Living Trust Daly City: Keeping Your Home Out of the Redwood City Probate Court

Where a Daly City Estate Is Probated

San Mateo County's Superior Court divides the county into a northern and a southern area. Its table of geographical areas lists Daly City, Broadmoor and Colma under the Northern Branch, whose courthouse is at 1050 Mission Road in South San Francisco, a short drive from most Daly City streets. That is not where a Daly City estate goes. The court's probate division page puts the probate courtroom and the probate clerk's office at the Hall of Justice, 400 County Center, Redwood City, and Probate Code §7051 sends a decedent's estate to the county where the person was domiciled. For a Daly City homeowner that is San Mateo County, and the trip is to Redwood City, about 19 miles to the southeast in a straight line between the two cities' Census center points.

The court's own checklist for a decedent's estate petition shows what the family would be signing up for. The original will has to be lodged with the court before the hearing. The proposed Order for Probate goes in at least seven days before the hearing. The notice of petition must be published, and the checklist points to the court's form PR-13 for the timing. Before letters are issued the court wants the Duties and Liabilities of Personal Representative statement, a confidential statement of the representative's birth date and driver's license number, a request for appointment of a probate referee on the court's local form PR-5, and a bond if the order calls for one. Attorneys have had to e-file probate papers in San Mateo County since January 21, 2020; a family filing on its own may still use paper at the clerk's office, which sees the public by appointment only.

The court posts probate tentative rulings by 3:00 p.m. on the court day before a hearing under its Local Rule 4.1(B), and probate hearings may be attended by Zoom. None of that changes the basic sequence. A petition is filed with the $435 first filing fee, the house is appraised by a probate referee, creditors get four months after letters issue to file claims (Probate Code §9100), and the court must approve the final distribution. The petition, the will, the inventory and the accounting all go into a public case file.

A funded trust skips all of it. The successor trustee you name in the trust takes over the house and the accounts in the trust when you die, without a petition, a hearing or letters. The Hall of Justice becomes involved only if someone later asks the court to interpret the trust or to review what the trustee did.

Recording a Daly City Trust Deed

Funding a trust with a Daly City house takes one recorded document: a deed from you, as owner, to you as trustee of your trust. San Mateo County has no recording counter in the north of the county. The ACRE contact page lists the Assessor on the 3rd floor and the County Clerk-Recorder on the 1st floor of 555 County Center in Redwood City, and its Elections office at 40 Tower Road in San Mateo; nothing in Daly City. You can drive the deed down, or mail it with a pre-printed check or money order payable to the San Mateo County Recorder. At the counter, a deed that meets the requirements and comes with the right fees is recorded while you wait. By mail, a rejected deed comes back unrecorded with the reason, along with the payment.

Whichever way you record, the County keeps an image of the deed and mails the original to the name and address in the upper left corner of the first page, about four to six weeks later. If you want proof of recording sooner, the County's instructions say to include an exact copy of the deed and a stamped, self-addressed envelope for a conformed copy, and the fee schedule lists $10.00 for a conformed copy.

The recorder checks a deed for recording requirements only, not for whether it does what you intended. The County's list of reasons documents come back is a practical checklist for a trust deed: the name typed in the deed and in the notary's acknowledgment must match the signature exactly, the notary must sign and seal, the property must be in San Mateo County and described well enough to identify it, a return address must appear, and the check must be signed. Under the County's page rules, the right hand 5 inches of the top 2½ inches of the first page stay blank for the recorder, side margins must be at least half an inch, and the tax statement address goes at the bottom of the first page.

The transfer tax lines on a Daly City deed

San Mateo County's documentary transfer tax is 55 cents per $500 of value, which the recorder states as $1.10 per $1,000. Daly City takes part of that rate under its own ordinance. The California City Finance table effective December 1, 2025 lists Daly City as a general law city with a city rate of $0.55 and a county rate of $0.55 per $1,000, for the same $1.10 total. Daly City Municipal Code Chapter 3.24 is the city's Real Property Transfer Tax Ordinance. Section 3.24.010 says it is adopted under Part 6.7 of Division 2 of the Revenue and Taxation Code, the state Documentary Transfer Tax Act. Section 3.24.020 imposes the city's 27.5 cents per $500 only on a deed by which realty sold within the city is conveyed, when the consideration, not counting any loan that stays on the property, exceeds $100. Section 3.24.090 has the county recorder administer the city tax under the same state law. A deed of your own Daly City house into your own revocable trust involves no sale and no price, so it owes no city tax.

