Checklist · Wills and Estates

Administering an Estate: A Probate Checklist

18 U.S.C. § 2701

Type: Checklist
Jurisdiction: National
Date: 2024-06-06
Topic: Wills and Estates

This checklist walks an executor or personal representative through a full probate administration, phase by phase. It covers the first days after death, opening the estate and obtaining letters testamentary, the EIN and estate bank account, marshaling and inventorying assets while identifying non-probate property that bypasses probate entirely, giving statutory notice to heirs and creditors, evaluating and paying claims in the statutory order of priority, filing the decedent's final Form 1040, the estate's Form 1041, and any Form 706 with a portability election, managing and selling estate property, making distributions against receipts and releases, and closing with a final accounting. Probate is governed by state law, so the checklist teaches the Uniform Probate Code framework and the majority approach and flags where your state will differ. Throughout, it follows Nadia Chen as she administers her father's estate, complete with a contested contractor claim and a house to sell. Fiduciary duty and personal liability are treated as running themes, not footnotes, because that is how they operate in practice.

Administering an Estate: A Probate Checklist

Wills and Estates > Probate | Published 6 June 2024 - Updated 11 September 2025 | UpLaw - uplaw.us

An executor is not a beneficiary who happens to have paperwork. You are a fiduciary holding other people's money, and the law will hold you to that standard whether or not anyone told you so. Do the steps in order, document everything, and pay nobody out of turn.

Keywords: probate checklist, estate administration, executor duties, personal representative, letters testamentary, notice to creditors, creditor claims, priority of claims, estate EIN, inventory, non-probate assets, Form 706, portability, Form 1041, final accounting

How to use this checklist

Probate is a creature of state law. There is no federal probate code. The Uniform Probate Code (UPC), adopted in whole or substantial part by roughly a third of the states and influential nearly everywhere else, supplies the vocabulary and the default rules this checklist uses. But the deadlines, the forms, the court's name (Surrogate's Court in New York, Orphans' Court in Pennsylvania and Maryland, Probate Division elsewhere), and the degree of judicial supervision vary enormously. Confirm every deadline against your own state's statute and local rules before you rely on it.

Our running example: Nadia Chen, named executor in her father Wen Chen's will. Wen died in Oregon leaving a house worth about $610,000 with a $180,000 mortgage, a $340,000 brokerage account, an IRA naming Nadia's brother as beneficiary, a modest photography business with a catalogue of licensed images, credit-card balances, a hospital bill from his last illness, and a $48,000 claim from a contractor who says he was never paid for a kitchen remodel Wen disputed. Nadia has never done this before. Neither has almost anyone.

For the doctrine behind these steps — what a will actually does, how trusts avoid probate, intestacy, the elective share — read Wills, Trusts, and Probate: A Comprehensive Estate Planning Guide alongside this checklist. If you are reading this because you are about to become someone's executor and want to know what a well-drafted instrument should have done for you, work backward from Drafting a Will: A Practical Checklist, and see The Estate Planning and Wealth Transfer Toolkit for the full architecture.

Phase 1 — First steps: death certificate, locate the will, secure the property

[ ] Order 10–15 certified copies of the death certificate from the funeral home or vital records office. Banks, transfer agents, insurers, and the county recorder each want an original.
[ ] Locate the original will (not a copy) — safe deposit box, the drafting attorney's vault, a home safe, the county's will-deposit registry.
[ ] Locate any codicils, revocable trust instrument, and pour-over will.
[ ] Check for a letter of instruction, funeral/burial directives, and any prepaid arrangements.
[ ] Secure the residence: change locks, remove valuables and firearms, take date-stamped photographs of contents, stop mail forwarding to yourself.
[ ] Confirm property and casualty insurance remains in force; notify the carrier of the death and the vacancy — many policies limit or void coverage on a vacant dwelling after 30 or 60 days.
[ ] Locate vehicles, safe deposit boxes, and any storage units; do not open a safe deposit box alone if state law requires bank or court supervision.
[ ] Notify Social Security, the VA, any pension plan, and the decedent's employer. Social Security benefits paid for the month of death and after must generally be returned.
[ ] Inventory digital access: password manager, email, cloud storage, cryptocurrency wallets, business accounts.
[ ] Do not pay any bills yet, and do not distribute any property to family members, no matter how obviously "his."

Why it matters, and the traps. Everything you do before appointment you do without authority. The two irreversible mistakes at this stage are letting property walk out the door and letting insurance lapse. A house that burns while uninsured is a personal-liability event for you, not a misfortune for the estate.

