Settling an estate in Georgia
An executor in Georgia has to work through the Probate Court and a long list of tasks that have nothing to do with the court. This page sets out what Georgia law actually requires at each step, with the section it comes from and the date we last read it.
- Probate court
- Probate Court
- Small-estate shortcut
- Estates of $15,000 or less may qualify for a simplified small-estate procedure (personal property only — it will not transfer real estate).
- Creditor claim period
- 3 months
- Typical timeline
- 9–18 months
- State death tax
- None — no state estate tax and no state inheritance tax
Immediate
Obtain certified death certificates
Georgia keeps county-held death records open to the public, which is unusual and worth using. Under O.C.G.A. § 31-10-25(f) official copies of records of deaths located in the counties shall remain accessible to the public — so the county office where the death was recorded is a route that does not turn on proving a relationship. Subsection (a) otherwise makes it unlawful to permit inspection of or disclose information in vital records except as authorized by the chapter, by regulation, or by order of a court, so the state-level position is stricter than the county one. Two further points. Under subsection (c) an appeal from a custodian’s refusal to disclose or to permit copying goes to the state registrar, whose decision binds that custodian. And under subsection (e), seventy-five years after the date of death the record is transferred to the State Archives. Two practical notes. The funeral director usually orders the first batch as part of their service, so ask them how many they have already requested before you order more — families routinely pay twice. And order more than you think: banks, insurers and transfer agents often keep the copy you give them rather than returning it. Confirm the current fee on the state’s own page at the moment you order, because fees change without notice.
O.C.G.A. § 31-10-25·last read 2026-08-25
Locate the will (or confirm there is none)
Georgia is short, automatic, and unusually blunt about the remedy. Under O.C.G.A. § 53-5-5 a person having possession of a will shall file it with reasonable promptness with the probate court of the county having jurisdiction. Two things follow that set Georgia apart. The duty runs from possession alone — no interested person has to ask, and nothing has to be served to start it. And the will must be filed with the court: handing it to the named executor, which discharges the custodian in many states, is not what this section asks for, so a will sitting with a family member is not where the statute says it belongs. The enforcement is equally direct. The probate court may attach for contempt, and may fine and imprison a person withholding a will until the will is delivered — imprisonment here is coercive rather than punitive, so it ends when the will is produced. There is no stated deadline and no damages provision in this section, so the court, not a claim for money, is the lever. Put your request in writing and keep a dated copy before asking the court to act.
O.C.G.A. § 53-5-5·last read 2026-08-25
Short-term
Claim the family allowances you are entitled to
Georgia calls it year’s support, it outranks ordinary creditors, and an unopposed petition is granted exactly as filed. Under O.C.G.A. § 53-3-1(c) the surviving spouse and the minor children of a decedent, testate or intestate, are entitled to year’s support in the form of property for their support and maintenance for the twelve months from the date of death. Subsection (b) ranks it among the necessary expenses of administration, preferred before all other debts or demands, notwithstanding any other provision of law to the contrary. Now the part most summaries get wrong. Under § 53-3-7(a), if no objection is made after publication of the notice — or an objection is disallowed or withdrawn — the court shall set apart the property applied for in the petition. The standard-of-living test is in subsection (c), and it applies only where an objection is made: the court then weighs the support available from other sources, the solvency of the estate and any other relevant criterion. So what you schedule in the petition matters more than any evidence of need, unless someone objects. One protection is built in. A deposit applied to funeral and last-illness expenses under § 7-1-239(c) shall not count against the family when solvency is weighed. The deadline is the part to diarise: under § 53-3-5(c) the petition must be filed within 24 months of the date of death, in the probate court with jurisdiction over the estate. There is no fixed dollar figure in Georgia. And under § 53-1-5(b) a killer forfeits year’s support along with everything else.
