When and Why to Review Your Florida Estate Plan: A Guide for Out-of-State and Dual-State Owners

You should review your Florida estate plan at least every three to five years, and sooner whenever a major life event, a property transaction, or a change in the law affects how your assets will pass at death. A review is not a rewrite — it is a deliberate check to confirm that your will, trust, beneficiary designations, and incapacity documents still reflect your wishes and still work under current Florida law. For people who own property in more than one state, that check carries extra weight, because a plan drafted in New York or New Jersey rarely accounts for Florida’s homestead rules, its elective share, or its self-proving will requirements.

I practice estate planning in Palm Beach County, and a large share of my clients are people who kept a home up north and bought or inherited a place here — a condo in West Palm Beach, a house in Jupiter, a unit in Boca. Their plans are usually fine on paper. The trouble is that the paper was written for a different state, and Florida does not quietly defer to another jurisdiction’s assumptions. Below is how I think about the question of when to review, and why it matters more for dual-state owners than almost anyone else.

Why a Florida estate plan needs periodic review

An estate plan is a snapshot of three moving things: your assets, your family, and the law. All three drift. A trust funded with a brokerage account in 2015 may now hold real property in two states. A child who was a minor when you signed your will may now be married with creditors of their own. And the statutes that govern probate, homestead, and incapacity get amended more often than most people realize.

The cost of skipping a review is rarely visible until it is too late. A stale beneficiary designation on a retirement account overrides whatever your will says — full stop. An unfunded revocable trust does nothing, no matter how carefully it was drafted. A power of attorney signed before 2011 may not satisfy Florida’s current durable power of attorney statute, found in Chapter 709, Florida Statutes, which requires specific authority to be enumerated rather than granted in broad strokes. These are not theoretical problems. They surface at the worst possible moment, when someone is incapacitated or has died and the family is left to clean up the gap.

Life events that should trigger an immediate review

Set the calendar reminder, but do not wait for it if any of the following happen. Each of these can quietly break a plan that was sound the day before.

• You move to Florida or establish Florida residency. This is the single most common reason my clients need a fresh plan. Domicile changes the law that governs your estate, your homestead protection, and even your state tax exposure.
• You buy, sell, or retitle real property — especially in a second state. Florida real estate held in your individual name will generally require ancillary probate here even if your primary estate is administered elsewhere.
• Marriage, divorce, or the death of a spouse. Florida’s elective share gives a surviving spouse a claim to 30% of the elective estate under Section 732.2065, Florida Statutes, regardless of what your will says, unless that right was waived.
• The birth or adoption of a child or grandchild. New beneficiaries, new guardianship questions.
• A significant change in net worth. A liquidity event, an inheritance, or the sale of a business can push you into federal estate tax planning territory.
• A beneficiary or named fiduciary dies, becomes incapacitated, or develops a problem — addiction, divorce, a lawsuit, a special need that calls for a different structure.
• You or a beneficiary move out of state or out of the country. Cross-border beneficiaries complicate trust administration and tax reporting.

The dual-state and out-of-state owner problem

If you split your year between a northern home and a Florida one, you have a planning question most single-state residents never face: which state’s law governs, and what happens to the property left in the “other” state? Florida real property is governed by Florida law for purposes of transfer at death. That means a New York revocable trust, however well drafted, will not avoid a Florida probate proceeding unless the Florida property has actually been deeded into the trust or otherwise titled to pass outside probate.

This is where a coordinated review pays for itself. The most reliable way to keep a Florida home out of probate is to retitle it — typically by deeding it into your revocable trust, or by using a properly structured life estate or enhanced life estate (commonly called a “lady bird”) deed. For clients who want to keep an interest in their property while directing where it goes at death, the mechanics of are worth understanding, because the same conceptual tools exist in Florida with different statutory contours. The point of a review is to make sure the deed, the trust, and the will all tell the same story.

Florida-specific rules that catch out-of-state plans off guard

Homestead is not just a tax break

Out-of-state owners often think of “homestead” as the property-tax exemption on the November bill. In Florida it is also a constitutional restriction on how you can leave your home. Under Article X, Section 4 of the Florida Constitution, if you are survived by a spouse or a minor child, you generally cannot freely devise your homestead. A will that leaves the house to one child, or to a trust, can be partially or wholly invalid as to that property if the homestead restrictions are not respected. A plan imported from another state almost never accounts for this, and it is one of the first things I check on review.

Will execution and self-proving formalities

Florida requires that a will be signed at the end by the testator and witnessed by two people who sign in the presence of the testator and each other, under Section 732.502, Florida Statutes. To avoid the need to track down witnesses years later, Florida allows a self-proving affidavit. Holographic (unwitnessed handwritten) wills and oral wills are not valid in Florida even if they were valid where you signed them. A document that passed muster up north may need to be re-executed here. A review catches that before it becomes a probate dispute.

