You have given advance notice to all other “successors” of your intention to obtain the asset of the loved one and they have provided you written authorization to do so. No application or petition for the appointment of a personal representative or estate administrator is pending or has been granted in any jurisdiction.Īll debts of the decedent including funeral and burial expenses have been paid or provided for. Your loved one must also have been a resident of the State of Washington at the date of death. If you are a surviving spouse, you are also a successor at least to the extent of your community property portion of the asset being held. You are a successor if you are entitled to the asset in question under the will of the decedent or under Washington’s law of intestate succession ( RCW 11.04.015) if there was no will. You must be a “successor,” as that term is defined in the small estate affidavit statute. The holder of the asset has no obligation to inquire into the truth of the material in the affidavit, however, he or she cannot ignore facts known to be untrue.Įven if the estate meets the financial threshold, however, other requirements need to be satisfied: The person or financial institution that held the asset will be discharged and released from any liability in the same way as if it had been dealing directly with the personal representative of an estate. If you decide to use the small estate affidavit and present it to a person or financial institution that is holding the assets of your loved one, that person or financial institution is supposed to deliver the asset to you. In those cases, you'll probably need a probate. Therefore, it is rare when you could or would want to use the small estate affidavit process if your loved one died with real property. Furthermore, the equity in the real property is used toward the $100,000 calculation. While a small estate affidavit may be used for a decedent who had real property, the affidavit cannot be used to transfer title to the real property. If the answer is “yes,” then using a small estate affidavit may not be the best choice. However, you should also ask whether they owned any real property (i.e., land or real estate).

If they did, you can probably use this process. Before using a small estate affidavit, you should first ask whether the deceased person had less than $100,000 in probate assets. Washington law permits the use of a small estate affidavit in certain circumstances.

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