Miami probate litigation attorney

A Miami probate litigation attorney handles the estates that are fought over rather than filed — a will challenged, a trustee who will not account, a family in Caracas or Bogotá discovering that none of them can serve as personal representative of a Brickell condo. Contested estates in Miami-Dade are heard in the Probate Division of the Eleventh Judicial Circuit, at the Osvaldo N. Soto Miami-Dade Justice Center, 20 NW 1st Avenue, Suite 6.223, Miami, FL 33128.

Jose M. Lorenzo, Jr. served as a judicial clerk in the Probate Division of the Eleventh Judicial Circuit, to the Honorable Maria M. Korvick — the same division where these cases are decided. He handles contested probate and trust matters in all 67 Florida counties, in English and in Spanish. The initial consultation is free.

Updated August 7, 2026. Every statute on this page was read against the current Florida Statutes, and the Miami-Dade filing rules confirmed against the Clerk and the Eleventh Circuit, this week. The deadline that ends most cases before they start is §733.212(3) — 3 months, not 90 days, from service of the notice of administration.

What counts as probate litigation in Miami?

Any estate or trust dispute a judge has to decide rather than a clerk record. Uncontested probate is paperwork. Litigation begins when two people who both have standing disagree about the document, the money, or the person holding it.

Dispute	What is actually contested	Governing section
Will contest	How the document was made — capacity, undue influence, execution	§732.5165
Revocation of probate	A will already admitted, challenged before final discharge	§733.109
Removing a personal representative	Conduct after appointment — waste, conflict, refusal to account	§733.504
Who may serve at all	Whether a non-resident relative even qualifies	§733.304
Trust contest	A trust or amendment procured by influence, fraud or duress	§736.0406
Breach of fiduciary duty	A trustee’s accounting, distributions, self-dealing or silence	§736.0802
Emergency loss of assets	Property being moved out of the court’s reach right now	§733.501

Two rows on that table are Miami’s own. In no other Florida county does the question of who may serve and the question of where the assets already went arise as often, and both are driven by the same fact: a very large share of Miami-Dade estates involve someone who lived, or still lives, outside the United States.

What happens when someone dies outside Florida owning Miami real estate?

Florida probate is still required — as an ancillary administration under §734.102.

The statute applies whenever “a nonresident of this state dies leaving assets in this state, credits due from residents in this state, or liens on property in this state.” A Brickell condo, a Key Biscayne apartment, a Doral warehouse, a mortgage owed by a Miami resident — each is exactly that.

What §734.102 sets out:

• Who gets the letters, in order. A personal representative “specifically designated in the decedent’s will to administer the Florida property”, if qualified. Failing that, the foreign personal representative, if qualified to act in Florida. Failing that, a qualified person chosen by those holding a majority interest in the Florida property.
• The foreign will can be admitted. “If the will and any codicils are executed as required by the code, they shall be admitted to probate.”
• The ancillary representative has real power — the same rights and authority as any Florida personal representative to manage and settle the estate, including selling, leasing or mortgaging the Florida property.
• Creditor notice still runs under Chapter 733.

There is a second, quieter route. §734.104 allows an authenticated copy of a non-resident’s will devising Florida real property to be admitted to record — but only after 2 years from the death, or after the domiciliary personal representative has been discharged, and only if no Florida administration was ever opened. Once recorded it is “as valid and effectual to pass title to real property … as if the will had been admitted to probate in this state.”

Where this becomes litigation: the family abroad assumes the executor appointed in Caracas, Bogotá, Buenos Aires or New York automatically controls the Miami property. They do not, automatically. Priority is fixed by §734.102, and while the fight runs the condo sits — accruing assessments, taxes and insurance nobody has authority to pay.

Can the family serve as personal representative if they live abroad?

Often not, and this is the single most common shock in a Miami estate.