Ancillary probate on the Florida property

When a non-resident dies owning Florida real estate in their own name, the estate must usually open an ancillary administration in the Florida county where the property sits, governed by Chapter 734, Florida Statutes. That means two probate proceedings, two sets of fees, and two timelines. Coordinating the plan so the Florida asset passes by trust, deed, or other non-probate mechanism is often the whole reason a dual-state client comes to see me.

Tax and benefit changes worth a fresh look

Florida has no state estate tax and no state income tax, which is part of why people establish residency here. But the federal estate and gift tax exemption is scheduled to change, and the figure that protects a large estate today may be roughly half that after a sunset. If your taxable estate is anywhere near the exemption — or could grow into it — your plan should be reviewed with that horizon in mind. For families with charitable goals or income-sensitive beneficiaries, more specialized vehicles come into play. A , for example, can preserve Medicaid eligibility for a disabled or elderly beneficiary while still allowing surplus income to be used for their benefit — the kind of structure that only surfaces when someone sits down and re-examines an existing plan against current circumstances.

If your plan has any Florida component, it also makes sense to have it reviewed by counsel admitted here. Our colleagues handling see the homestead and ancillary-probate issues every week, and the fixes are usually straightforward once the gap is identified.

How a review actually works

A proper review is not just re-reading the will. I walk clients through a short, ordered checklist:

1. Confirm domicile. Where do you actually intend to be a resident, and does your paperwork support it?
2. Inventory titling. How is each asset titled — individual, joint, trust, payable-on-death? Titling, not the will, controls most transfers.
3. Audit beneficiary designations. Retirement accounts, life insurance, and annuities pass by designation and ignore the will entirely.
4. Verify trust funding. An unfunded trust is an empty box. Florida real property in particular must be deeded in.
5. Stress-test the fiduciaries. Are your personal representative, trustee, and agents still willing, able, and (for a personal representative) qualified under Florida law?
6. Check incapacity documents. Durable power of attorney, health care surrogate, and living will should meet current Florida statutory standards.
7. Reconcile across states. Make sure your Florida and out-of-state documents do not contradict each other.

Most reviews end with a few targeted updates — a re-executed will, a new deed, a corrected beneficiary form — rather than a wholesale redo. You can start that process on our contact page, and our overviews of Florida wills and Florida probate explain the underlying rules in more depth.

The bottom line

Estate plans age. They age faster when your life is spread across two states and your documents were written with only one of them in mind. Reviewing your Florida estate plan on a regular cadence — and immediately after any move, marriage, purchase, or major change — is the cheapest insurance you can buy against a probate surprise. The families who avoid the worst outcomes are almost always the ones who treated their plan as a living document, not a binder on a shelf.

Frequently Asked Questions

How often should I review my Florida estate plan?

Review it at least every three to five years as a baseline, and immediately whenever a major event occurs — a move or change of residency, marriage or divorce, the birth or death of a family member, a significant change in assets, or the purchase or sale of real property. Changes in federal estate tax law or Florida statutes are also good triggers for a fresh look.

I have a will from another state and a home in Florida. Is it still valid?

Often yes, but with caveats. Florida recognizes wills validly executed in another state, except for handwritten (holographic) and oral wills, which are invalid here regardless of where signed. The bigger issue is that an out-of-state plan rarely addresses Florida’s homestead restrictions, elective share, or the ancillary probate that Florida real property usually requires. A review by Florida counsel is the safest way to confirm it works as intended.

Will a revocable trust keep my Florida property out of probate?

Only if the property is actually titled in the trust. A revocable trust avoids probate for assets that have been transferred into it. If your Florida home is still deeded in your individual name, it will generally require a Florida probate (often an ancillary administration if you reside elsewhere), no matter what your trust says. Funding the trust by deeding the property in is the step people most often miss.

What is Florida's homestead restriction and why does it matter to my plan?

Under the Florida Constitution, if you are survived by a spouse or a minor child, you generally cannot freely leave your homestead to anyone you choose — including to a trust. A devise that ignores these restrictions can be invalid as to the home, redirecting it by operation of law. Out-of-state plans almost never account for this, which is why it is one of the first items reviewed for dual-state owners.

Does moving to Florida change my estate plan automatically?

No. Establishing Florida residency changes which state’s law governs your estate and incapacity documents, but your existing documents do not update themselves. You should have your will, trust, durable power of attorney, and health care directives reviewed and, where needed, re-executed to meet current Florida statutory requirements after a move.