For the county's tax, the recorder lists among its recognized exemptions a deed that transfers the grantor's interest to a revocable trust, with a statement that the trust is for the grantor's benefit and the transfer is not pursuant to a sale, under Revenue and Taxation Code §11930. Our deed shows the tax as $0 with that statement on its face. Unlike a deed for a house inside the City of San Mateo, a Daly City deed needs no second city declaration: the recorder's transfer tax page calls for an additional city declaration only for property in the City of San Mateo, and its FAQ says the City of San Mateo is the only city for which the County collects city conveyance tax. Daly City's share is part of the $1.10 county line, not a separate charge.

San Mateo County also asks for a Documentary Transfer Tax Affidavit with every conveyance, a requirement it has had since January 2011, and its FAQ says the affidavit is needed even when the deed is exempt and specifically lists trust transfer deeds. Only one person has to sign it, either a party to the deed or a representative who knows the transaction. Attach whatever supports the exemption you claim.

SB 2, the PCOR and your property tax

The $75 SB 2 fee is usually not charged on a deed moving your own home into your trust, because the owner-occupier exemption under Government Code §27388.1(a)(2) is claimed on the deed. San Mateo County's notice on the fee says a valid declaration of exemption must be on the face of each document when it is submitted, or the fee is collected. The fee is charged on rentals, second homes and vacant land, capped at $225 per transaction, so a Daly City rental you do not live in should be budgeted at $75.

Revenue and Taxation Code §62(d) excludes a transfer into a revocable trust from change in ownership, so your Proposition 13 base year value stays where it is. The County requires the Preliminary Change of Ownership Report with any conveyance, treats it as confidential, and adds $20 if it is missing. From January 1, 2027, Assembly Bill 2224 (Stats. 2026, ch. 292) sets the statewide base recording fee at $15 for the first page and $4 for each additional page, so San Mateo County's posted fees will change then; county program fees are still added on top. Our office prepares the trust transfer deed for $100 per property; you sign it before a notary and record it.

Probate Fees on a Typical Daly City Home

Zillow's typical home value for Daly City was $1,115,941 on August 31, 2026 (Zillow Home Value Index, all homes, middle tier, smoothed and seasonally adjusted), up from $1,109,677 a month earlier. We use the August figure. Probate Code §10810 pays the estate's attorney 4% of the first $100,000 of the estate, 3% of the next $100,000, 2% of the next $800,000 and 1% of the next $9,000,000, figured on gross value with no deduction for a mortgage, and §10800 gives the executor the same amount again.

• Court filing fee: $435 for the first petition for letters, under the Judicial Council's statewide civil fee schedule effective January 1, 2026. San Mateo is not one of the counties with a higher local figure.
• Probate referee: one tenth of one percent of the property appraised (Probate Code §8961), about $1,116 on this house.
• Creditor period: four months after letters issue (Probate Code §9100).

That is about $48,319 in statutory fees, against a $400 trust plus $100 deed for one person, or a $500 trust plus $100 deed for a couple. The California probate fees guide covers extraordinary fees and how the court approves them.

The shortcuts do not fit a typical Daly City house. The small estate affidavit stops at $208,850 for deaths on or after April 1, 2025, and the affidavit for real property of small value under Probate Code §13200 stops at $69,625. The Probate Code §13151 petition for a decedent's primary residence covers a home worth up to $750,000 for the same deaths; the typical Daly City value is $365,941 above that, and the petition is still a court filing in Redwood City with a $435 fee.

The same math across Daly City neighborhoods

Zillow publishes a typical value for twelve Daly City neighborhoods. The figures below are for August 31, 2026, rounded to the dollar, with the combined attorney and executor fee under §§10810 and 10800.