§733.304 is short and absolute:

“A person who is not domiciled in the state cannot qualify as personal representative unless the person is: (1) A legally adopted child or adoptive parent of the decedent; (2) Related by lineal consanguinity to the decedent; (3) A spouse or a brother, sister, uncle, aunt, nephew, or niece of the decedent, or someone related by lineal consanguinity to any such person; or (4) The spouse of a person otherwise qualified under this section.”

Read what that list leaves out. A non-resident stepchild does not qualify. A non-resident cousin does not qualify — a cousin is collateral, not lineal. A non-resident close friend, business partner or long-term companion does not qualify. The person the will actually names may be legally incapable of serving, however clear the will is.

Non-resident nominee	Qualifies under §733.304?
Child, grandchild, parent, grandparent	Yes — lineal consanguinity
Spouse, brother, sister, uncle, aunt, nephew, niece	Yes — named in the statute
Spouse of any of the above	Yes — subsection (4)
Legally adopted child or adoptive parent	Yes — subsection (1)
Cousin	No — collateral, not lineal
Stepchild, not adopted	No
Friend, partner, colleague, named executor abroad	No

When the nominee fails §733.304, someone else must be appointed, and who that is becomes the first contested proceeding in the estate — often before anyone has argued about the will at all.

How long do you have to contest a will in Miami?

Three months from the date you are served with the notice of administration, under §733.212(3). Miss it and the objection is “forever barred.”

• It is 3 calendar months, not 90 days. Served 1 January, the deadline is 1 April — 91 days, wider in a leap year.
• It runs from service, not from the death and not from when you found out. Two siblings served two weeks apart have two different deadlines.
• It extends only for estoppel based on a misstatement by the personal representative about the deadline itself, and never past the earlier of final discharge or one year after service.

If you were never served, that clock has not started against you. Relatives outside the United States are frequently not served promptly, and in Miami that is the rule rather than the exception. Check it before anyone concludes it is too late.

Every other clock that decides these cases:

Clock	Period	Section
Objection after service of the notice of administration	3 months	§733.212(3)
Petition to revoke probate	Before final discharge	§733.109
Creditor claim after first publication	3 months	§733.702
Creditor claim, absolute outer bar	2 years from death	§733.710
Suing a trustee over a matter disclosed in an accounting	6 months from receipt	§736.1008
Contesting a revocable trust	Not until it becomes irrevocable or the settlor dies	§736.0207
Foreign will admitted to record instead of probated	2 years after death	§734.104
Custodian’s duty to deposit the original will	10 days after learning of the death	§732.901

How do you contest a will in Florida?

By filing in the probate case, as an interested person, on a statutory ground, before the clock in §733.212(3) runs.

§731.201(23) defines an interested person as “any person who may reasonably be expected to be affected by the outcome of the particular proceeding involved.” The practical test: would you receive more if this will fell than you receive under it?

• You can usually contest even if you are not named, so long as you would take without the will — as an intestate heir, or under an earlier will this one replaced. Being written out is not a bar to standing; it is often the evidence.
• A step-child normally cannot, unless legally adopted or named in a prior will.
• A surviving spouse has rights that require contesting nothing — the 30% elective share under §732.2065, available whatever the will says. Price that first; it is frequently larger and far cheaper than a contest.
• Standing is issue-specific. A creditor is an interested person for the questions that touch the debt and no further.

What are the grounds for contesting a will?

Not that the split feels unfair. §732.5165 is one sentence:

“A will is void if the execution is procured by fraud, duress, mistake, or undue influence.”

Four grounds, plus two more from elsewhere in the code:

• Undue influence — someone in a position of trust overbore the testator’s free will. The most common ground by a wide margin.
• Lack of testamentary capacity — measured at the moment of signing, which is why a dementia diagnosis is evidence and not proof.
• Improper execution — §732.502 requires signature at the end, before two attesting witnesses who sign in the presence of the testator and of each other. This is where foreign and out-of-state wills fail, because other countries and other states set entirely different requirements.
• Fraud, duress or mistake.
• Revocation by a later will or codicil.

