Suze Orman

All right, Katie.

Where?

Yeah.

So here's the big thing, Amber.

Obviously, California real estate, depending on where it is, has gone up tremendously in value.

So when you inherit this house from him, hopefully via a trust, so there's no probate fees, because probate fees in the state of California are statutory, will take anywhere from one to two years.

You want to make sure that the house is left to you via that living revocable trust that he's about to do with you while you're there with the attorney.

However,

All right, so you get this house and now you get a step up in cost basis on it, whatever it's worth the day that you inherit it.

However, you're also going to see that it's worth far more than when he probably bought it and the property taxes are going to have skyrocketed unless you do something that they allow in California.

And it's called Prop 19.

And

And this is when a parent leaves a property to a child, and it's excluded from a step-up in property taxes as long as you, the child, moves into that house within one year, and you live in it as your primary residency.

If you do that...

then you're going to be able to keep whatever property taxes your father has been paying for all these years.

That's going to be your property tax.

And you do not want to lose that on any level.

So you're going to have to do certain things with it.

Talk to the lawyer about it, but you're going to have to file for homeowner's exemption.

and all these things.