If someone dies without a valid will, state law decides who inherits, using a fixed list of relatives that nearly always starts with a spouse and children. If a court case is needed, the court appoints the person who handles the estate. If there is a will and someone believes it isn’t valid, there’s a set process with a deadline. Thinking a will is unfair isn’t on any list of grounds we read.
This page is general information, not legal or tax advice. Estate law varies by state and changes. Ask the court clerk, or a lawyer or tax professional, about your case.
This guide follows the order families usually meet these questions: is there a valid will, who inherits, who takes charge, how the heirs are shown, and what happens in a dispute. Rules differ by state, so the states below are examples, read on 5 November 2026 in the source linked beside them.
First: is there a valid will?
Testate means the person died with a valid will. Intestate means they didn’t. Someone can also be partly intestate, when a valid will doesn’t cover everything they owned.
Finding a paper called a will doesn’t always settle it. The court decides. New York, Florida, Texas and California each want a written, signed will with at least two witnesses in the usual case (EPTL 3-2.1, Fla. Stat. 732.502, Tex. Est. Code 251.051, Cal. Prob. Code 6110), though Texas and California can accept some handwritten wills. If a will fails, the person is generally treated as intestate, unless an earlier will stands.
Our page on what testate and intestate change walks through the hard cases: a will that can’t be found, one that covers only part of the estate, and one that turns up later.
Who inherits when there is no will
The list reaches only property with no other instructions. Joint accounts, named beneficiaries and trusts mostly follow their own paperwork, and the Supreme Court held in Kennedy v. DuPont that a workplace plan pays the person named on its form, even an ex-spouse who had signed a waiver.
What’s left goes by state. Many people assume a spouse gets everything. Often that’s true, but frequently not when there are children from another relationship. Take a spouse and one adult child from an earlier relationship, with $400,000 of separate property left after debts and costs, in the person’s sole name, with no land and no beneficiary named:
| State and statute | Spouse gets | Child gets |
|---|---|---|
| Minnesota 524.2-102 | $312,500 | $87,500 |
| New York 4-1.1 | $225,000 | $175,000 |
| Ohio 2105.06 | $210,000 | $190,000 |
| Florida 732.102 | $200,000 | $200,000 |
| Virginia 64.2-200 | About $133,333 | About $266,667 |
This is our arithmetic from those statutes, as an illustration, not a statement of what any family is owed. A spouse may have other rights on top. Ohio was read on 5 November 2026 in the official Ohio code.
With no spouse, children come first on the lists we read, and the children of a child who has died generally step into that place. Then come parents, brothers and sisters, then more distant relatives. Unmarried partners, stepchildren, friends and charities usually get nothing, with exceptions: Washington gives a state registered domestic partner the same share as a spouse. The state comes last. Our guide to what happens without a will has the shares in 11 states, and what happens with a family home or children under 18.
Debts come first either way. They “are generally paid out of the money or property left in the estate”, says the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and heirs get what is left. See what happens to debts after a death.
Who takes charge
With no will naming an executor, the court picks from a list of its own. The person it appoints is usually called an administrator. In New York the order is spouse, children, grandchildren, a parent, then brothers and sisters, and California has a similar list that puts domestic partners with spouses. The IRS says administrators and executors generally have the same duties: gather the property, pay what’s owed, and pass on what remains.
Authority comes from a court paper, letters of administration, the counterpart of the letters testamentary an executor usually gets.
Not every estate needs this. Having no will doesn’t always mean a full probate case, and if what’s left is small, a small estate process may replace it. Firms say an estate with no will takes longer and costs more. We looked for figures comparing the two and found none we could confirm. For the numbers that do exist, see how long probate takes.
Showing who the heirs are
With no will, the relatives have to be established. Nothing updates the deed on its own. Families who never clear the title end up with what the US Department of Agriculture calls heirs’ property: land owned jointly by a deceased person’s descendants, without clear title. Each generation generally adds more heirs.
An affidavit of heirship is one tool some families use: a sworn statement of family history, usually recorded in the county land records. It’s evidence, not a court order. In Texas, a court must accept it as true unless shown otherwise only once it has been on record for five years or more, and it “does not affect the rights of an omitted heir or creditor of the decedent”. In New York the same name means a court paper. Texas also has a court case to declare heirs, which ends in a final judgment naming the heirs and their shares.
Nothing in the statutes read requires a title company to accept an affidavit. If the goal is a sale, it’s a question to ask before anyone signs a contract. Selling a house in probate covers the wider picture.
When someone disputes a will
A will contest needs a legal reason. Those reasons are specific: the person lacked capacity, was pressured or deceived, the will was forged or not signed properly, or it was later revoked. Only someone with a stake can bring one. If the will fell, the estate would generally follow an earlier will that still stands, or otherwise the state’s intestacy rules, which may be no better for the person contesting.
Deadlines differ widely, and most start from a court step, not the death. So the time can begin to run before anyone has read the will.
| State | Time to contest | Runs from |
|---|---|---|
| California | 120 days to petition to revoke probate | The will being admitted |
| Florida | 3 months, with an outer limit | Service of the notice of administration |
| Ohio | 3 months | The filing of the certificate that notice of admission was given or waived |
| Texas | 2 years. For forgery or fraud, 2 years from discovering it | The will being admitted |
These are the main rules, not all of them. Ohio was read on 5 November 2026 in the official Ohio code. Missing a deadline is usually the end of it.
Some wills add a no-contest clause, which says a beneficiary who contests loses their gift. It’s unenforceable in Florida, but enforceable in New York even with probable cause, with exceptions. Our page on how a will contest works sets out the steps, proof and costs. It covers process only: we can’t say whether a contest makes sense for a family or how one would end.
Not every family dispute is a contest. A worry that the executor is mishandling the estate is a complaint about conduct, and the will stays valid. Our list of what an executor can’t do is a place to start. In some states, a surviving spouse left little has a separate right called an elective share, with its own clock.
When to get a lawyer
Clerks generally can’t give legal advice. These are the points to speak to a probate lawyer in the state where the case is:
- A deadline is running, or the will is disputed.
- You suspect forgery or fraud.
- Heirs disagree or can’t be found, or someone disputes a marriage or a child’s parentage.
- A no-contest clause could cost someone a gift.
- The estate can’t pay its debts, or there is a business or land in another state.
What to do next
- Search for a will: home papers, safe deposit records, the person’s lawyer, the local probate court.
- List what the person owned, and how: sole name, joint, or with a beneficiary. Leave property in their sole name alone until someone has legal authority over it.
- Write down the family tree, including the children of any child who has died.
- Call the probate court clerk in the county where they lived. Ask whether a will has been filed or admitted, on what date, and whether a small estate process fits.
If someone has only just died, our checklist for the first weeks covers what comes first and what can wait.
Sources checked on 5 November 2026.