Two features change strategy: only the part so procured is void — the rest of the will stands — and a procured revocation is also void, which can bring an earlier will back into force.

How do you prove undue influence?

Often you do not have to prove it outright.

Under §733.107(1) the proponent establishes proper execution, and the burden then moves to the challenger. Then subsection (2): where the presumption of undue influence applies, it is a presumption that shifts the burden of proof under ss. 90.301–90.304, “adopted to implement the public policy of this state against abuse of fiduciary or confidential relationships.”

Once it triggers, the favoured beneficiary must disprove undue influence.

Florida courts look at whether the beneficiary stood in a confidential relationship, was substantially benefited, and was active in procuring the will — being present at the signing, recommending the attorney, knowing the contents beforehand, instructing the drafter, securing the witnesses, keeping the will afterwards.

What to gather: medical records for the twelve months around signing; who made the appointment, drove, sat in the room and paid; bank and brokerage statements showing new joint accounts, signature cards or powers of attorney; the drafting attorney’s file; evidence of isolation, which in Miami often means a relative newly arrived from abroad who becomes the only point of contact; and the timing relative to a hospitalisation.

How do you contest a trust in Florida?

Two different attacks, and confusing them costs cases. Almost every trust litigation matter out of Miami-Dade is one or the other, and the deadline, the proof and the remedy differ for each.

Attacking how the trust was made. §736.0406: “If the creation, amendment, or restatement of a trust is procured by fraud, duress, mistake, or undue influence, the trust or any part so procured is void.” It also voids a procured revocation.

Note that amendments and restatements are covered. The common Miami case is not an attack on a twenty-year-old trust — it is an attack on the amendment signed weeks before the death that moved a condo, an account, or everything, to one child.

Attacking what the trustee has done since. That is breach of trust, under §736.1001 and §736.0802. Different proof, different remedies, different clock.

§736.0207: you cannot contest a revocable trust until it becomes irrevocable or the settlor dies. The evidence has to be preserved before then.

Can a trustee sell trust property without the beneficiaries approving?

Often yes — but not if the trustee is on both sides of the sale. In a county where the trust asset is usually a condominium, this is the trust question that arrives most.

§736.0802(1): “a trustee shall administer the trust solely in the interests of the beneficiaries.”

Subsection (2) decides cases. A sale entered into by the trustee “for the trustee’s own personal account or which is otherwise affected by a conflict between the trustee’s fiduciary and personal interests is voidable by a beneficiary.”

And subsection (3) does the hard work for you. A conflict is presumed where the trustee transacts with:

• the trustee’s spouse
• the trustee’s descendants, siblings or parents, or their spouses
• certain affiliated persons and entities

A trustee who sells the Miami condo to their own brother is presumed conflicted, and the sale is voidable unless the trustee brings it inside a statutory exception — the trust authorised it, the court approved it, you consented, or you waited too long to sue.

That last exception is why the six-month clock in §736.1008 matters so much.

Can an executor of a will remove a beneficiary?

No. A personal representative administers the estate; they do not rewrite it. There is no power to disinherit anyone, reduce a share, or decide a beneficiary no longer deserves what the will leaves them.

What they can do, which is what prompts the question:

• Delay. Distribution can lawfully wait for creditor periods, tax clearance, or a property sale — and unlawfully wait for no reason. From outside, the two look identical.
• Charge the estate. Fees and costs reduce what is left.
• Dispute that you are a beneficiary at all, if the will is ambiguous or a later document exists.
• Sell the asset you wanted.

None of that is removal. If a personal representative behaves as though the inheritance is theirs to allocate, that is not a power they hold — it is a ground to remove them.

Do you need a Miami trust litigation attorney or a probate litigation attorney?

In Miami-Dade the honest answer is usually both, and the two searches lead to the same case.

A large share of the wealth here is held in revocable trusts, and the will is often a two-page pour-over document that does nothing but send everything to the trust. So the fight people describe as a will contest is frequently a trust contest wearing a will’s name, and the fight people describe as a trust dispute usually has to be opened in the probate case to get anywhere.