O.C.G.A. §§ 53-1-5, 53-3-1, 53-3-5, 53-3-7·last read 2026-08-27
Notify beneficiaries and keep them informed
Georgia serves the will itself, and it does so a clear month before anything happens. Under O.C.G.A. § 53-5-22 probate in solemn form requires service of notice on all the heirs of the testator, and on the beneficiaries and propounders of any other purported will already before a Georgia court. Service must be at least thirty days before probate is to be made, unless notice is waived. Where it is made personally or by mail, the notice must include a copy of the petition and of the will for which probate is sought — so a Georgia heir receives the document, not a description of it. Beneficiaries with present interests whose identity and whereabouts are known or reasonably determinable must be served, along with any guardian or conservator of a beneficiary under age and each trustee; those holding only contingent interests need not be. Getting this wrong rarely costs money directly — it stalls the case. An estate that cannot show notice was properly given can be held open, and the appointment itself can be reopened, so keep proof of what you sent, to whom, and on what date.
O.C.G.A. § 53-5-22·last read 2026-08-25
Determine if probate is required
Georgia’s $15,000 figure is narrower than it looks: O.C.G.A. § 7-1-239 is a bank-deposit rule, letting a financial institution pay a deceased intestate depositor’s funds to family up to $15,000. It is not a general small-estate procedure. Georgia’s real shortcuts are different — a petition for year’s support, which can absorb an entire modest estate, or a petition that no administration is necessary where the heirs agree. Ask the probate court about those rather than assuming $15,000 is your ceiling.
O.C.G.A. § 7-1-239; §§ 53-3-1 et seq.·last read 2026-08-17
Legal Process
File a petition with the probate court
Georgia gives you two ways to shorten this, and a self-proved will is the first. Under O.C.G.A. § 53-5-21(a) a will may be proved in solemn form on the testimony of all the witnesses living and within the jurisdiction. But only one witness is required where no caveat is filed. And where the will is self-proved, compliance with the signature and other execution requirements is presumed, subject to rebuttal, with no witness testimony at all, on filing the will and the affidavit annexed to it. The second shortcut is at the end of subsection (b): if all the heirs acknowledge service of the petition and notice and assent to it, and no proceedings for another purported will are pending in this state, the will may be probated and letters testamentary may issue without further delay. The petition itself must name the testator, their domicile and date of death, the petitioner’s address, and the spouse and all other heirs with their ages and relationship — and where full particulars are lacking, state the reasons for the omission. One practical point: the word your state uses for this office is not decoration — asking for the wrong one wastes a trip and a phone call. And where a registrar or clerk can grant it, no judge is involved and no hearing is set, so nothing in the system will prompt you: the case moves only when you file.
O.C.G.A. §§ 53-5-20, 53-5-21·last read 2026-08-25
Inventory all assets and debts
Georgia makes you both file the inventory and post it to the family. Under O.C.G.A. § 53-7-30 the personal representative must prepare an inventory of all the property of the deceased, unless the will provides otherwise or they are relieved under § 53-7-32 or § 53-7-33. It is filed with the probate court, with a copy delivered by first-class mail to the beneficiaries of a testate estate or the heirs of an intestate one. All of that falls within six months after qualification, and the court may extend it for good cause. The inventory must state that it contains a true statement of all the property within the representative’s knowledge, and be verified in the same manner as a petition. It must also state that it has been mailed to everyone entitled to it, and name anyone who has waived the right to receive it under § 53-7-32. Two things that apply everywhere. Values are as of the date of death, not today — a house that has risen since is still listed at what it was worth then. And the inventory is the document everything else is measured against: fees, bond, and every later distribution. It is also what beneficiaries most often challenge, so take the time to get it right rather than filing a rough figure you intend to fix later.
O.C.G.A. § 53-7-30·last read 2026-08-25
Publish notice to creditors
Georgia does not bar a late creditor at all — it costs them their place in the queue, and sometimes not even that. Under O.C.G.A. § 53-7-41 the personal representative is allowed six months from the qualification of the first representative to ascertain the condition of the estate, and must within sixty days of qualification publish a notice to all creditors to render an account of their demands. Publication runs once a week for four weeks in the official newspaper of the county. A creditor who fails to give notice of a claim within three months from the date of the last publication loses the right to equal participation with creditors of equal priority who were paid before the claim surfaced, and may not hold the representative liable for misappropriation. But the section gives it back: if there are assets in hand sufficient to pay those debts and no unpaid claims of greater priority, the assets shall be appropriated notwithstanding the failure to give notice. Two things to hold on to. Publication is what starts the clock in most states, so an estate where nobody published can stay exposed to claims far longer than the family expects. And a known creditor usually has to be told directly — publication alone does not bind someone whose name and address you could reasonably have found.