Digital assets are a distinct legal problem. The Revised Uniform Fiduciary Access to Digital Assets Act (RUFADAA), now law in nearly every state, sets a three-tier priority: (1) an online tool the user affirmatively completed (Google's Inactive Account Manager, Facebook's Legacy Contact) controls; (2) if none, the will, trust, or power of attorney controls; (3) if neither, the provider's terms of service control. Critically, RUFADAA lets a custodian disclose a catalogue of electronic communications (who, when) but not the content unless the user consented to disclosure. Nadia can get a list of her father's email correspondents; she cannot get the emails themselves unless the will says so. Guessing his password and logging in is not a workaround — it may violate the Stored Communications Act, 18 U.S.C. § 2701, and the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act.

Phase 2 — Open the estate: petition, letters testamentary, and your authority

[ ] Identify the proper venue: the county of the decedent's domicile at death (real property elsewhere may require ancillary administration in that state).
[ ] Determine whether a simplified procedure applies: small-estate affidavit (UPC § 3-1201 allows collection of personal property by affidavit for estates under the statutory ceiling, 30 days after death) or summary administration where the estate does not exceed allowances, exempt property, funeral, and administration costs (UPC § 3-1203).
[ ] Choose informal probate (UPC §§ 3-301 to 3-311; registrar issues letters without a hearing) or formal testacy proceedings (UPC §§ 3-401 to 3-414; needed where the will is contested, unclear, or lost).
[ ] File the petition/application for probate with the original will, the death certificate, and a list of heirs and devisees with addresses.
[ ] Confirm whether a bond is required. Under UPC § 3-603 no bond is required unless the will demands one, an interested person demands one, or the court finds it necessary. Most well-drafted wills waive bond.
[ ] Obtain Letters Testamentary (if named in a probated will) or Letters of Administration (intestacy or no qualified nominee). Order several certified copies; institutions often require letters dated within 60 days.
[ ] Determine your state's supervision regime: independent administration (Texas Estates Code; California's Independent Administration of Estates Act, Cal. Prob. Code § 10400 et seq.) versus supervised administration requiring court approval for major acts.
[ ] Calendar the statute of limitations on opening probate — under UPC § 3-108 no informal probate or appointment proceeding may be commenced more than three years after death, with narrow exceptions.

Why it matters, and the traps. Letters are your license. Until the clerk hands them to you, you are a grieving relative with opinions; after, you are an officer of the court with statutory powers (UPC § 3-715 grants broad powers — sell, lease, borrow, continue a business, settle claims) and the acts you take relate back to the date of death (UPC § 3-701).

Two traps recur. First, ancillary administration: Wen Chen also owned a lot in Idaho. Real property is governed by the law of its situs; Nadia's Oregon letters do nothing in Idaho and she will need a second, ancillary proceeding there. Second, the will contest window. Informal probate is fast but not final — an interested person can force formal proceedings later. If there is any family friction, a bad relationship with a stepparent, or a recent will change, consider formal testacy from the start and get the adjudication that comes with it. Where a contest is brewing, mediation is often the right forum; see Choosing a Dispute-Resolution Forum: Litigation, Arbitration, and Mediation Compared.

Phase 3 — Administrative setup: EIN, estate account, records

[ ] Apply for the estate's EIN on IRS Form SS-4 (online, same day). The estate is a new taxpayer; never use the decedent's SSN for estate accounts.
[ ] Open a dedicated estate checking account in the name of "Estate of Wen Chen, Nadia Chen, Personal Representative." Deposit every dollar of estate income into it and pay every estate expense from it.
[ ] Close or redirect the decedent's direct deposits and autopays; cancel subscriptions, gym memberships, and streaming services.
[ ] Notify the three credit bureaus and request a deceased alert to prevent identity theft.
[ ] Set up a ledger from day one: every receipt, every disbursement, date, payee, purpose, and supporting document. This becomes your accounting.
[ ] Retain professionals: probate counsel, a CPA for the fiduciary returns, an appraiser for real property and any unique tangibles.
[ ] Record your own time if you intend to claim a commission (New York's SCPA § 2307 and California's Probate Code § 10800 set statutory percentages; UPC § 3-719 allows "reasonable compensation").

Why it matters, and the traps. The single most common way a decent person becomes a defendant is commingling. Depositing an estate refund check into your own account — even briefly, even with the intent to repay — is a breach of the duty of loyalty and it looks exactly like theft on a bank statement. Keep one account, keep it clean, and never pay a personal expense from it.