What you are actually facing	Where it is fought	Which clock
The will was procured by undue influence	Probate Division, Eleventh Circuit	3 months from the notice of administration
A trust amendment was procured weeks before the death	Probate Division, same court	Ends when the trust becomes irrevocable
The trustee will not account, or accounted badly	Probate Division, same court	6 months from receipt of the accounting
Assets moved before the death and never reached either document	Probate or civil	Ordinary limitations
The decedent lived abroad and owned Miami property	Ancillary administration, §734.102	2-year alternative under §734.104

A Miami trust litigation attorney is the right search when the money sits inside a trust and the person holding it is a trustee. A Miami probate litigation attorney is the right search when the fight runs through the estate. Splitting them across two firms costs money, because the same documents, the same witnesses and the same final-year timeline prove both.

What is handled here: will contests and revocation of probate · personal-representative removal under §733.504 · §733.304 qualification fights · ancillary administration for non-resident and foreign decedents · trust contests and amendment challenges under §736.0406 · breach-of-trust and accounting actions under §736.1001 and §736.0802 · trustee removal under §736.0706 · petitions to compel an accounting under §736.0813 · surcharge, constructive trust and tracing · curatorship and emergency relief under §733.501.

What are your rights as a beneficiary of a trust?

§736.0813 opens with a duty, not a discretion: “The trustee shall keep the qualified beneficiaries of the trust reasonably informed of the trust and its administration.”

Within 60 days of accepting the trust, the trustee must give notice of acceptance and their name and address. Within 60 days of the trust becoming irrevocable, notice of its existence, the settlor’s identity, and your right to request a copy of the trust instrument. And a trust accounting at least annually, on termination, and on a change of trustee.

A trustee who will not tell you the trust exists is already in breach of the statute’s first sentence.

The clock that runs against you. §736.1008 bars a claim over any matter “adequately disclosed in a trust disclosure document” unless suit is commenced within six months after receipt — receipt, not discovery, not understanding. Read every accounting the week it arrives, and if it arrives in English and you read Spanish, have it read the same week.

How do you remove a personal representative or a trustee?

A personal representative — twelve grounds under §733.504. The ones that arise in real cases: failure to comply with a court order · failure to account for a sale or produce the estate’s assets · wasting or maladministration · holding interests adverse to the estate that interfere with administration · failure to give bond · felony conviction or incapacity.

Note the fourth. A personal representative who is also a beneficiary, and who is buying estate property or preferring their own claim, may be removable on conflict grounds with no allegation of dishonesty at all.

A trustee — four grounds under §736.0706, on the application of the settlor, a cotrustee or a beneficiary: a serious breach of trust · lack of cooperation among cotrustees substantially impairing administration · unfitness, unwillingness or persistent failure to administer effectively · a substantial change of circumstances with a suitable successor available.

“Persistent failure to administer effectively” does not require dishonesty. A trustee who simply is not doing the job is removable on that ground alone.

And once removal is on the table, §736.1001(2) lets the court do considerably more: compel an accounting, appoint a special fiduciary, suspend the trustee, reduce or deny compensation, and void an act, impose a lien or constructive trust, or trace trust property wrongfully disposed of. “It’s already spent” is not the end of the conversation.

What if assets are disappearing right now?

This is the Miami emergency, and it has a specific answer.

§733.501 lets the court appoint a curator, who “may be authorized to perform any duty or function of a personal representative.” The critical sentence is the second one:

“If there is great danger that any of the decedent’s property is likely to be wasted, destroyed, or removed beyond the jurisdiction of the court and if the appointment of a curator would be delayed by giving notice, the court may appoint a curator without giving notice.”

Removed beyond the jurisdiction of the court. In a county where accounts, buyers and relatives are routinely offshore, that phrase is not theoretical — it is the reason curatorship petitions exist.

