Reviewed by Rozsa Gyene, California attorney. Last reviewed October 2026.
Probate for every Fontana ZIP code is filed and heard at the Fontana Courthouse on Arrow Boulevard. On Zillow's August 2026 typical Fontana home value of $633,683, statutory attorney and executor fees would total $31,347.32. An attorney-prepared living trust is $400 for one person or $500 for a couple.
To keep a Fontana home out of probate, sign a revocable living trust and record a trust transfer deed with the San Bernardino County Recorder. Without that deed, a home at Zillow's August 2026 typical Fontana value of $633,683 goes through probate at the Fontana Courthouse, where statutory attorney and executor fees under Probate Code §10810 and §10800 come to $31,347.32. The trust is $400 for one person or $500 for a married couple.
For Fontana families the probate court is inside the city limits. San Bernardino County used to hear probate downtown at the San Bernardino Justice Center on West Third Street. The court moved probate hearings to three courtrooms at the Fontana Courthouse and one in Victorville beginning September 5, 2023, according to its press release of July 20, 2023, and then moved the probate clerk's office and all in-person probate services out of the Justice Center to the Fontana District on February 13, 2024. Older websites that still send Fontana families to Third Street are out of date.
The current rule is the Presiding Judge's General Order GO26-032, "Where Probate Cases Are Filed and Heard," effective January 1, 2026 through December 31, 2027. It sorts every case by the ZIP code where the person lived. Fontana's ZIP codes, 92331, 92334, 92335, 92336 and 92337, are all on the Fontana Courthouse list, along with the rest of the valley and mountain communities from Chino and Upland to Redlands, Yucaipa and Lake Arrowhead. High Desert ZIP codes such as Victorville, Hesperia and Barstow go to the Victorville District at 14455 Civic Drive. So if a parent lived in Fontana and a child lives in Hesperia, the case is still filed in Fontana, because the decedent's home controls.
The court describes electronic filing in its Probate Division as voluntary, for attorneys and self-represented parties alike. Probate notes, the examiner's list of what a petition is missing, are posted on the court's Court Access Portal two weeks before the hearing and stay up for seven days after it, so the person handling the estate has to check them before each hearing. None of that applies to a trust administration. A successor trustee works from the trust document and a recorded affidavit, with no petition, no probate notes and no court file open to the public.
Signing the trust does not move your Fontana house into it. The deed does. It runs from you as owner to you as trustee, describes the parcel by its legal description and Assessor's Parcel Number, and is recorded at the Hall of Records on Hospitality Lane in San Bernardino. On the PCOR you check the box for a transfer into a revocable trust. Under Revenue and Taxation Code §62(d) that transfer is not a change in ownership, so your Proposition 13 base year value stays where it is and no supplemental tax bill follows. Our living trust property tax guide explains the rule in more detail.
One local quirk: the Assessor's "Fontana" district office is not in Fontana. It is on Haven Avenue in Rancho Cucamonga and handles assessments for Fontana, Rialto, Bloomington, Devore and Lytle Creek. That is the office to call about your parcel's assessed value or exemptions; the deed itself is recorded at the Hall of Records.
San Bernardino County charges documentary transfer tax at $0.55 for each $500 of value on taxable conveyances over $100. A deed into your own revocable trust involves no sale, so the tax is $0.00, with the Revenue and Taxation Code §11930 exemption stated on the face of the deed. Our office prepares the deed and PCOR for a separate $100 per property, and you record it yourself. Page fees change on January 1, 2027, when AB 2224 (Stats. 2026, ch. 292) sets the Government Code §27361 base fee at $15.00 for the first page and $4.00 for each additional page; the county's own add-on fees are charged on top of that base. See our trust transfer deed guide for the deed itself.
Zillow's Home Value Index put the typical home value in Fontana at $633,683 for August 2026 (data through August 31, 2026), up about 0.2% from a year earlier. We use that typical value, not a sale price median, for the math. Probate Code §10810 sets the attorney's fee as a percentage of the gross estate: 4% of the first $100,000, 3% of the next $100,000 and 2% of the next $800,000. The value is gross, so a mortgage does not reduce it. Probate Code §10800 gives the executor the same amount.
