Probate and Estates
Expert guidance when you have lost a loved one
Our team has experience in both simple and complex estates allowing you to feel secure in knowing what will be passed on to your loved ones in a time of grief. The term “Deceased Estate” refers to the net worth of a person at their death. The Estate is the sum of a person’s assets being legal rights, interests and entitlements to property of any kind – less all liabilities.
Whether or not Probate, Letters of Administration or Letters of Administration with Will Annexed will be required, will depend upon the assets of the deceased and their manner of ownership.
What is Probate?
Probate in Victoria is applied for through the Supreme Court of Victoria in its Probate jurisdiction and, in simple terms, is the acknowledgement that the Executor appointed in the Will has proven the Will and is therefore granted Probate to undertake the legal process of administering the estate of a deceased person by resolving all claims and distributing the deceased person’s property under the valid Will.
What are Letters of Administration and who can apply?
If a person has died intestate ie: without a Will, instead of applying for Probate of the Will, an Application for Letters of Administration of the Estate may be required.
In the event that the deceased did not leave a Will, then the next of kin would be entitled to apply for a grant of Letters of Administration. The next of kin sequence would firstly be a surviving spouse or defacto partner, then children. If there was no living spouse or children, the sequence would revert to grandchildren, parents, siblings, grandparents, uncles and aunts and then first cousins. The distribution of an intestate’s estate is also based on next of kin, however there is a scale applied.