The Eleventh Circuit has a route for it. Emergency petitions are uploaded to the courtMAP Emergency Motion queue, where the probate emergency duty judge reviews and responds within 24 to 48 hours. A curator can be in place, with authority over the property, before the fight about the will has properly started.

The trust-side equivalent is §736.1001(2) — suspend the trustee, appoint a special fiduciary, impose a constructive trust, trace what was disposed of.

Where is the case heard, and what cannot be e-filed?

Contested Miami-Dade estates are heard in the Probate Division of the Eleventh Judicial Circuit.

Probate Court	Osvaldo N. Soto Miami-Dade Justice Center, 20 NW 1st Avenue, Suite 6.223 (6th floor, Room 223), Miami, FL 33128
Phone	305-349-7492 and 305-349-7502
Counter hours	9:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m., Monday to Friday
County Recorder (deeds)	Same building, Suite 5.243, 786-463-0566

The filing trap, and it is worse in Miami than anywhere else in Florida. Attorneys must e-file everything through the Florida Courts E-Filing Portal — except a short list that must be filed physically, at that counter:

• the original will, and any original codicil
• authenticated copies — which is precisely what an ancillary administration runs on
• commissions — the instrument you need to take a deposition abroad
• subpoenas, defaults and bonds

Read the second and third of those together. A foreign family’s ancillary case cannot be opened by e-filing, and the testimony of the witness who was in the room in Havana or Caracas cannot be commissioned by e-filing either. Both go to a counter on the sixth floor of 20 NW 1st Avenue, in person or by mail.

Separately, §732.901 gives the custodian of an original will 10 days from learning of the death to deposit it, and a custodian who fails without just cause can be ordered to pay “all costs, damages, and a reasonable attorney’s fee.”

And on contested hearings, the Eleventh Circuit requires a motion for a special-set hearing to attach “a statement certifying that he/she has conferred with counsel for all opposing parties in a good faith effort to resolve by agreement the issues raised.” Filing without it costs a hearing date.

What about documents from Cuba, Venezuela, Haiti or Colombia?

It depends on the country, and getting it wrong stops the case at the counter.

A foreign document — a will, a death certificate, a birth certificate proving lineal consanguinity under §733.304 — has to be authenticated before a Florida court will accept it. There are two routes, and which one applies is not a matter of preference:

Country	Route
Colombia, Venezuela, Argentina, Brazil, Nicaragua, Peru, Mexico, Spain	Apostille — parties to the Hague Convention of 1961
Cuba	Consular legalization — Cuba is not a party
Haiti	Consular legalization — Haiti is not a party

Cuba and Haiti are not contracting parties to the Apostille Convention. Two of the largest communities in this county cannot use the apostille route at all, and a family told to “just get an apostille” on a Cuban document will be sent away, sometimes after months. Their documents require the older, slower consular legalization chain.

That is a Miami problem almost exclusively, and it is why foreign-document estates here take planning that estates elsewhere in Florida do not.

What if the estate is a Miami condominium?

Then the association is a party to your problem before anyone files anything.

Under §718.116, unpaid assessments follow the unit. A beneficiary who takes a Miami condo takes it with the decedent’s arrears, including post-Surfside special assessments that can dwarf the ordinary monthly figure.

The estoppel certificate — the document that tells you the real number — is regulated: 10 business days to produce, $250 base, +$100 if expedited within 3 business days, +$150 where the unit is delinquent. The association’s transfer fee is capped at $150 per applicant under §718.112(2)(k), with spouses, parents and dependent children counting as a single applicant.

Get the estoppel figure before anyone argues about who inherits the unit. In a contested estate it is common for the asset everyone is fighting over to be worth materially less than they think.

Does a no-contest clause stop you?

No. §732.517 is a single sentence: a provision in a will purporting to penalize any interested person for contesting the will, or instituting other proceedings relating to the estate, is unenforceable.

In terrorem clauses are enforceable in many states and in many other countries — including several the families here came from. They are not enforceable in Florida, in wills or in trusts. The clause may still sit in the document and may still read as though it works. It does not.