Only Sullivan Corridor falls under the $750,000 limit of the §13151 petition, and even there the petition helps only with the decedent's primary residence. Every other neighborhood on the list is above $900,000, and Westlake, St. Francis and Southern Hills are above $1,200,000, where the combined fee passes $50,000. Zillow counts Broadmoor among Daly City's neighborhoods, but the Census Bureau treats Broadmoor as a separate unincorporated place, a point that matters for the city transfer tax and is explained below.

Daly City Houses and Your Trust

Westlake and the postwar tracts

Much of Daly City was built in a short burst after World War II. KQED's history of the city describes how developer Henry Doelger secured 1,350 acres south of San Francisco for Westlake, planned as a self-contained community for first-time buyers, and how its rows of houses are said to have inspired Malvina Reynolds' song "Little Boxes." The Census Bureau's American Community Survey for 2020 to 2024 shows the result in the housing stock: 24.5% of Daly City's 35,922 housing units were built in the 1950s, and 41.8% before 1960. Only 2.5% were built in 2010 or later.

The same survey shows how long people stay. Of occupied homes, 16.5% have a householder who moved in before 1990 and another 13.8% one who moved in during the 1990s. Of owner-occupied homes, 37.6% have no mortgage. And 20.5% of residents are 65 or older. For a trust, that profile points in one direction. A house bought decades ago usually carries a Proposition 13 base year value far below today's market, and the owner wants that value protected now and, if possible, for the children later. The deed into the trust does the first part: Revenue and Taxation Code §62(d) keeps the base year value where it is. The second part depends on Proposition 19, covered at the end of this section.

Owners, renters and the house you rent out

About 60.2% of Daly City's occupied homes are owner-occupied and 39.8% are rented, by the 2020 to 2024 survey. Single family detached houses make up 49.3% of housing units and attached single family homes 14.1%, while 16.7% of units are in buildings of 20 or more. If you own the house you live in plus a second house or a condominium you rent out, each parcel takes its own deed, its own PCOR and its own transfer tax affidavit, and the rental's deed pays the $75 SB 2 fee because the owner-occupier exemption covers only the home you live in. List every parcel in the questionnaire by its assessor's parcel number so that nothing stays in your own name and ends up in probate anyway.

Downstairs rooms, in-law units and ADUs

Daly City's zoning code has its own rules for adding rooms on the ground floor of a house, often at garage level. Daly City Municipal Code §17.40.090 allows downstairs room construction in single family homes and duplexes only if it keeps the required parking, connects every habitable room inside the house without going through non-habitable rooms such as the garage, an exterior breezeway or outside, and limits a wet bar to a small sink, an under-counter refrigerator and five feet of counter, unless the space is an approved accessory dwelling unit. Section 17.40.100 sets the city's standards for an ADU, and §17.40.110 has the owner file a certificate of registration that the city records with the San Mateo County recorder. The code says that certificate may be conveyed with title.

Two points follow for a trust. First, the deed into your trust moves the whole parcel, the main house and any permitted unit, and it does not remove the recorded certificate or any deed restriction; your successor trustee and your children take the house subject to them. Second, the city's code still describes an owner occupancy condition for ADUs, but Government Code §66315 now provides that a local agency may not use or impose an owner-occupant requirement when it evaluates an ADU on a lot with a proposed or existing single family home. If your unit was permitted under the older rule, ask the city's planning staff which rule it applies before your family relies on either one. Tell us about any downstairs unit, permitted or not, so the funding instructions and the beneficiaries' expectations match what is actually on the parcel.

The fault line and an insurance claim after a death

Daly City sits beside the San Andreas Fault. The city's draft environmental impact report for the Serramonte Shopping Center expansion places the fault system as close as 0.9 miles southwest of the center, describes a magnitude 5.4 earthquake on March 22, 1957 centered near Mussel Rock that triggered landslides along Lake Merced and slope failures along State Route 1, and cites a USGS forecast of a 21 percent chance of a magnitude 6.7 or larger earthquake on the San Andreas Fault by 2036.

