Castles Probate Services

Sandy hails from a legacy Florida real estate family and lives and breathes anything real estate-related. She has lived in Florida all her life and currently specializes in helping families during the probate process to achieve their goals related to real estate assets.

The probate process is often confusing, daunting, and emotionally charged. Not only are you dealing with the loss of a loved one, but there are many other family members, also in pain, participating in this process. While the State of Florida has concrete steps for that process, the reality is that we humans mourn, analyze, and process things differently than the cold, impersonal legal systems.

We have a team of experts who have all been personally involved a probate in their own lives, giving us the ability to not just know what the next step is, but to relate to the families in an emotional and human capacity as well. We understand the role of the attorney, the State, and the weighty role of those in charge in their family for bringing financial closure to the estate.

Please take a look at the FAQs on the website for lots of details and good educational info that will help you and your family, and reach out to us we would be honored to assist you in any way that is helpful to you in meeting YOUR GOALS, and not someone else’s.

I’ve been involved in real estate in one way or another for over 30 years. I flipped the first condo with my siblings at age 16, it was fun, and educational and we made solid, sweat-equity money by doing all the renovations ourselves, guided by our parents, of course. After that, I was hooked on real estate!

My grandfather was a developer who built hospitals and schools, condos and co-ops, all up and down the west coast of Florida, all the way down to Key West. My parents are both real estate brokers, did quite a number of commercial and land development projects, and started a bank. So, there was never a time in our household as a kid when I didn’t hear about the next project, spend time on a job site, or get bribed into doing some kind of rehab grunt work. I’ve done floors and walls, landscaping, kitchens and baths, patios, and even a roof (that’s WORK).

After graduating from the University of Alabama, I worked for a commercial developer based in Tampa, Florida. We had a Class A office building and several Class B&C office/warehouse/industrial parks in the portfolio under management.

I was the CFO and COO for a distribution company for a couple of European manufacturers for 14 years. We ran North America and the surrounding islands for order fulfillment and customer service, with a call center and teams of service techs. We imported containers of products for retailers and smaller parts for consumers and service companies. Site selection and build-outs, lease negotiations, multi-million dollar contract negotiations, photo shoots, marketing, trade shows…so many things that tie in nicely to working in real estate at this point. Even while running this company, I was running personal real estate investment adventures in the background. I couldn’t pick a stock to save my life, but I’ve never lost money in real estate.

I’ve been involved in just about anything you can think of in the real estate industry. Probably my favorite thing about real estate is how diverse it is: from working with residential sellers and buyers, international clients, 1031 exchanges, real estate in your self-directed investment accounts, helping clients set up their first short-term rental, flipping properties, having my own annual and short-term rentals, commercial deals, and so much more.

Here at Howz, we have an open education philosophy with our clients, because the more you know as a buyer or seller, owner or tenant, the better you are able to make informed decisions to achieve YOUR GOALSnot someone else’s goals.