Run your own numbers in the probate cost calculator
Our California probate fees guide explains each charge. The small estate affidavit under Probate Code §13100 stops at $208,850 for deaths on or after April 1, 2025, far below any Fontana house. The Probate Code §13151 petition for a primary residence reaches $750,000, which covers the typical Fontana home today, but it is still a court petition at the Fontana Courthouse with the same $435 filing fee, and it does nothing for a rental or a second parcel. Compare those costs with a $400 trust for one person or $500 for a married couple.
Fontana values cluster close to the §13151 limit, which is why the "my house is small enough" assumption is risky here. Zillow's August 2026 neighborhood figures for Fontana:
What counts under §13151 is the home's gross value at the date of death, not today. Zillow's citywide figure was $354,980 in August 2016, so the typical Fontana home has gained about 79% in ten years. A Sierra Lakes or Morningside house a few thousand dollars under the line now can be over it by the time it matters, and then the family is in a full probate with the fees in the table above. A Hunter's Ridge home at $752,750 would already carry $18,055.00 a side, $36,110.00 together. A recorded trust deed takes the question off the table.
Much of Fontana's housing is recent. Of 61,759 housing units counted in the Census Bureau's 2024 American Community Survey, 22,625 (about 37%) were built in 2000 or later, and another 15,101 in the 1980s. Parts of the city lie in Community Facilities Districts, also called Mello-Roos districts, which the City of Fontana describes as areas where owners voted to impose special taxes or assessments. Some districts issue bonds for streets, sewers and storm drains; others pay for ongoing upkeep of street lighting, landscaping and parks. The special tax is collected by the San Bernardino County Treasurer-Tax Collector with your property taxes.
For a trust, two points follow. The deed into your trust does not end or change the special tax; you keep paying it as trustee, and your successor trustee keeps paying it after you. And when the house is sold, Civil Code §1102.6b generally requires the seller to give the buyer a Notice of Special Tax. A successor trustee selling during the trust administration may fall under the fiduciary exemption in Civil Code §1102.2(d), which does not apply if the trustee is a former owner or lived in the house within the past year. Either way, keep your most recent property tax bill, which shows the district charges, with the trust papers. The city notes that bond-financed districts typically run about 30 years.
Fontana households average 3.6 persons in the same 2024 survey, which counts 37,934 owner-occupied homes out of 60,075 occupied units, about 63%. When an adult child lives in the parents' house, Proposition 19 matters. The parent and child exclusion keeps a parent's low property tax base only if at least one inheriting child makes the house a principal residence and files for the homeowners' exemption within one year, and the protection is capped at the old taxable value plus $1,044,586 for transfers from February 16, 2025 to February 15, 2027. The BOE-19-P claim goes to the San Bernardino County Assessor within three years of the death.
A trust is where you decide what happens when one child lives in the house and the others do not. It can leave the house to the child who lives there and equalize the others with other assets, give that child time to buy out siblings, or direct a sale. Without those instructions the successor trustee has only an even split. Our Prop 19 inheritance guide covers the rule in full.
The 2024 survey counts 2,102 mobile homes in Fontana. A manufactured home titled with the California Department of Housing and Community Development is not deeded at the Hall of Records. It goes into the trust through an HCD title transfer. For a home taxed by the county (local property tax), HCD's instructions for a transfer into a trust call for the signed certificate of title, the department's multi-purpose transfer form signed by each trustee, and a tax clearance certificate from the county tax collector showing the trust as applicant. If you also own the lot under the home, the lot is real property and needs its own recorded deed.
A. B. Miller bought land in what was then called Rosena in 1905, the town took the name Fontana in 1913, and the city incorporated on June 25, 1952. Its ranches and citrus groves changed during World War II, when Henry J. Kaiser opened the Kaiser Steel mill on the outskirts of town in 1942; the city says the mill remained a primary source of jobs until it ceased operation in 1984. The city had 208,393 residents in the 2020 Census, second in San Bernardino County, and the 2024 survey estimate is 218,453. The largest employers in the city's 2023 principal employer figures, as reported on Wikipedia, are Kaiser Permanente (9,677 employees), the Fontana Unified School District (5,983) and Amazon (3,145). Pensions, 401(k) and 403(b) plans, and group life insurance from those employers pass by beneficiary designation, outside both the trust and the will. When we prepare your trust we go through those designations with you so they fit the plan.
