Probate Research

[Chas Fabiano]

Went to the Maricopa County probate records and started becoming familar with how everything is set up.  Understanding how the overall process works is very important in being able to save TIME.  The next step for me is to find a method to sort out the probates that have RE property and the ones that don't.  Any ideas?

[Rick H.]

I can only speak for CA as no experience with other states. All probate laws, procedures and, of course, forms are local to your state.

Here in CA, they've made it easy by including a checkbox on the face of the Petition for Probate (of decedents estate) form. 

I'm trying to remember how we used to do it (in the old days) however one tip might be the estimated value of the total estate. A brief online search revealed that your challenge is to sort through Petition for Appointment of Personal Representative and further research shows a criteria for filing similar to California's. Petitioners may either file a formal or informal estate, as well as ancillary estate (when part of an decedent who was a resident in another state).

While in the court clerk's office, you might as well discretely ask other doing research if they are performing research for clients. If yes, they might be good prospects to buy data from, if they will pull all the files that you want rather than just the files other clients want. This is how I used to pull files as once I understood my court's archival system, it was a more efficient use of my resources to pay someone else, freeing me up to work on marketing and dealmaking. 

Just remember, the data that's harder to obtain is better for those few who make the effort to pull and mine it. What's bad is good and what's good is bad!