O.C.G.A. § 53-7-41·last read 2026-08-25
Administration
Identify and close digital accounts
Georgia will take nothing but letters, which makes an appointment unavoidable. Chapter 13 of Title 53 is the Revised Uniform Fiduciary Access to Digital Assets Act, enacted in 2018. Under § 53-13-13 the content of electronic communications is disclosed where the deceased person consented or a court directs it, and the personal representative must give the custodian a written request, a certified copy of the death certificate, and a certified copy of the letters testamentary, letters of administration, or other letters of appointment. That third item is the whole of it. There is no small-estate affidavit route — the uniform act offers one and Georgia did not take it, but neither did the states around it. On the court-order point Georgia IS stricter than New Hampshire, whose RSA 554-A:7(c) accepts a certified copy of the letter of appointment OR a court order. A Georgia court can still direct disclosure under this section’s opening words, but that is not one of the documents you hand the custodian. Do not read Georgia as the strict outlier, though. Connecticut’s § 45a-334h(3) takes only a certified copy of the certificate of appointment AS EXECUTOR, which is narrower than Georgia’s three routes because it leaves out an administrator, and Vermont’s § 3557(3) takes a certificate of appointment of a fiduciary. Unless the person used the provider’s online tool you must also produce the will, trust or power of attorney evidencing consent. The rule to hold on to everywhere: without consent you generally get only the catalogue — who was contacted, when, and at what address — not what was actually said. “The executor can get into the accounts” is not what these laws do. And if you are advising someone still living, the provider’s own online tool is where this should be set, because it beats the will.
O.C.G.A. § 53-13-13·last read 2026-09-09
Financial Settlement
Pay valid debts and expenses
Georgia’s order is set by O.C.G.A. § 53-7-40, and year’s support sits at the very top of it — ahead of the funeral, ahead of administration, ahead of everything. Unless the law provides otherwise, all property of the estate, both real and personal, is liable for claims in this order. First, year’s support for the family. Then funeral expenses, whether or not there is a surviving spouse, in an amount corresponding with the circumstances of the deceased in life — and where the estate is solvent the representative may also provide suitable protection for the grave. Then other necessary expenses of administration. Then the reasonable expenses of the last illness. Then unpaid taxes and other debts due to the state or the United States. Then judgments, secured interests and other liens created during the lifetime, paid according to their priority of lien. And last, all other claims. One qualification carries the weight in a house-and-mortgage estate. A secured interest or lien on specific property is preferred only to the extent of that property — the lien reaches the thing it encumbers and no further. How that limit meets the year’s support at the top of the list is not something the section spells out, so where the estate is a mortgaged house and little else, put the question to a Georgia attorney before paying anyone. And do consider year’s support first: a surviving spouse or minor child may petition the probate court to set aside twelve months’ support, the petition must be filed within 24 months of the death, and the award can absorb a modest estate entirely, leaving nothing for creditors and no further administration to do.
O.C.G.A. §§ 53-3-1, 53-3-5, 53-7-40·last read 2026-08-27
File required tax returns
Georgia settled this by statute rather than by letting an old tax lapse quietly. O.C.G.A. § 48-12-1(a) says that on and after 1 July 2014 there shall be no estate taxes levied by the state and no estate tax returns shall be required by the state. That is as clean as this gets — no tax and no return, said in the statute itself. Georgia has no inheritance tax either. What Georgia does have is an income tax, so an estate that earns income while it is being administered — interest, rent, a gain on a sale — will have a Georgia fiduciary return to file alongside the federal one. Ask the Department of Revenue for the current form and the filing threshold rather than assuming. None of that removes the federal returns: the deceased’s final income tax return, and Form 1041 for income the estate itself earns during administration. And it does not help with property in another state, which may carry that state’s own death tax and its own filing.
