The headline catches your eye right!?  Could a billionaire die without a will!? Actually, reading the story again he was “only” worth an estimated $840 million at death!  Let me say right now if you have $840 million, or $84 million, or $8.4 million, or $840,000 I suggest you get a will and most likely a living trust.  Heck, even most people with $84,000 should have a will!   Mr. Hsieh was busy though and he was young. People don’t think it will happen to them!

The Nevada probate was filed by attorney, Dara Goldsmith. The probate petition shows that Ms. Goldsmith represents Mr. Hsieh’s father and brother.  Looking at her bio online it appears Ms. Goldsmith is well suited to assist the Hsieh family.

Here’s a link to the story in the Las Vegas Review Journal.

The story of Tony Hsieh was well written long before he died without a will. The child of immigrants, he went to Harvard, had sold a business for over $200m by the time he was 25, was CEO of Zappos and built that into a global power that was sold to Amazon, and then died two weeks shy of his 47th birthday from smoke inhalation from a house fire.

By all accounts in Las Vegas this guy was an absolute hero and savior to the people of Vegas.  Primarily in terms of the jobs he built there but even more in all the ways he gave back to the community either directly by donations or indirectly by development of the blighted downtown area.  Supposedly he built an Airstream community, in downtown, and was leaving there!  He owned multi-multi-multi million dollar homes in Park City, Utah but supposedly lived in an Airstream trailer in a neighborhood with tons of crime, drugs, and homeless. The guy beat to his own drum!  Everything I have read about Mr. Hsieh has been very positive!

Might Mr. Hsieh have owned property in California? It’s highly likely right!  A guy that right buys property everywhere, right!?  If they need an ancillary probate I hope they contact me to help them out!  A reminder, an ancillary probate is when a person dies a resident of one state but owns property in another. We do a lot of ancillary probate work for people who died owning property in California.

-John Palley