Estate Planning Attorney for Panama City, Florida

A Florida trust that leaves your home or savings to someone at your death has to be signed the way a will is signed, with two witnesses who watch you sign and a notary. Florida law voids the parts of a trust that pass property at death when they are signed without those formalities, and Florida courts have thrown out trust amendments that carried one witness instead of two. We run the signing with our own witnesses and notary, by video or in person. If you would rather sign locally, these are the places nearby.

A Florida deed needs two witnesses and a notary. We set up the signing for you by video, so you can sign from your own kitchen table. If you would rather sign in person, The UPS Store #521 in the Panama City Square Shopping Center at 653 West 23rd Street lists notary service seven days a week, at (850) 784-4877. Call ahead to confirm when a notary is in.

The Bay County Clerk publishes its own list of what a deed needs before it will record. The witnesses sign, print their names and give their addresses, the grantee’s mailing address appears on the deed, the first page names the person the deed goes back to, the deed names who prepared it, and the notary’s seal shows the commission number and expiration date. When we draft your deed, all of that is on it.

Putting your home into the trust means recording a new deed, from you to yourself as trustee, in Bay County’s official records. The trust deed is recorded at the same office, and in the same way, as any other deed.

In Bay County, deeds are recorded by the Recording office of Bill Kinsaul, the Clerk of Court and Comptroller, in Room 110 of the Bay County Courthouse at 300 East 4th Street in Panama City. The Clerk is open weekdays from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Central time, an hour behind Miami, and every department answers at (850) 747-5100. The Recording office takes email at [email protected].

You will not need to go to the courthouse. We record your deed electronically through Simplifile, which the Clerk lists by name among its e-recording vendors, so the deed never has to travel by mail. Bay County posts its recording fee as $10 for the first page and $8.50 for each page after, so a two-page deed records for $18.50. At the counter the Clerk takes cash, money orders, cashier’s checks and business checks, and a card carries a 3.5 percent processing fee.

A home held in your revocable trust keeps its homestead exemption when the trust gives you a lifetime interest in the home, which is how we draft it. The Property Appraiser still asks for proof of the trust, and each county asks for something slightly different, so here is what this one wants.

Homestead is handled by Dan Sowell, CFA, the Bay County Property Appraiser. The main office is at 860 West 11th Street in Panama City, open weekdays from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Central time, at (850) 248-8401. A second office at the beach sits inside Panhandle Educators Federal Credit Union at 301 Richard Jackson Boulevard in Panama City Beach, at (850) 248-8470.

The application is due by March 1 for the year you apply, and you must own and live in the home as your permanent residence on January 1. The Property Appraiser’s website carries a Homestead Online application alongside the in-office one. The office’s exemption checklist asks you to bring proof of ownership such as your recorded deed, the Social Security numbers of both spouses, and a Florida driver’s license and vehicle registration showing the home’s address.

After your death your successor trustee steps in without a court. Within 60 days the trustee must tell the beneficiaries the trust exists, and Florida law requires a notice of trust to be filed with the court in Bay County. To sell or transfer the house, the trustee signs a deed as trustee and gives the title company a certification of trust instead of the whole trust.

After you die, the house is already your family’s. To show that in the record, they record a certified copy of your death certificate and an affidavit, and then a title company can insure a sale. The Florida Department of Health in Bay County issues certified death certificates at 597 West 11th Street in Panama City, down the same street from the Property Appraiser and about 13 minutes on foot from it, weekdays from 8 a.m. to 4:45 p.m., at (850) 872-4455, option 4, then option 2. Each copy costs $15. The office issues certificates for Florida deaths from 2009 on, and the cause of death is released only to family or a legal representative with a photo ID. We prepare and record the rest.

We send you the recorded deed as soon as the Clerk returns it. The deed also appears in the Clerk’s official records search, which covers everything recorded since January 1, 1987 and gives free uncertified copies you can print at home. Older records sit in a separate Direct and Reverse index on the same page.

