The Law Offices of Odelia Goldberg

What the firm handles day to day

Estate planning and probate make up the core of this Fort Lauderdale practice. The firm drafts wills and trusts, handles trust administration, and manages Florida probate for families settling an estate. It also works in elder law, asset protection and real estate closings. For a firm built around one founding attorney, the list of named services runs long.

The website groups that work into several connected areas. These cover simple and complex estate planning, high net worth estate planning, gift and estate tax planning, and family business succession. On the elder law side, the firm names Florida Medicaid planning, nursing home Medicaid benefits, guardianship and special needs trusts. Real estate closings, deeds and Lady Bird deeds fill out the property work.

The documents behind an estate plan

Wills, trusts and directives

A Florida estate plan usually rests on a small set of documents. A will directs where property goes after death. A revocable trust can hold assets during life and pass them outside probate. Durable powers of attorney and health care proxies name who decides on finances and medical care if the client cannot act. The firm prepares each of these, along with living wills and advanced healthcare directives.

Special needs trusts and Lady Bird deeds show up in the same document set. A special needs trust holds money for a person with a disability while preserving their public benefits. A Lady Bird deed lets an owner keep control of a home during life and pass it at death outside probate. Both tools solve narrow problems, and both need careful drafting to hold up.

The firm also lists inheritance law and pre and post-nuptial agreements. Prenuptial and postnuptial agreements set terms for property between spouses, and they often shape how an estate plan later divides assets. Keeping the marriage contract and the estate plan under one firm helps the two documents stay aligned.

How Florida probate proceeds

Probate is the court process that settles what a person leaves behind. In Florida, it runs through the circuit court in the county where the person lived. A personal representative gathers the assets, gives notice to creditors, pays valid debts and taxes, and distributes what remains under court supervision. Formal administration is the standard path, and a smaller estate can sometimes use a shorter summary process.

The timing depends on the size of the estate and whether anyone contests the will. Creditors have a set window to bring claims, and the representative works through that period before final distribution. As a reviewer, I read the firm's probate administration work as the practical counterpart to the estate plans it drafts. Trust administration follows a parallel track. It moves assets to beneficiaries under the terms of a trust, and it keeps the transfer private.

Elder law and paying for care

Medicaid planning deals with a hard problem for many families: how to cover long-term care while keeping some assets. Florida Medicaid sets income and asset limits, and nursing home coverage adds its own rules. Legal planning here often turns on timing, trusts and the treatment of a family home. The firm names Medicaid planning, nursing home Medicaid benefits and life care planning among its services.

Guardianship and special needs planning also appear on the site. A guardianship gives a court-appointed person authority over someone who can no longer manage their own affairs. A special needs trust holds money for a person with a disability so that public benefits stay in place. These matters reach the same probate courts that handle estates, so the firm's footing in probate carries into elder law.

Life care planning looks further out than a single application. It maps the medical, housing and financial steps an aging client may face, and it lines up the legal tools for each stage. The firm places this next to its Medicaid work, and both draw on the same rules for income, assets and care settings.

The attorney who founded the firm

Odelia Goldberg started her own private practice in 2003 and has more than twenty years as a Florida attorney. She earned her Juris Doctor from Pace University School of Law that same year, Cum Laude. Before law, she studied at the University of Texas at Austin and earned an MBA from SUNY Binghamton with a focus on finance and management information systems. That business grounding fits a practice centered on assets, tax and succession.

Her record reaches past estate work. She passed the Patent Bar Exam and is admitted to practice before the United States Patent and Trademark Office. She has taught as an adjunct professor at the University of Miami, and she ran for the New York State Senate in 2006. In my opinion, that mix of teaching, finance and legal practice gives the firm a broad base for a founder-led office.

The website points to a team and to a combined tally of years in practice. Odelia Goldberg is the named attorney and the founder. The site also records a run of practice acquisitions, in 2013, 2014, 2018, 2019 and 2023. That pattern describes a firm that has grown by taking on other practices across two decades.

Coverage area and property services

The firm works mainly across three South Florida counties: Broward, Miami-Dade and Palm Beach. It also takes clients based elsewhere in the country who have family or property in South Florida, which suits estate and probate matters tied to a Florida home. Appointments happen at the office, and the firm offers home and hospital visits along with telephone meetings for clients who have trouble traveling.

Real estate closings connect the estate work to Florida property. A residential closing moves through a title search, a settlement statement and the recording of a new deed with the county. Asset protection planning works earlier, arranging ownership so that property carries less exposure to future claims. A Family Limited Partnership can hold family assets under shared, structured ownership, and a pet trust sets aside money and instructions for an animal's care.

As a reviewer, I would read this listing as a match for individuals and families planning around property, care and inheritance in South Florida. The site describes one Florida attorney with more than twenty years in estate, probate and elder law, backed by a business and finance education. The practice dates to 2003, and the site records further acquisitions through 2023.