Inherited a California home? The clock started the day they died.
California attaches a dozen deadlines to an inherited home — and the most expensive one runs out at twelve months, right when a grieving family is least able to notice. Enter one date and see all of them, with what each costs if you miss it.
Free · nothing to install · educational estimate, not legal or tax advice
Five questions
Nothing you enter leaves your browser. There's no account and nothing is submitted unless you request the reminders below.
For property-tax purposes, California treats the date of death as the date of transfer.
This single answer decides whether the low Prop 13 tax base survives.
Only used to decide whether federal estate-tax deadlines appear. The federal exclusion is $15,000,000 for deaths in 2026; it was lower in earlier years, so use the figure for the year of death.
Optional: two dates that sharpen the results
Starts the 120-day trust contest window.
Starts the four-month creditor claim window.
Enter a date of death to start the clock.
Your deadlines will appear here, in order.
I'll remind you before each deadline.
Settling an estate takes months, and the twelve-month Prop 19 deadline lands almost exactly when families stop thinking about paperwork. Give me the date of death and I'll send a written version of this timeline, then a reminder ahead of each deadline that still applies. No cost, and I'll tell you plainly if you don't need a broker at all.
The Trustee’s First 30 Days
The deadline clock tells you when. This tells you what to actually do, in what order, starting the week you were handed the job.
Download the PDF — free, no form
Call or text. You get me, not an assistant, and there is no obligation attached to it.
What heirs ask me first
Which deadline actually costs the most money?
The one-year mark, almost always. Under Prop 19, an inherited home keeps its low Prop 13 tax base only if a child moves in as their principal residence and files for the homeowners' exemption within one year of the date of death. Miss it and the home is reassessed at market value. On a Cupertino or Santa Cruz home held since the 1980s, that's routinely a five-figure annual swing — every year, forever.
The cruelty of it is the timing: twelve months after a death is usually when a family has finally stopped dealing with paperwork.
We're not planning to move in. Do the Prop 19 deadlines still matter?
The occupancy deadline stops mattering, but the reassessment doesn't. A home kept as a rental is reassessed at full market value, which changes the keep-versus-sell math considerably. The 150-day change-in-ownership filing still applies no matter what you do with the house, and the step-up in basis still makes the date-of-death valuation worth getting right early.
What is the value cap I keep reading about?
Even when a child does move in, the exclusion isn't unlimited. The excluded amount is the property's factored base year value plus an inflation-adjusted allowance — $1,044,586 for transfers dated February 16, 2025 through February 15, 2027. If market value exceeds that sum, the difference is added to the taxable value. The Board of Equalization re-sets this figure every two years, so the number that applies is the one in effect on the date of death.
The death was before February 16, 2021. Is this different?
Yes, substantially. Transfers dated before February 16, 2021 fall under the older Propositions 58 and 193, which had no move-in requirement and treated principal residences far more generously. This tool flags that and stops showing the Prop 19 items. If that's your situation, the deadlines that still matter are the filing ones — talk to your attorney about the old-law claim forms.
Is this legal or tax advice?
No. I'm a real estate broker, not an attorney or a CPA, and this tool is general education built from published California and IRS sources. Estates have edge cases this can't see — partial interests, multiple heirs moving in and out, disclaimers, farms, out-of-state property, contested trusts. Every deadline here should be confirmed with your attorney and tax advisor, who have the final word. What I can do is run the property side and give your advisors numbers they can rely on.
Do you keep what I enter?
Not from the calculator — all of that math runs in your browser and is never transmitted. The only information that reaches me is what you type into the reminder form above, and only if you submit it.
The fine print, stated plainly: this page is general education, not legal or tax advice, and no attorney-client or fiduciary relationship is created by using it. Deadlines are calculated from published California Board of Equalization, California Probate Code, and Internal Revenue Code sources current as of August 2026. Statutes change, county assessors differ in practice, and many of these rules have exceptions this tool cannot account for. Confirm every date with your own attorney and CPA before relying on it.
The house shouldn't be the hardest part.
Whether you sell through me or not, I'll walk you through where you stand — the date-of-death valuation, the Prop 19 math, and what the keep-rent-sell decision looks like in actual dollars. First conversation is information, not obligation.
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City of Santa Cruz only: Measure C and inherited homes. Since July 1, 2026 the City of Santa Cruz has charged a graduated transfer tax on the portion of a sale price above $1.8 million — 0.5% to $2.5M, 1% to $3.5M, 1.5% to $4.5M, 2% above that, capped at $200,000. It is on top of the county’s $1.10 per $1,000 and it is marginal, so a $2.6M sale owes $4,500.
The distinction that catches people: the transfer from the person who died, or out of their trust, to the heirs or beneficiaries is exempt (Santa Cruz Municipal Code 3.34.258, adopting Rev. & Tax. Code §11930). The subsequent sale to a buyer is fully taxable — SCMC 3.34.160(b) applies the tax “regardless of the method by which the transfer is accomplished or the relationship of the parties.” Inheriting the house does not exempt selling it. This applies inside city limits only, not to unincorporated county, Capitola, Scotts Valley or Watsonville. The net proceeds calculator accounts for it.