If a bank or title company asks for a certified copy, the Clerk charges $1 a page plus $2 for the certification. Ask the Official Records Division at (850) 747-5100 or [email protected], or buy an electronically certified copy through the Clerk’s E-Certify page.

Then take two minutes to sign up for the Clerk’s free Property Fraud Alert. The service sends an email or text within 24 hours whenever a deed, mortgage or other land document is recorded in your name, with a link to the document. The Bay County Property Appraiser links the same sign-up from its home page. Watching the records for your name is the simplest guard there is against someone recording a false deed on your house.

Some families pass through the courthouse for another reason and want to know what is close. Fourth Street has been closed at the courthouse since February 5, 2026, so the Clerk’s detour map sends every driver onto McKenzie Avenue from Fifth Street, with the courthouse parking lot straight ahead.

For coffee or an early lunch, The Press at 310 Harrison Avenue is about 5 minutes on foot and serves coffee, crepes, soups and sandwiches from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. daily.

Trustmark Bank has its Panama City main branch at 144 Harrison Avenue, about 7 minutes on foot from the courthouse, which helps if you bank there and need a cashier’s check for the Clerk. The Downtown Panama City post office at 421 Jenks Avenue, about 11 minutes on foot, keeps its window open weekdays from 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m.

When you are done, the city’s McKenzie Park is about 6 minutes on foot, with its main entrance on Harrison Avenue and a mailing address of 17 East 3rd Court. The city describes a shaded nature park under oak trees with a large gazebo, picnic shelters and restrooms, open from dawn until dusk, which makes it an easy place to sit down before the drive home.

For the water instead, the city’s Downtown Panama City Marina sits at 1 Harrison Avenue on St. Andrews Bay, about 16 minutes on foot from the courthouse, a fishing spot and a quiet place to look out over the bay.

Most of what a Panama City homeowner needs after a deed sits on one stretch of West 11th Street. The Property Appraiser is at number 860, the Tax Collector’s driver license office at 850, Bay County Veterans Services at 840, and the Bay County Public Library at 898, about 2 minutes on foot from the Property Appraiser.

The library is the place to print and, if you need one, to find a notary. Printing from the public computers costs 10 cents a black and white page and 30 cents in color. Library staff notarize simple documents for $2 a stamp, generally weekdays from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Central time as schedules allow, and ask you to call 850-522-2107 first. For a deed, bring your own two witnesses with their photo IDs, because the library cannot supply witnesses and does not allow asking other patrons. The library is open Monday through Wednesday from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. and Thursday through Saturday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., at 850-522-2100, and its Local History Room is open weekdays from 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.

A disabled veteran may qualify for more than the basic homestead exemption, and the proof is a letter from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. The Bay County Property Appraiser’s checklist asks for a VA letter stating the percentage of disability for the disabled veteran exemption, a VA letter stating “Total & Permanently Disabled” for the full exemption, and a certified death certificate from a surviving spouse of a totally and permanently disabled veteran. A veteran 65 or older with a combat-related VA disability and an honorable discharge can also ask for the disabled veteran’s discount, with the DD-214 and a VA letter showing the combat-related percentage. The office asks you to call (850) 248-8401 before filing with any question.

Bay County Veterans Services helps with VA claims and forms at 840 West 11th Street, a short walk from the Property Appraiser, at 850-248-8280. The office recommends calling first for an appointment with one of its counselors.

Marriage or divorce often leaves a home titled in a name you no longer use. We write the new deed with both names, the name on your old deed and your name today, so the record connects them and a future title search does not stall on the difference.

Your driver license should match as well, because the Property Appraiser’s checklist asks for a Florida driver license showing the home’s address. The Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles requires every name change on a license to be made in person at a local office, and only after the Social Security Administration has updated your name, allowing 24 to 48 hours after that. The Bay County Tax Collector’s Panama City office at 850 West 11th Street, next to the Property Appraiser, handles driver licenses Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. Central time, opening at 8:30 a.m. on Wednesdays, at 850-248-8501.