Think about what happens if a house is damaged while the estate is in limbo. Under Probate Code §8400 no one has power to administer an estate until letters issue; a named executor may only pay funeral expenses and take necessary measures to preserve the estate before then. A successor trustee does not wait for a court. The trustee can deal with the insurer, sign contracts for repairs and decide whether to rebuild or sell as soon as the trust's terms allow. When you fund the trust, tell your homeowner's and earthquake insurers that the house is now held in it, so the policy reflects the trustee as the owner.

Broadmoor, Colma and the city line

Not every house that people call Daly City is inside the city. The Census Bureau's 2024 Gazetteer lists Broadmoor as a census designated place rather than an incorporated city, and Wikipedia describes it as an unincorporated enclave entirely surrounded by Daly City. Colma is a separate town, with an estimated 1,385 residents in 2025. Daly City's own transfer tax ordinance reaches realty sold within the city, so a Broadmoor parcel is outside it, and Colma has its own rate in the California City Finance table. For a trust deed none of this changes the result: the deed carries the county exemption statement, it is recorded at the same Redwood City counter, and the probate it avoids would be heard at the same Hall of Justice. Daly City itself had an estimated 101,261 residents on July 1, 2025, against a 2020 base of 104,905.

When your children inherit the house

After a death, the San Mateo County Assessor needs a Change in Ownership Statement, Death of Real Property Owner (BOE-502-D), within 150 days to avoid a penalty. If the house goes to your children, the Assessor's FAQ says they must file the parent and child exclusion claim, BOE-19-P for deaths on or after February 16, 2021, or the property will be reassessed. That holds even if they sell: the possible reassessment covers the time between the death and the sale, and after a sale the children have only six months from the date of a supplemental or escape notice to submit the claim. The Assessor also asks to have a current address for the successor trustee.

Proposition 19 keeps the parent's factored base year value on a family home only if a child makes it his or her principal residence, and only up to that value plus $1,044,586 for transfers from February 16, 2025 through February 15, 2027, according to the Board of Equalization. At the typical Daly City value of $1,115,941, any part of the value is added only when the parent's factored base year value is below $71,355. A child who will rent the house out instead loses the parent's value. The trust does not change those rules, but it lets your trustee finish the transfer and file the claims without a court case. The Proposition 19 inheritance guide has the details.

How to Create and Fund a Living Trust in Daly City

1. Answer the questionnaireList each Daly City parcel you own and how title reads on your last deed, any ADU or in-law unit and any rental, your bank and brokerage accounts, your beneficiaries and your successor trustee. Answers save as you go.
2. Attorney prepares and reviews the documentsRozsa Gyene, a California attorney licensed since 2000, prepares the trust, pour-over will, durable power of attorney, advance health care directive and certification of trust from your answers, then reviews every document before sending the set to you.
3. Sign before a notarySign the trust and the power of attorney before any California notary public, in Daly City or elsewhere. The trust transfer deed must also carry a notary's acknowledgment before the San Mateo County recorder will take it.
4. Record the deed in Redwood CityRecord the trust transfer deed with the San Mateo County Clerk-Recorder Division, 555 County Center, 1st Floor, Redwood City, in person or by mail, with a Preliminary Change of Ownership Report, the county's Documentary Transfer Tax Affidavit, the $0 transfer tax statement and, for the home you live in, the SB 2 owner-occupier exemption. Our office prepares the deed for $100 per property; you record it.
5. Retitle bank and brokerage accountsGive each bank, credit union and brokerage the certification of trust and ask it to change the owner to you as trustee, or to name the trust as payable on death beneficiary where the institution allows it.
6. Check every beneficiary designationIRAs, 401(k) and 403(b) plans, pensions and life insurance pass by their own beneficiary forms, not by the trust. Make each primary and contingent beneficiary match your plan.

What the $400 Daly City Package Includes

• Revocable living trust
• Pour-over will
• Durable power of attorney
• Advance health care directive with HIPAA authorization
• Certification of trust
• Assignment of personal property
• Personal property memorandum
• Funding instructions

The package is $400 for one person and $500 for a married couple. A deed for your Daly City house, a rental or a condominium is $100 per property, prepared by our office for you to record in Redwood City. Call the attorney directly at (818) 337-4071. The office is at 3500 W. Olive Ave., Suite 300, Burbank, CA 91505, and you do not need to come in: you sign before a notary in Daly City or anywhere else in California. See what a California living trust costs for how the pricing compares.