O.C.G.A. § 48-12-1·last read 2026-08-25
Distribution
Distribute assets to heirs
Georgia does not use dollar tiers at all. It makes the spouse share with the children, and then guarantees the spouse a third. Under Ga. Code § 53-2-1, where there is no will and no children or other descendants survive, the spouse is the sole heir. Where children or descendants do survive, the spouse shares equally with the children — but the spouse’s portion shall not be less than a one-third share. So with one child the spouse takes half, and with two children a third each. With five children the spouse still takes a third, and the children divide the rest between them. Where no spouse survives, the estate passes by degree: children equally with the descendants of a dead child taking per stirpes, then parents equally, then siblings with nieces and nephews per stirpes, then grandparents, then uncles and aunts with first cousins per stirpes, and beyond that by counting the steps to a common ancestor. One more rule closes the section, and it matters where a child dies leaving no spouse and no descendants: a parent who is disqualified from inheriting because they abandoned the deceased is treated as though they had predeceased, and the estate passes as if that were so. A separate section removes a killer, and it reaches further than the estate. Under O.C.G.A. § 53-1-5(a) an individual who feloniously and intentionally kills, conspires to kill or procures the killing of another forfeits the right to take from the estate and the right to serve as personal representative or trustee of the estate or of any trust the deceased created. The killing counts only where it would be murder, felony murder or voluntary manslaughter under Georgia law. Subsection (b) extends the forfeiture to year’s support, the will, deeds and powers of appointment, and treats the killer as having predeceased. Subsection (c) spares the killer’s own descendants, who may still take — but only the share the killer would have had. A conviction or guilty plea settles it; without one, the killing must be shown by clear and convincing evidence. These shares apply only where there is no valid will — a will overrides all of it. And do not distribute anything until the creditor period has run and the debts are settled: a representative who pays the family early can be personally liable for what is still owing. Georgia lists in § 53-2-3 the ways a child born out of wedlock may inherit from the father, and attaches no deadline to any of them. A court order declaring the child legitimate. A court order otherwise establishing paternity. A sworn statement signed by the father attesting to the parent-child relationship. The father having signed the child’s birth certificate. Or other clear and convincing evidence that the child is his. Genetic testing showing at least a 97 per cent probability of paternity raises a rebuttable presumption. The birth certificate is worth checking first, because it is the commonest of these and the easiest to prove.
Ga. Code §§ 53-1-5, 53-2-1, 53-2-3·last read 2026-09-09
Close Estate
File a final accounting and close the estate
Georgia lets either side force the reckoning, and after only six months. Under O.C.G.A. § 53-7-62(a) any person interested as an heir or beneficiary — or the probate court itself — may, after the expiration of six months from the granting of letters, cite the personal representative to appear before the probate court for a settlement of accounts. The representative may instead use the same section defensively, citing all the heirs or beneficiaries and every creditor whose claim is disputed or cannot be paid in full, because the settlement is then conclusive on the representative and on everyone who received notice of the hearing. The court may allow more time in its discretion. Under subsection (b), if the representative fails or refuses to appear the court may proceed without them; a bond surety served personally is bound; and where the sheriff’s attempts at the representative’s last address of record appear futile, first-class mail to that address is sufficient. Any party may appeal. Closing is what ends your exposure, so do not simply stop when the money runs out — an estate left open leaves the representative personally on the hook. And filing a closing statement is not the same as being discharged. In several states the appointment only terminates some months later, if nobody objects. Keep the file, the receipts and the proof of what you sent until then.
O.C.G.A. § 53-7-62·last read 2026-08-25
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EstateMate is not a law firm and this is not legal advice. Every note above cites the section it came from and the date it was last read, so you can check it yourself. Statutes change, and the right answer can turn on facts specific to your family — when something looks close to the line, talk to a Georgia probate attorney.