Phase 4 — Marshal and inventory the assets (and identify what bypasses you)

[ ] Compile the probate estate: assets titled in the decedent's sole name with no beneficiary designation and no survivorship feature.
[ ] Separately list the non-probate assets that pass outside your authority:
- [ ] Property held in joint tenancy with right of survivorship or tenancy by the entirety;
- [ ] Payable-on-death / transfer-on-death accounts and TOD deeds (UPC Article VI);
- [ ] Life insurance, IRAs, 401(k)s, and annuities with a living named beneficiary;
- [ ] Assets already titled in a revocable living trust.
[ ] Value each asset as of the date of death (§ 1014 basis step-up runs from that value). Obtain formal appraisals for real property, closely held business interests, and art.
[ ] Search for forgotten assets: state unclaimed property databases, old employers' pensions, savings bonds, refunds, class-action recoveries, mineral rights.
[ ] Identify intellectual property: copyrights, trademarks, patents, and rights of publicity are transmissible assets and often the most valuable thing a creator leaves behind.
[ ] File the inventory with the court and/or serve it on interested persons within the statutory window — under UPC § 3-706, within three months of appointment.
[ ] Send UPC § 3-705 information to heirs and devisees within 30 days of appointment (your name, the court, and their right to petition).

Why it matters, and the traps. Beneficiary designations beat wills. Wen's will leaves "all my retirement accounts equally to my children," but his IRA names only Nadia's brother. The beneficiary form wins; the will's contrary language is irrelevant to the custodian. Where a federal statute governs the plan, that result is constitutionally locked in: Egelhoff v. Egelhoff, 532 U.S. 141 (2001), held ERISA preempts a state law revoking a spouse's beneficiary designation on divorce, and Kennedy v. Plan Administrator for DuPont Savings & Investment Plan, 555 U.S. 285 (2009), held the plan administrator must pay according to the plan documents even where the ex-spouse had waived her interest in a divorce decree. Hillman v. Maretta, 569 U.S. 483 (2013), reached the same result for federal employees' group life insurance. A beneficiary form is not a suggestion.

Divorce is the recurring fact pattern here, and it is the one executors most often get wrong. Many states have a revocation-on-divorce statute (UPC § 2-804 is the model) that automatically strips an ex-spouse of a devise or a beneficiary designation — but as Egelhoff and Hillman hold, those statutes are preempted where a federal plan governs, so the ex-spouse still collects. If the decedent divorced and never updated the forms, treat the question as contested until counsel confirms which regime applies; the property-division mechanics that produced the waiver are explained in Divorce: A Comprehensive Guide to Dissolution, Property Division, Support, and Custody and The Family Law Toolkit.

Wen's photography copyrights are a probate asset, and a peculiar one — they have a life of their own after death. Termination-of-transfer rights under 17 U.S.C. §§ 203 and 304(c) pass by statute to a defined class of heirs and cannot be willed away, and the renewal-term rules for pre-1978 works can hand a copyright to a widow or children regardless of what a grant said. Nadia should read Passing Down Your IP: Copyright, Patents, Publicity Rights, and Estate Planning and work the deadlines in Copyright Renewal and Termination of Transfer: A Practical Checklist before she assumes the licenses simply continue. If the decedent was a public figure, postmortem right of publicity is a state-law asset with wildly varying duration — see The Right of Publicity: Controlling Commercial Use of Name, Image, and Likeness and The Right of Publicity and NIL Toolkit.

Phase 5 — Notice to heirs, devisees, and creditors; the claim period

[ ] Publish notice to creditors in a newspaper of general circulation in the county — under UPC § 3-801(a), once a week for three successive weeks, announcing that claims must be presented within four months of first publication or be barred.
[ ] Conduct a diligent search for creditors: open the mail, review 12 months of bank and card statements, check the credit report, review the decedent's tax returns.
[ ] Mail actual notice to every known or reasonably ascertainable creditor. Under UPC § 3-801(b) a claim is barred unless presented within four months after publication or 60 days after the mailing, whichever is later.
[ ] Notify the state Medicaid agency if the decedent received long-term-care benefits — states must pursue estate recovery under 42 U.S.C. § 1396p(b), and many require affirmative notice.
[ ] Calendar the outer nonclaim bar: in states following UPC § 3-803(a), claims arising before death are barred unless presented within the earlier of one year after death or the applicable § 3-801 notice period. The one-year backstop runs from death whether or not any notice was ever published — but its length is a state-by-state variable, not a national rule.
[ ] Calendar the spousal elective share and family protection deadlines (UPC § 2-211: within nine months after death or six months after probate of the will, whichever is later), plus homestead allowance (§ 2-402), exempt property (§ 2-403), and family allowance (§ 2-404).

