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Should a bank account of the deceased person be closed immediately upon death? First off is we would need to determine whether or not as a joint account, if it’s a joint account, particularly between husband and wife, I do not suggest that it be closed immediately. The reason for that is if a check comes in payable to the decedent, you need to have some place to deposit it so that you wouldn’t have to go through a probate proceeding in order to cash the check. If however, the account is just in the decedent’s name,  I suggest that you may want to deliver a death certificate to the bank and ask them to freeze the account. You would then need to go through a probate proceeding in order to close the account and collect the proceeds. So if you have any questions about how to collect the money from a decedents bank account, give me a call at 727) 847-2288.

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What can I do if my neighbor is harassing me? Well, 1st off, we need to determine what you mean by the neighbor harassing you. Many times I get calls from folks with a neighbor is continuing to call code enforcement or call the county to come out and check on about any potential code violations or anything else. And they’re using the government to harass you. As far as that’s concerned, under those circumstances, you have no recourse against your neighbor. The only time that you would be able to do anything about your neighbor, harassing you is in the event that they would break the law. Such as you know, them calling you or whatever. And then you need to report that to the Sheriff’s office, or the police  to file a complaint and have them investigated and charge them with a crime. But unless they are committing a crime, I’m not aware of anything that you can do as far as harassment. There, I did see recent case where the neighbor was shining their spotlights into the neighbor’s windows or patio next door. And there was an action as far as that’s concerned, but usually with harassment, unless they’re breaking the law, there isn’t much. My phone number’s (727) 847-2288.

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Can I legally access a deceased person’s email account? The answer is no, you cannot. There is specific language that needs to go in into a will, which provides the personal representative when appointed by the court to have these powers, to be able to access electronic accounts. And that legislation was passed and they negotiated with Google and some of the other major companies in order to have the language, which would be recognized and authorize the personal representative to access these accounts.  I won’t go into the practical aspects of that, but that’s the answer is without being appointed the personal representative with those powers, well, you are not, legally supposed to access the electronic accounts of the decedent.  You can call me, although I don’t have any expertise and I’ve never had to have a personal representative have to use those powers. My phone number (727) 847-2288.

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Who gets a deceased person’s automobile when it has a loan against it. The same persons that would receive the automobile, if there wasn’t a loan on it, and whoever is the beneficiary, whether that be the children, the spouse, or someone that they left to under the will. They would be entitled to the title, to the automobile, and it would be subject to the loan. So,  what my experience has been whenever someone wants to keep the automobile, we,  advise them the best thing to do is to go ahead and pay the lean off so that we can obtain the title and have the title removed, and then they can be placed into their names. So that is the practical approach on what to do about, automobiles with leans against them. Whenever you have automobiles under leases, it’s even a larger problem. If you have any questions, give me a call. It’s (727) 847-2288.

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How do I transfer my homestead? I’m assuming that this question has to do with your homestead exemption on if you’re an owner or property, and that’s your permanent place of residence. And you’re a resident of the state of Florida. You can exempt the first $25,000 of your taxable valuation from taxes, which saves you approximately $500 in taxes. You pay tax on any amounts between 25,000 and 50,000, from 50,000 to 75,000. You can and exempt everything except school taxes, which save you another approximately $300. In addition to that, there’s a constitutional amendment that provides that,  As long as you have homestead exemption on your property, then the tax assessment will not increase by the lesser or a 3% or cost of living. So, if you change homestead, if you buy another property, or acquire another property, you move into that property. And it’s now your homestead.
You should apply to the property appraiser’s office to have homestead on that property and tell them that you wish to, for your homestead exemption, to this new property, it’s called portability. And they should transfer that to you. If this, you have to acquired this other property within two years from the date that you  last had homestead. So, if you sold your property, you don’t want to wait more than two years to acquire another property. If you want to transfer your homestead and or save our homes, freeze, or holding the tax assessment to the lower amount, which is transferable on, and that’s called portability. You have any questions on that? You give me a call at (727) 847-2288.