The City of Fontana's fire hazard severity zone page explains the state's hazard zones and links an interactive map for checking a parcel. After your house is deeded to the trust, ask your insurer to add the trust and you as trustee to the homeowner's policy, and keep the policy number with your trust papers. If a fire or other loss comes while you are ill, the successor trustee can deal with the insurer and the rebuild for property the trust holds, and the durable power of attorney in the package covers anything left outside it.
Some Fontana owners also hold a rental in Riverside County or a family house in Los Angeles County. Each parcel needs its own deed recorded in the county where the land is. A trust that holds the Fontana house but not the Moreno Valley rental leaves the rental for a probate in Riverside County, where the first filing fee is $450, not $435.
The trust is $400 for one person and $500 for a married couple; deed preparation for your Fontana house is a separate $100 per property. You can reach the attorney's office directly at (818) 337-4071, and you sign before any California notary in San Bernardino County. See what a California living trust costs for the full price list.
At the Fontana Courthouse, 17780 Arrow Boulevard, Fontana, CA 92335. The court's General Order GO26-032, effective January 1, 2026, assigns probate cases for all five Fontana ZIP codes (92331, 92334, 92335, 92336 and 92337) to that courthouse. The probate clerk's office moved there from the San Bernardino Justice Center on February 13, 2024, and the Justice Center no longer handles probate. A funded living trust keeps your Fontana home out of that court entirely.
Zillow put the typical Fontana home value at $633,683 for August 2026. On that value Probate Code §10810 allows the attorney $15,673.66 and Probate Code §10800 allows the executor the same, $31,347.32 together, before the $435 filing fee, the probate referee and publication costs. The fees are figured on the gross value, so a mortgage does not reduce them. A trust is $400 for one person or $500 for a married couple.
Sometimes, but it is still a court case. For deaths on or after April 1, 2025, Probate Code §13151 lets heirs ask the court to transfer a primary residence worth up to $750,000 without a full probate. It requires a petition at the Fontana Courthouse with a $435 filing fee, at least 40 days after the death, and notice to the heirs. It does not cover a rental or a second property, and several Fontana neighborhoods already have typical values above $750,000. A recorded trust deed avoids the petition.
You sign a trust transfer deed from yourself as owner to yourself as trustee and record it at the San Bernardino County Hall of Records, 222 W. Hospitality Lane, San Bernardino, with a Preliminary Change of Ownership Report. Under the county's July 1, 2026 fee schedule the first page of a trust transfer deed is $14.00 (the $24.00 rate is for document types that carry the Real Estate Fraud fee, such as quitclaim deeds and deeds of trust), and each additional page is $3.00. Our office prepares the deed for a separate $100 per property, and you record it.
No. Revenue and Taxation Code §62(d) says a transfer into your own revocable trust is not a change in ownership, so the Assessor keeps your Proposition 13 base year value. Any Community Facilities District special tax on a Fontana parcel stays on the county tax bill after the deed is recorded, and you keep paying it as trustee, just as before.
The trust avoids probate but does not change Proposition 19. Your Fontana home keeps its tax base only if at least one inheriting child makes it a principal residence and files for the homeowners' exemption within one year, and the protection is capped at the old taxable value plus $1,044,586 for transfers from February 16, 2025 to February 15, 2027. The BOE-19-P claim is due within three years. A trust can say which child receives the house and how the others are paid.
A manufactured home titled with the California Department of Housing and Community Development is not deeded at the county recorder. It moves into the trust through an HCD title transfer, using the department's forms; for a home taxed by the county, HCD also asks for a tax clearance certificate from the county tax collector. If the home sits on land you own, the land itself still needs a recorded deed.
No. You answer the questionnaire online, the attorney prepares and reviews the documents, and you sign the trust and power of attorney before any California notary public, including one in Fontana. The pour-over will is signed before two witnesses. You can reach the attorney's office at (818) 337-4071.
Checked October 6, 2026. Fees and addresses change; confirm with the office before you file or record.
Answer the questionnaire online, sign before a notary near home, and record one deed at the Hall of Records.
Law Offices of Rozsa Gyene, 3500 W. Olive Ave., Suite 300, Burbank, CA 91505. California State Bar #208356. Read client reviews.
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California State Bar #208356 | Licensed Since 2000
25+ years estate planning experience in California