Why it matters, and the traps. Publication alone is not enough, and this is constitutional law, not merely good practice. In Tulsa Professional Collection Services, Inc. v. Pope, 485 U.S. 478 (1988), the Supreme Court held that where the probate court's involvement makes the nonclaim statute state action, due process requires actual notice to creditors who are known or reasonably ascertainable. Skip the mailed notice to the hospital whose bill is sitting on the kitchen table and you have not barred that claim — you have merely delayed it, and you may have created a personal exposure for yourself when the estate is already distributed.

State periods differ sharply, and there is no national claim period. California gives creditors four months after letters issue (Cal. Prob. Code § 9100). Florida works from a short window after first publication and layers an absolute repose period on top of it (Fla. Stat. §§ 733.702, 733.710). New York practice treats seven months after letters as the conventional safe interval before distribution (SCPA § 1802). These are representative, not exhaustive, and each has been amended; they are offered to show you the shape of the variation, not to supply your deadline. Look up your number in your own statute, this year.

Phase 6 — Evaluating and paying claims: the order of priority

[ ] Log every claim: claimant, amount, date presented, basis, supporting documentation.
[ ] Verify each claim against the decedent's records. Demand proof — an invoice is an assertion, not a debt.
[ ] Allow valid claims in writing; disallow invalid ones in writing. Under UPC § 3-806(a), a claimant whose claim is disallowed must commence a proceeding within 60 days after the mailing of the notice of disallowance or the claim is forever barred.
[ ] Determine solvency before you pay anything. If the estate cannot pay all claims, do not pay any claim in full.
[ ] Pay in the statutory order of priority. UPC § 3-805 ranks: (1) costs and expenses of administration; (2) reasonable funeral expenses; (3) debts and taxes with preference under federal law; (4) reasonable and necessary medical and hospital expenses of the last illness; (5) debts and taxes with preference under other state law; (6) all other claims. Claims within a class are paid pro rata (UPC § 3-807) and no class is paid until every prior class is satisfied in full.
[ ] Honor secured creditors' rights in their collateral — a mortgage rides with the house regardless of the claim schedule.
[ ] Do not pay debts that die with the decedent (most tort claims that abate, unsecured debts of an insolvent estate beyond assets, debts already barred).

Why it matters, and the traps. Two personal-liability landmines sit here.

First, 31 U.S.C. § 3713, the federal priority statute: a claim of the United States (unpaid income tax, for example) is paid first from an insolvent estate, and § 3713(b) makes the fiduciary personally liable to the extent she pays any other debt before satisfying the government's claim, if she had notice of it. Pay the credit card before the IRS in an insolvent estate and you may write the check twice — the second time from your own account.

Second, paying too fast. Nadia's contractor claim is the live one. The contractor presents a $48,000 claim for the remodel; Wen's file contains a punch list, two unanswered emails, and evidence the work was never finished. Nadia should not pay it to make it go away, and she should not ignore it. She should mail a written notice of disallowance, which starts the contractor's 60-day clock to sue. If he sues, the estate defends; if he does not, the claim is barred. If she simply pays a doubtful claim out of an abundance of politeness, the residuary beneficiaries — her siblings — can surcharge her for the loss. An executor who pays a claim she should have contested has spent other people's money.

Phase 7 — Taxes: the final 1040, the estate's 1041, and Form 706

[ ] File the decedent's final Form 1040 for the year of death, due April 15 of the following year. Write "DECEASED," the name, and the date of death across the top. A surviving spouse may still file jointly for the year of death.
[ ] File any delinquent prior-year returns.
[ ] File the estate's Form 1041 fiduciary income tax return for income earned by the estate after death — required if gross income is $600 or more, or if any beneficiary is a nonresident alien (26 U.S.C. § 6012(a)(3)). Choose the estate's fiscal year deliberately; it need not be the calendar year, and a well-chosen year-end can defer beneficiary income by months.
[ ] Consider the § 645 election to treat a qualified revocable trust as part of the estate for income tax purposes.
[ ] Issue Schedule K-1s to beneficiaries for distributed income (distributable net income carries out to them).
[ ] Determine whether Form 706 is required. Under 26 U.S.C. § 6018, an estate tax return is due if the gross estate plus adjusted taxable gifts exceeds the basic exclusion amount. That amount is now in the eight figures per decedent (indexed annually) — verify the current year's figure, because Congress has moved it repeatedly.
[ ] Even if no tax is owed, consider filing Form 706 solely to elect portability of the deceased spousal unused exclusion under 26 U.S.C. § 2010(c)(5)(A). The election is available only on a timely filed, complete Form 706. Estates not otherwise required to file may use the simplified late-election relief in Rev. Proc. 2022-32 (within five years of death).
[ ] Calendar the Form 706 deadline: nine months after death, extendable six months on Form 4768. Payment is still due at nine months.
[ ] Consider the alternate valuation date (26 U.S.C. § 2032, six months after death) if it reduces both the gross estate and the tax, and § 6166 installment payment for a closely held business.
[ ] Check state estate and inheritance taxes. They are the surprise. Oregon taxes estates above $1 million; Massachusetts, Washington, Illinois, Minnesota, and others have their own thresholds far below the federal one, and Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Kentucky, Maryland, and Nebraska impose inheritance taxes on the recipient.
[ ] Consider IRS Form 5495, requesting discharge from personal liability for the decedent's income and gift tax (26 U.S.C. § 6905) and for estate tax (§ 2204).

