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Estate Planning

California Pour Over Will

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About This Template

For clients with a Revocable Living Trust, a Pour Over Will is a necessary backup to ensure all non-Trust assets are eventually transferred to the Trust upon death. This template provides a procedurally compliant California Pour Over Will. This allows estate planning firms to efficiently draft this critical companion document that conforms to the state's specific execution requirements, ensuring a client's entire estate plan functions as intended and avoids partial intestacy.

Pour Over Will

Jurisdiction Notes

This document is specific to California Probate Code ($S$ 6100 et seq.). Attorneys must ensure the will is executed in strict compliance with California's statutory requirements (e.g., the specific witness requirements). The effectiveness of the pour-over clause depends on the validity of the Trust, so the Trust document must also comply with California law. The will is subject to formal probate proceedings, and the provisions must align with the administration process of the relevant California Superior Court.

What is this template?

This is a legal document specific to California probate and trust law designed to be used in conjunction with a Revocable Living Trust. The Pour Over Will template primarily names the Trust as the sole beneficiary of the estate, stating that any assets not already titled in the Trust's name should "pour over" into the Trust upon the Testator's death. The template also typically names an executor and may include provisions for guardians of minor children.

How to Customize

With Clio Draft

If this template is available in your region, you can activate it in your Clio Draft account. It will then be pre-filled with information from your contacts and matters, helping you save time.

  1. Click Request Template, and complete the Request Information form.
  2. Open the activation email to activate the template in Clio Draft.
  3. In Clio Draft, go to Library and select the Court forms subtab.
  4. Select a category to view all the court forms associated with that category.
  5. Find the form that you need. You can use the search bar to search by form number or form title.
  6. Click the Actions dropdown and then select Create form template.
  7. At this stage, you can configure any fields on the template that will remain consistent across multiple matters and specific practice areas.
    • Purple fields: These fields are highlighted in purple because they are connected to linked fields that will automatically insert information entered on the Populate page. If you fill in a purple field, the data in that field will always populate when you draft a document from this form template and will not be overwritten by text entered on the populate page.
    • Blue fields: These fields are highlighted in blue because they are unique to a specific matter. You will enter this information after you generate the form template, on the Populate page.

For detailed instructions for drafting form templates and more information about Clio Draft, see Clio Draft: Form Templates and Clio Draft: Draft and Manage Documents.