Ryan Kenneth Hodges

After years of paying taxes on land that was in my parents name, hearing that it was a cumbersome task to get real estate transferred from a deceased family member, I saw Ryan’s post for a feee consultation. He walked me through the process, I hired him, and I now have the land titled in my name with... my children as beneficiaries. Ryan’s communication was great. He was professional but down to earth at the same time.

I had a very difficult situation made much better when I used Ryan Hodges of Jackson White Attorneys at Law to help me get through it. When my mom passed she left me in charge of the trust and it had 2 houses in it to go equally to my sister and I. The difficulty of the situation was that my sister i...s legally dependent and I had already spent years working to get her into a situation so she is taken care of. I did not want anyone down the road to have to deal with anything that involved her so I was trying to buy out her half of the property. In the meantime I was also not able to get a payout from a life insurance policy of about $6,000. I originally went to another lawyer who assured me she had helped family with a family member that was legally incapacitated so she knew how to help. This other lawyer took a $3500 retainer, got busy and forgot about me. I stupidly gave her another chance. She asked for mountains of old paperwork related to my sister, which I sent and created a 2-page statement of trust document to obtain the insurance, despite the insurance and myself showing her they needed an affidavit of assets. They rejected the statement of trust and at that point I had to review what I was trying to accomplish. She asked for more documents and said she had used up the retainer. I then went to Ryan. After reviewing what I needed, he just requested the paperwork needed and within a day produced the affidavit that was sent to the insurance company and the funds were immediately released. We then moved onto the property. He helped take me through the steps to set up a special needs trust and followed up with an email of what to do. He took the time to review the situation, as it is not a straight-forward task, and went over how and why this is the proper way to go about getting this accomplished given my sister’s situation. I got the account created, had the property appraised, adjusted for mortgage and finances due and sent him a copy for review. He then proceeded to confirm the money transfer. Once done, he quickly followed up with the transfer of title. The second property was harder as I needed to take out a loan. I had a hard time finding a creditor to obtain the loan and was also waiting for interest rates to drop. Ryan patiently sent me emails to check in and see where I was at in the process. Once that was all completed, as with the first property Ryan quickly submitted the paperwork and the title was transferred. He also reviewed if there was anything else left on the trust so it could be finalized and closed. This is not something I had even thought to do, but appreciate having it done so there isn’t any confusion later on. Throughout the process Ryan was very communicative via email. He responded quickly and made things very clear. It was easy to send a quick question or clarification on any step along the way to know that I was doing things properly. He clearly understands what is needed and does not do extraneous things or waste time. His concise and timely manner was much appreciated. Between having to deal with a passing relative followed by several years of figuring out how to get a guardianship, close out a conservatorship, and apply for care for my sister; I was very burnt out. So attempting to deal with the houses and having a horrible experience with the first lawyer, I was very wary of starting over on that process. However, Ryan was the best person to help me get through and wrap up everything so that I could finally mentally rest knowing things were taken care of. He is knowledgeable, concise, does not take advantage of his clients, and makes things clear. I could not recommend a better lawyer.

I had in excellent experience with Ryan Hodges, who provided outstanding service to me as the executor for the estate of my brother. He lived in California, but owned property in Arizona. I needed legal help to go through the probate process in the courts of Arizona to sell the property. Ryan Hodg...es was very professional, knowledgeable and easy to work with. He was very thorough and made sure that all of the details and any needed information was handled in a timely fashion. Because of his efforts, within a short time I had the ability to sell the property. His help relieved my anxiety and concern about dealing with the property. I would highly recommend him to others who are executors or have probate or estate issues.

I’m an attorney, so my standards for effective counsel are high – perhaps unfairly so. Yet Ryan exceeded all of my expectations, and for a very reasonable cost. I have sought his guidance twice – this time for a probate of my father’s estate. This was a medium-complexity probate, with property acr...oss three states and Arizona taking the lead due to real property there. From the very beginning of our work together through the close of probate months later, Ryan was highly capable, proactive, responsive, helpful, and friendly. Over the course of our matter, he sent several very clear and highly detailed emails walking me through each step of the process, and his filings with the court were impeccable. (I always review filings very carefully and had essentially no changes – that is extremely rare in my experience.) It’s clear that Ryan starts with email / filing models developed through years of experience and careful revision, and he always personalized those templates appropriately for my unique situation. Because I was managing the process from several states away, it was important to have someone like Ryan who was an exceptional communicator both in email and by phone. Ryan also provided thoughts on real estate agents and other local Phoenix professionals who could help with cleaning out and selling real estate. Ryan answered my questions (and there were many!) promptly and with apparent substantive mastery of the probate process. When he hadn’t heard from me in a while, he’d reach out and ask if there were any steps that I needed further guidance on; I cannot emphasize enough how rare that is for attorneys. He also directed me to online resources that enabled me to recover more than $1k for the estate that I didn’t even know existed. In short, if you want a highly capable counselor with great attention to detail, who communicates clearly and promptly while walking you through each step of the process, Ryan is an exceptional choice.

A situation came up where I needed to hire an attorney. It involved a property for which my family had an interest in and that property belonging to another family due to divorce. Underlying this is that the property was in AZ and I live in CA. My research led me to believe that there was an a...lternative to probate and becoming a personal representative to manage the estate. Which is what the other family was pushing me to do. I did a web search for probate attorneys in AZ and found Ryan Hodges. I read reviews of him and his firm JacksonWhite Law and I knew I had found an attorney and firm that I felt confident was going to get the job done and I wasn’t wrong. I reached out to Ryan and in less than 24 hours I was in contact with him. I asked him about the probate matter and an alternative to being a personal representative that I had discovered in my research. He asked the pertinent questions and confirmed that the alternative solution was viable. From the very beginning Ryan was informative of the process and forthright every step of the way. Every email I sent was answered promptly satisfying every inquiry. All of the documents that were sent to me by him were explained as their purpose, in detail, and in a manner that was easily understood. Along with the documents were detailed instructions on what I needed to do with them and also a list of things he was going to do. All of the filing of court documents were handle by Ryan, and he informed me of when they were filed and when to expect an answer to the filing. In the end, the court approved all filings and the property transfer was completed seamlessly, and funds derived from the transfer were then quickly apportioned. The time it took to finality was exactly as Ryan had predicted. I could not be more happy to have hired Ryan Hodges for this seemingly at the time trying circumstance in our life. However, because of Ryan I had peace of mind, and was able to save an immense amount of personal time and money. Ryan was an asset to our family and I highly recommend him.