Why it matters, and the traps. Portability is the most-missed election in American estate practice. A surviving spouse's estate can inherit the unused exclusion of the first spouse to die — potentially eight figures of shelter — but only if someone files a Form 706 for an estate that owed nothing and had no other reason to file. Families routinely skip it and discover the loss a decade later. If there is a surviving spouse, put the portability question in writing to the family and get a written answer.

For Nadia: Wen's federal gross estate is nowhere near the federal threshold, so no Form 706 is required. But his gross estate for Oregon purposes — house, brokerage, IRA (yes, the non-probate IRA counts in the gross estate even though it bypasses probate), and business — clears $1 million, so an Oregon estate transfer tax return is due nine months after death. The federal/state divergence is exactly where unrepresented executors get hurt. The broader planning architecture behind these elections is mapped in The Estate Planning and Wealth Transfer Toolkit.

Phase 8 — Managing and selling estate assets

[ ] Prudently invest and preserve estate assets pending distribution. The Uniform Prudent Investor Act standard applies to fiduciaries in most states: prudence is judged on the portfolio as a whole, diversification is affirmatively required unless special circumstances say otherwise (UPIA § 3), and delegation to a professional is permitted with due care in selection and monitoring (UPIA § 9).
[ ] Continue or wind down any business the decedent operated; check the operating agreement or shareholder agreement for buy-sell provisions triggered at death, and confirm whether the entity dissolves by default on a member's death. The entity, licensing, and wind-down questions are collected in The Small Business Legal Toolkit; if the decedent held interests across several entities, Running Multiple Businesses Under One Structure: A Deep Dive into Holding, Operating, and Parent Companies maps what you have actually inherited control of.
[ ] Confirm your power of sale. UPC § 3-715 gives the personal representative broad authority to sell without court order; supervised-administration states and California's IAEA regime require notice of proposed action or court confirmation.
[ ] Before listing real property: clear title, satisfy or assume the mortgage, obtain a date-of-death appraisal, and confirm the deed will be an executor's/fiduciary's deed (no warranties of title).
[ ] Sell for fair market value through an arm's-length process. Get the appraisal, list it publicly, document the offers.
[ ] Never buy an estate asset yourself, or sell to a spouse, a child, or an entity you control, without express authority in the will or a court order after full disclosure.

Why it matters, and the traps. The house is where fiduciary duty gets tested. Nadia's sister wants to buy the Portland house "at appraisal, to keep it in the family," and Nadia is tempted to agree. That is a self-dealing transaction viewed through the duty of loyalty, and the traditional no-further-inquiry rule means the beneficiaries can void it without proving the price was unfair. The fix is procedural: full written disclosure to all beneficiaries, written consent from every one of them (or a court order), an independent appraisal, and — best practice — exposure of the property to the open market first.

The mechanics of the sale itself are an ordinary real estate transaction with an unusual seller. Work the diligence and closing sequence in Closing a Residential Real Estate Purchase: A Practical Checklist, and use The Real Estate Transactions Toolkit and Buying and Selling a Home: A Comprehensive Legal Guide from Contract to Closing for the title, disclosure, and escrow questions. Expect the title company to demand certified letters, a certified death certificate, and sometimes a court order. If the estate holds a rental, the tenancy does not pause for the death — the obligations in Residential Landlord-Tenant Compliance and Eviction: A Practical Checklist run against you as the new landlord.

Phase 9 — Distributions, receipts, and releases

[ ] Do not distribute before the creditor claim period closes and taxes are provided for. This is the cardinal rule.
[ ] Satisfy specific devises first; then general legacies; then the residue. If assets are short, apply the abatement order (UPC § 3-902: intestate property, then residuary, then general, then specific devises).
[ ] Address ademption — if the specifically devised car was sold before death, the devise generally fails; do not substitute cash without authority.
[ ] Consider partial/interim distributions to beneficiaries with cash needs, holding a reserve sufficient for all known and contingent claims, taxes, and administration costs.
[ ] Obtain a signed receipt and release (or refunding agreement) from each beneficiary for each distribution.
[ ] Retitle real property by personal representative's deed; transfer securities through the transfer agent with a medallion signature guarantee; assign copyrights and business interests by written instrument, and record copyright assignments with the U.S. Copyright Office.
[ ] Where a beneficiary cannot be located, follow the state's procedure for unclaimed distributive shares — never simply hold the money indefinitely.

