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Welcome to Your Intellectual Property Attorney

Offering the sound counsel of an experienced attorney, enhanced by AI-powered guidance.

Seattle & South King County Estate Planning Attorney

Use the links below to explore estate planning resources organized by location and by planning topic. For local pages, we focus on the core services most people search for: wills, trusts, and estate planning.

Note on linked pages

Many of the pages linked below address closely related estate planning issues and include access to our experimental legal guidance chatbot. Topic-specific pages remain important for making information discoverable through search.

Estate Planning by Location

Looking for a local starting point? Choose your area to view pages for wills, trusts, and estate planning.

Seattle Neighborhoods

South King County & Tacoma

Washington Estate Planning Topics

These statewide pages cover common planning tools and situations, including powers of attorney, healthcare planning, trusts, planning for minors, guardianship designations, and elder planning.

Wills, Estate Planning & Estate Plans

Healthcare Directive & Durable Powers of Attorney

Trust Planning

Planning for Minors, Guardianship & Elder Planning

Get Basic Estate Planning Guidance Before Scheduling a Consultation

If you’re still evaluating your options, try our custom (experimental) RAG chatbot for general educational information about wills, trusts, durable powers of attorney, healthcare directives, and common estate planning questions. When you’re ready, you can schedule a meeting with Ruth.

Disclaimer: The chatbot provides general information only and does not create an attorney-client relationship.

Ruth Apahidean

About Ruth

Ruth Apahidean is a trusts and estates attorney at the Law Office of Neil R. Sarles. Her practice focuses on elder law, estate planning, and probate. She helps individuals and families plan for the management and transfer of their assets during life and after death.

This includes creating wills, trusts, powers of attorney, and healthcare directives. She assists clients decide how assets should be distributed, who will make financial or medical decisions if the client becomes incapacitated, and how to protect beneficiaries such as minor children or family members with special needs.

Ruth guides individuals and families through the probate process (the court-supervised procedure used to settle a person’s estate after death). Her primary role is to assist the personal representative ensure that the deceased person’s assets are distributed according to a valid will or, if no will exists, in accordance with state law.

She has volunteered at Neighborhood Legal Clinics: Elder Law Clinic, the Washington First Responder Will Clinic, and Tacomaprobono Community Lawyers. Ruth is the Bar Talk Columnist for the King County Bar Association Bar Bulletin and the New Lawyer Liaison for the Washington State Bar Association Senior Lawyers Section.

Learn more about Ruth at https://www.sarles.com/.

Education:

  • J.D., University of Washington School of Law
  • B.A., History and English, University of Washington, magna cum laude

Bar Admissions:

  • U.S. District Courts: Western District of Washington
  • All Washington State Courts

Memberships:

  • King County Bar Association

Contact Us

If you have any questions, concerns, or want to schedule a meeting, you can reach Ruth directly by email at ruth@sarles.com or using the form below.