What our work costs.
We post this so that anyone considering our services can see how we bill before they ever pick up the phone. There is no pricing held back for a sales call, and no “contact us for a quote” in place of a number. A fiduciary asks a family to trust them with money and with decisions at the hardest moment of their lives. That trust starts with being plain about what the work costs.
The short version: we bill hourly.
Nearly everything we do — serving as trustee, as agent under a power of attorney or an Advance Health Care Directive, as a daily money manager, administering a trust or an estate, coordinating care — is billed at a single hourly rate for time actually spent on your matter.
Our principal fiduciary rate is $250 per hour. Case management and administrative work — the routine, necessary tasks that do not require the principal’s judgment — is billed at $125 per hour, so you are not charged the principal rate for work that does not call for it. Time is recorded and billed in increments of one-tenth of an hour, and every billed entry describes the work it covers.
Our principal fiduciary rate reflects professional fiduciary services provided by a California Licensed Professional Fiduciary (License No. 1654) with advanced healthcare training and additional professional credentials, including Certified Dementia Practitioner (CDP) and National Certified Guardian (NCG).
We chose an hourly model on purpose. It means you pay for the work your situation actually requires — no more, no less — rather than a flat fee that overcharges a simple matter and undercharges a hard one.
Why the total varies.
Because we bill for time, the monthly cost follows the work. A trustee or financial agent for a stable situation — a quiet portfolio, a settled household, no decisions pending — bills a few hours a month. The same role during an acute crisis, with banks to satisfy, a property to sell, a hospital on the phone, and decisions in motion, bills many more hours that month, and then settles back down.
This is why we cannot quote a single number for “a conservatorship” or “a trust administration” the way a shop quotes a flat price. What we can tell you, early and in writing, is the rate, how we record time, and an honest estimate of the shape of the work once we understand your situation.
Court-supervised appointments are different.
When the work is a conservatorship or a probate estate, our fees are not set by us alone. They are reviewed and approved by the court. For conservators, the court fixes just and reasonable compensation under Probate Code §§2640–2641. For an executor or administrator of a probate estate, ordinary compensation is set by statute under Probate Code §10800, and any extraordinary services must be requested separately and approved by the court under §10801.
The statutory schedule for ordinary compensation is calculated as follows:
- 4% of the first $100,000 of the probate estate
- 3% of the next $100,000
- 2% of the next $800,000
- 1% of the next $9,000,000
- 0.5% of the next $15,000,000
- Amounts exceeding $25,000,000 as determined by the court
Examples of extraordinary services may include litigation support, management or sale of real property, business interests, tax matters, asset recovery, or other unusually complex estate administration matters.
In plain terms: in a court matter, a judge looks at what we did and what we are asking to be paid, and signs off before we are paid. We record our time the same way for these matters, and present it to the court for approval. The hourly rate above is the basis for that request.
Costs that are not our fee.
Some costs belong to your matter but are not payment for our time. Court filing fees, certified copies, property appraisals, recording fees, bonds, and the fees of other professionals — the attorney, the CPA, the appraiser — are paid out of the estate or trust at their actual cost. We do not mark them up, and we do not take a percentage of them. They appear separately from our hourly fee so you can always see which is which.
When a matter requires us to be somewhere in person beyond our immediate service area, reasonable travel time is billed at the applicable hourly rate and mileage is billed at the current IRS standard mileage rate. Local time and travel within our immediate service area are simply part of the work.
In most conservatorship, trust, and probate matters, our approved fees and the costs above are paid from the assets of the conservatorship, trust, or estate — not by family members personally, unless someone has agreed to that in writing. Who pays, and from what source, is set out in the engagement letter before we begin.
It is all in writing before we begin.
Before any engagement begins, the hourly rate, the billing increments, what is billed and what is passed through, and how and when you receive statements are all set out in a written engagement letter, consistent with AB 1194 §6563. Nothing about how you are billed should ever be a surprise. If a question about fees comes up after we have started, the answer is in the letter — and if it is not, we put it in writing.
A retainer may be required depending upon the nature of the engagement. When a retainer is held, it is applied against billed time and described in the engagement letter.
Fiduciary consultation services.
We also provide consultation on fiduciary matters — trust administration, conservatorships, estate administration, care planning, and related concerns — without taking on a full appointment. Consultation is billed at $250 per hour.
Consultations are by appointment and held in strict confidence.
Or call 760-33-TRUST (760-338-7878) directly.
Discretion and confidentiality are fundamental to our practice. Information submitted through this form is kept private and used solely for purposes of communication regarding potential fiduciary services.