Why it matters, and the traps. Early distribution is the executor's classic unforced error. Distribute in month three because the family is impatient, then a $48,000 judgment arrives in month seven, and you must either claw the money back from your siblings (good luck, and it will end the relationships) or pay it yourself. The reserve is not bureaucratic caution; it is your indemnity. Hold it, explain why you are holding it, and put the explanation in writing.

Phase 10 — Final accounting and closing the estate

[ ] Prepare the final accounting: opening inventory, receipts, disbursements, gains and losses on sales, distributions, and the proposed final distribution — reconciled to the penny.
[ ] Attach supporting documentation and your compensation request.
[ ] Choose the closing route:
- [ ] Informal closing by sworn statement — UPC § 3-1003 permits a closing statement no earlier than six months after appointment, certifying that notice was published, the claim period ran, claims were paid, assets were distributed, and the accounting was sent to all distributees.
- [ ] Formal closing — UPC § 3-1001, a court order approving the accounting and discharging the personal representative. Slower, costlier, and far more protective where beneficiaries are adverse.
[ ] Serve the accounting on every interested person and obtain consents or waivers.
[ ] Obtain tax clearance where the state requires it before discharge.
[ ] Close the estate bank account after the final distribution clears.
[ ] Retain the complete estate file for at least seven years — the accounting, receipts, tax returns, appraisals, releases, and the claim log.
[ ] Note the residual exposure: under UPC § 3-1005, proceedings against the personal representative are generally barred six months after the closing statement is filed — but that repose does not cover fraud or misrepresentation.

Why it matters, and the traps. If there is any hostility in the family, take the formal closing. A sworn closing statement is cheap and fast and leaves you exposed to a surcharge action for as long as the statute allows; a judicial decree approving the account, entered after notice, is res judicata. The extra few thousand dollars in fees is the cheapest insurance an executor will ever buy.

Fiduciary duties and personal liability throughout

Every phase above sits on the same foundation. UPC § 3-703(a) requires the personal representative to settle and distribute the estate "as expeditiously and efficiently as is consistent with the best interests of the estate," acting with the same standard of care as a trustee. That imports the full fiduciary architecture:

Duty	What it demands	Classic breach
Loyalty	Act solely in the beneficiaries' interest	Buying the house yourself; hiring your own company as broker
Prudence	Uniform Prudent Investor Act: portfolio-level care, diversification, cost-consciousness	Leaving the whole estate in one volatile stock for two years
Impartiality	Treat income and remainder beneficiaries even-handedly	Favoring the sibling you like
Segregation	No commingling; estate account only	Depositing an estate check into your own account
Accounting & disclosure	Full, accurate, timely reporting	Refusing to show beneficiaries the ledger
Delegation with care	You may hire; you must supervise	Handing everything to a broker and never reading a statement

The remedy for breach is surcharge — a personal money judgment against you for the loss, plus removal, plus denial of your commission. You are not liable for a bad outcome; you are liable for a bad process. Document the process. Where creditor exposure is genuinely serious — a decedent who died with litigation pending, a guaranty, or a professional-liability tail — the structural questions raised in Domestic and Offshore Asset Protection Compared: A Wealth-Defense Field Guide explain what can and cannot be shielded, and why post-mortem shielding attempts fail.

Worked example: the Chen estate, from death to discharge

It helps to see the whole arc with numbers attached. Here is Nadia's administration, compressed.

The estate as marshaled. The Portland house appraises at $610,000 as of the date of death, subject to a $180,000 mortgage. The brokerage account holds $340,000. The photography business — equipment, a licensing catalogue, and receivables — is appraised as a going concern at $95,000. There is $22,000 in a checking account. The IRA is worth $150,000 and names Nadia's brother as sole beneficiary.

What Nadia actually controls. The IRA is not hers to administer. It passes by contract to her brother the moment she gives the custodian a death certificate; it never enters the probate estate, and she has no authority over it and no duty to it. Her probate estate is the house, the brokerage account, the business, and the checking account: $1,067,000 gross, $887,000 net of the mortgage.

