lender to take possession of a specific piece of property if the debt is not repaid. Examples of such secured debts are mortgages or auto loans. If a piece of property is collateral for a secured debt, that property can be distributed, but the debt will generally go with it. For instance, say you have a car worth $10,000 and a loan on the car of $5,000. You can leave the car to someone in your will, but it will be that person's obligation to pay off the loan.

What happens if you owe more than you own? In general, people cannot inherit another person's debts. If there is not enough cash in the estate to pay debts, all property of the estate will be sold to pay the debts and no one will inherit anything. For example, if someone dies owing $12,000 in credit card debt, but has cash and property worth only $10,000, the property will be sold and the $10,000 will be paid to the credit card issuer.

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