This is the single most common reason people never make the call.

What does a contested estate or trust cost, and how long does it take?

It depends on whether the other side is defending conduct or defending a document, and on whether the §733.107(2) presumption is in play.

What drives the number:

• the volume of medical and financial records to obtain and read
• whether the decedent’s domicile or the nominee’s qualification under §733.304 is contested — each adds a whole evidentiary front
• whether documents or witnesses are outside the United States, which brings in commissions, translation and legalization
• whether the estate holds Florida real property, a condominium with arrears, a closely held business, or foreign assets
• how many beneficiaries must be served, and how many are abroad
• whether the fight is over the will alone, the trust, or lifetime transfers as well
• whether the personal representative or trustee is also a beneficiary, which merges two disputes into one

What you will not read here is an estimate of your odds. Rule 4-7.13 prohibits promises about outcomes, and no honest lawyer prices a case they have not seen.

What does “probate litigation specialist” mean in Florida?

It is a regulated term. The Florida Bar certifies in Wills, Trusts and Estates, and Rule 4-7.14 permits specialist or expert only where the claim is objectively verifiable — by that certification, or by the lawyer’s training, record and substantial involvement in the area.

What is verifiable about this office:

• Jose M. Lorenzo, Jr., Florida Bar No. 107002. Anyone can confirm the record free in The Florida Bar’s member directory.
• Judicial clerk in the Probate Division of the Eleventh Judicial Circuit, to the Honorable Maria M. Korvick — the division in which Miami-Dade contested estates are decided.
• Nearly a decade as a paralegal at two established Miami firms before practising.
• J.D., Florida International University College of Law; B.A. in accounting and finance, FIU.
• Practice concentrated in probate, wills, trusts and the transfer of Florida real property.
• Solo practice: the same person answers the phone, files the petition and appears in court.
• Service in English and Spanish, in all 67 counties.

What you will not read here is that this is the best firm in Miami. Rule 4-7.13 prohibits unsupported comparisons.

What to do this week

If you have been served with a notice of administration, the clock in §733.212(3) is already running. If a trust accounting has arrived, the six-month clock in §736.1008 is running too. If property is moving, §733.501 is the same-week answer.

Bring five things:

1. The will and every trust document, including any amendment signed in the final two years.
2. The notice, with its date of service — the date on the envelope sets the deadline.
3. Anything showing where the decedent actually lived, and where the nominated representative lives now.
4. Any foreign documents you already hold, apostilled or legalized or neither — we will tell you which route your country needs.
5. Anything showing who was near the decedent in the final year. That category decides more cases than the will itself.

Speak to a Miami probate litigation attorney — and, where the money sits in a trust, a Miami trust litigation attorney — directly. Jose M. Lorenzo, Jr. — (305) 224-6811. Free consultation in English or Spanish, for contested estates and trusts across Miami-Dade County: Miami, Miami Beach, Coral Gables, Coconut Grove, Brickell, Doral, Key Biscayne, Pinecrest, South Miami, West Miami, Hialeah, Aventura, Sunny Isles Beach, North Miami, Kendall and Homestead. You can also write from the contact page.

Related: Florida probate litigation lawyer · Florida trust litigation attorney · West Palm Beach probate litigation attorney · Boca Raton probate litigation attorney · contesting a will in Florida. Esta página en español: impugnar un testamento en Florida.

About this page. Author and reviewer: Jose M. Lorenzo, Jr., Florida Bar No. 107002, former judicial clerk in the Probate Division of the Eleventh Judicial Circuit. Every statute cited was read against the Florida Statutes, the Miami-Dade filing rules confirmed against the Clerk of the Courts and the Eleventh Judicial Circuit, and the Apostille Convention status confirmed against the HCCH status table, on August 7, 2026.

This page offers general information about Florida law and does not constitute legal advice for a specific case. Reading it does not create an attorney-client relationship. Every estate turns on its own facts, and the law changes.