What the tax law sees. The federal gross estate is a different number from the probate estate, and this is the distinction that catches people. The IRA counts. So does the full date-of-death value of the house, mortgage and all (the mortgage comes back as a deduction). Wen's gross estate is roughly $1,217,000 — comfortably under the federal basic exclusion amount, so no Form 706 is required. But Oregon imposes its own estate transfer tax on estates above $1 million, and the gross estate for that purpose includes the IRA too. Oregon's return is due nine months after death. Nadia was told by three well-meaning relatives that "there's no estate tax under thirteen million." They were talking about the wrong government.

The claims. Nadia publishes notice and mails actual notice to the hospital, the two credit-card issuers, and the contractor — all of whom are known or reasonably ascertainable, which is exactly what Tulsa Professional requires. The credit cards total $14,000 and are undisputed. The hospital's last-illness bill is $31,000. The contractor presents $48,000. Administration expenses — counsel, the CPA, the appraiser, the court — will run about $26,000.

Solvency, then priority. Add it up: roughly $119,000 in claims and expenses against $887,000 net. The estate is plainly solvent, so Nadia does not need to ration payment across the UPC § 3-805 classes — she can pay every valid claim in full. Note what that means: the priority ladder only bites when the estate is short. But she still determines solvency before writing the first check, because the day she assumes solvency and is wrong, 31 U.S.C. § 3713(b) is waiting.

The contested claim. Nadia mails the contractor a written notice of disallowance. That starts his 60-day clock under UPC § 3-806(a). He does not sue. The claim is barred, and $48,000 stays in the estate — not because Nadia won a fight, but because she did the paperwork that made the deadline run. Had she simply paid him to keep the peace, her siblings could have surcharged her for the $48,000, and they would have been right.

The house. Her sister's offer to buy at appraisal is self-dealing in substance even if the price is fair. Nadia does it the safe way: full written disclosure to all three siblings, an independent appraisal, thirty days on the open market, and written consent from every beneficiary. The house sells to a third party for $625,000. The $15,000 over appraisal is a gain reported on the estate's Form 1041 — and it is also, quietly, the best evidence Nadia will ever have that she did not sell the family home cheap to family.

Closing. Claim period closed at month five. Taxes filed and paid. Nadia holds a $40,000 reserve through the Oregon return and releases it in month eleven. Because one sibling has been angry since the funeral, she does not take the cheap route of a § 3-1003 sworn closing statement. She petitions for a formal closing under UPC § 3-1001, serves the accounting, and takes a decree. It costs about $4,000 more. It buys her res judicata. That is the trade every executor in a difficult family should make.

Common mistakes to avoid

Distributing before the claim period closes. The single most expensive error in probate.
Publishing notice but not mailing it to known creditors — Tulsa Professional says you have not barred them.
Commingling estate funds with your own, even briefly, even with good intentions.
Paying claims out of priority order, and especially paying anyone ahead of the United States in an insolvent estate (31 U.S.C. § 3713(b)).
Paying a doubtful claim to avoid conflict instead of formally disallowing it and starting the 60-day clock.
Missing the portability election on Form 706 for the first spouse to die.
Forgetting the state estate or inheritance tax because the federal exclusion is enormous.
Ignoring non-probate assets in the gross estate for tax purposes — they bypass probate, not the estate tax.
Assuming the will controls a beneficiary designation. It does not (Kennedy, Egelhoff).
Self-dealing on the house, even at appraised value, without written consent from every beneficiary or a court order.
Letting insurance lapse on a vacant residence.
Accessing digital accounts by password rather than through RUFADAA process.
Failing to keep a contemporaneous ledger, and reconstructing eighteen months of transactions the night before the accounting is due.
Missing the ancillary administration for out-of-state real property.
Closing informally in a hostile family. Buy the decree.

The consolidated probate checklist

Days 1–14

[ ] Certified death certificates (10–15) · [ ] Original will located · [ ] Property secured · [ ] Insurance confirmed · [ ] Social Security and pensions notified · [ ] Nothing paid, nothing distributed

Weeks 2–8

[ ] Petition filed · [ ] Bond addressed · [ ] Letters issued · [ ] EIN obtained (Form SS-4) · [ ] Estate bank account opened · [ ] Ledger started · [ ] § 3-705 notice to heirs and devisees (30 days) · [ ] Counsel and CPA retained

Months 1–4

[ ] Assets marshaled and appraised at date-of-death value · [ ] Non-probate assets identified · [ ] Inventory filed (3 months, UPC § 3-706) · [ ] Notice to creditors published · [ ] Actual notice mailed to known creditors · [ ] Medicaid estate recovery notice · [ ] Elective-share and allowance deadlines calendared

Months 4–9

[ ] Claim period closed · [ ] Claims allowed or disallowed in writing · [ ] Solvency determined · [ ] Claims paid in § 3-805 priority order · [ ] Final Form 1040 filed · [ ] Form 1041 / fiscal year elected · [ ] Form 706 and portability decision made and documented (9 months) · [ ] State estate/inheritance return filed · [ ] Real property sold at arm's length