Daly City Living Trust Questions

Related Pages

Sources

Checked October 7, 2026. Fees and addresses change; confirm with the office before you file or record.

1. Superior Court of California, County of San Mateo, Probate Division (clerk's office, hours, probate courtroom location)
2. San Mateo Superior Court, Court Judicial District and Geographical Areas (Northern and Southern Branch)
3. San Mateo Superior Court, documents required when filing a decedent's estate petition
4. San Mateo Superior Court, e-filing (mandatory for attorneys in probate since January 21, 2020)
5. San Mateo Superior Court, probate tentative rulings
6. Judicial Council, Statewide Civil Fee Schedule effective January 1, 2026
7. Judicial Council, Probate Code §890 adjusted dollar amounts
8. San Mateo County ACRE, office locations (Assessor, County Clerk-Recorder, Elections)
9. San Mateo County ACRE, County Clerk-Recorder Division: address, hours and phone
10. San Mateo County ACRE, How to Record a Document (requirements, mail recording, conformed copies)
11. San Mateo County ACRE, Possible Reasons Why Documents are Returned
12. San Mateo County ACRE, Recording Fees
13. San Mateo County ACRE, Documentary Transfer Tax and exemptions
14. San Mateo County ACRE, Documentary Transfer Tax Affidavit (DTTA)
15. San Mateo County ACRE, Documentary Transfer Tax Affidavit FAQs
16. San Mateo County ACRE, Recording Documents FAQs (City of San Mateo conveyance tax)
17. San Mateo County ACRE, SB 2 Building Homes and Jobs Act fee and declaration of exemption
18. San Mateo County ACRE, Preliminary Change of Ownership Report and the $20 penalty
19. San Mateo County Assessor, Change in Ownership (BOE-502-D within 150 days)
20. San Mateo County Assessor, Change in Ownership FAQs (inherited homes, parent and child claim)
21. Daly City Municipal Code, Chapter 3.24, Real Property Transfer Tax (§§3.24.010, 3.24.020, 3.24.090)
22. Daly City Municipal Code, Chapter 17.40 (§17.40.090 downstairs rooms; §§17.40.100 and 17.40.110 accessory dwelling units)
23. California City Finance, city documentary and property transfer tax rates (effective December 1, 2025)
24. City of Daly City, Serramonte Shopping Center Expansion Project Draft EIR, 4.5 Geology, Soils, and Seismicity
25. KQED, How Daly City Became One of the Most Densely Populated Cities in the Country (July 29, 2021)
26. U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey 2020 to 2024, DP04 housing profile, Daly City
27. U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey 2020 to 2024, DP05 age profile, Daly City
28. U.S. Census Bureau, Vintage 2025 city population estimates
29. U.S. Census Bureau, 2024 Gazetteer, California places (Daly City, Broadmoor CDP, Colma)
30. Wikipedia, Broadmoor, California (unincorporated enclave surrounded by Daly City)
31. Zillow Home Value Index, Daly City, August 31, 2026
32. Zillow Research data, city and neighborhood ZHVI files, August 31, 2026
33. Probate Code §10810, attorney compensation
34. Probate Code §10800, personal representative compensation
35. Probate Code §8961, probate referee commission
36. Probate Code §9100, creditor claim period
37. Probate Code §8400, no power to act before letters issue
38. Probate Code §7051, county of domicile
39. Probate Code §13151, primary residence petition
40. Probate Code §13200, affidavit for real property of small value
41. Revenue and Taxation Code §62, transfers into a revocable trust
42. Revenue and Taxation Code §480.3, $20 fee without a PCOR
43. Revenue and Taxation Code §11930, documentary transfer tax exemption
44. Government Code §27388, real estate fraud prosecution fee and its list of instruments
45. Government Code §27388.1, SB 2 recording fee and exemptions
46. Government Code §66315, no owner-occupant requirement for ADUs
47. AB 2224 (Stats. 2026, ch. 292), recording fees from January 1, 2027
48. California State Board of Equalization, Proposition 19