Months 9–12+

[ ] Reserve set · [ ] Interim distributions with receipts and releases · [ ] Assets retitled · [ ] Final accounting prepared and served · [ ] Tax clearance obtained · [ ] Compensation approved · [ ] Estate closed (UPC § 3-1003 sworn statement, no earlier than 6 months, or § 3-1001 formal decree) · [ ] File retained 7 years

Primary Authority

Uniform acts and state probate law

Uniform Probate Code, Article III (probate of wills and administration) — in particular §§ 3-108 (three-year limitation), 3-301 to 3-311 (informal probate), 3-401 to 3-414 (formal testacy), 3-603 (bond), 3-701 (relation back of powers), 3-703 (general duties; trustee standard of care), 3-705 (information to heirs and devisees), 3-706 (inventory), 3-715 (powers of personal representative), 3-719 (compensation)
UPC § 3-801 (notice to creditors); § 3-803 (limitations on presentation of claims); § 3-805 (classification and priority of claims); § 3-806 (allowance and disallowance; 60-day suit deadline); § 3-807 (payment of claims); § 3-902 (abatement)
UPC §§ 3-1001, 3-1003, 3-1005 (formal and informal closing; limitation on proceedings against the personal representative); §§ 3-1201, 3-1203 (small estates)
UPC §§ 2-202, 2-211 (elective share and election deadline); §§ 2-402 to 2-404 (homestead allowance, exempt property, family allowance); § 2-804 (revocation of probate and nonprobate transfers by divorce — subject to federal preemption)
Uniform Prudent Investor Act §§ 2, 3, 9 (prudence, diversification, delegation)
Revised Uniform Fiduciary Access to Digital Assets Act (RUFADAA)
Representative state statutes: Cal. Prob. Code §§ 9100, 10400 et seq., 10800; Fla. Stat. §§ 733.702, 733.710; N.Y. SCPA §§ 1802, 2307; Texas Estates Code (independent administration)

Federal statutes

26 U.S.C. § 6018 (estate tax return); § 2010(c)(5) (portability of the deceased spousal unused exclusion); § 2032 (alternate valuation); § 6166 (installment payment); § 1014 (basis of property acquired from a decedent); § 6012(a)(3) (fiduciary income tax return); § 645 (qualified revocable trust election); §§ 2204, 6905 (discharge from personal liability)
31 U.S.C. § 3713 (federal priority; fiduciary personal liability)
42 U.S.C. § 1396p(b) (Medicaid estate recovery)
17 U.S.C. §§ 203, 304(c) (termination of transfers — statutory heirs)
18 U.S.C. § 2701 (Stored Communications Act)

Cases

Tulsa Professional Collection Services, Inc. v. Pope, 485 U.S. 478 (1988) (due process requires actual notice to known or reasonably ascertainable creditors)
Egelhoff v. Egelhoff, 532 U.S. 141 (2001) (ERISA preempts state revocation-on-divorce statute)
Kennedy v. Plan Administrator for DuPont Savings & Investment Plan, 555 U.S. 285 (2009) (plan documents rule)
Hillman v. Maretta, 569 U.S. 483 (2013) (federal beneficiary designation preempts contrary state law)

IRS forms and guidance

IRS Forms SS-4 (EIN), 1040 (decedent's final return), 1041 (fiduciary income tax), 706 (estate tax and portability election), 4768 (extension), 5495 (request for discharge from personal liability)
Rev. Proc. 2022-32 (simplified method for a late portability election, generally within five years of death)

A caution on figures. The federal basic exclusion amount, the Form 1041 gross-income filing threshold, small-estate ceilings, and every state estate- and inheritance-tax threshold are moving targets. Nothing in this checklist should be treated as the current number. Verify each against the governing statute and the current-year IRS instructions before you rely on it.

Secondary Sources

Restatement (Third) of Trusts (fiduciary duties of loyalty and prudence; the prudent investor rule)
Restatement (Third) of Property: Wills and Other Donative Transfers
Uniform Law Commission official comments to UPC Article III
IRS Publication 559, Survivors, Executors, and Administrators
Standard fiduciary-administration treatises and your state bar's probate practice manual — in a state-law field, the local manual is often worth more than any national text

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This checklist is general legal information from UpLaw (uplaw.us), not legal advice, and does not create an attorney-client relationship. Probate law is state-specific and changes over time; deadlines, thresholds, and procedures in your jurisdiction may differ materially from the Uniform Probate Code defaults described here. Verify current requirements and consult qualified counsel before acting.