What to Do When Someone Dies: Probate, Debts, and Taxes

When someone close to you dies, the legal checklist for what to do splits into tasks with hard deadlines and tasks that can wait. In the first week you need a death certificate in hand, Social Security notified, and the home secured. In the first month or two you deal with benefits claims, COBRA elections, and locating the will. Probate, debts, and tax returns stretch over months. Working in that order protects the estate, protects you from personal liability, and keeps survivors from losing benefits they’re entitled to.

The First Days

If the death happens at home and wasn’t expected, call 911 or the person’s physician. A doctor or medical examiner has to formally pronounce death and determine the cause before a death certificate can be issued. In a hospital or nursing facility, staff handle that.

If the person wanted to be an organ donor, tell hospital staff immediately, because that process starts within hours.

Secure the home if no one else lives there. Lock the doors, collect the mail, arrange care for pets, and grab the will if you know where it was kept. An unoccupied home attracts both theft and insurance problems, and the second one is bigger than most people realize (more on that below).

Order Enough Death Certificates

Almost every institution you deal with over the next several months will demand a certified copy of the death certificate. Banks, insurance companies, the DMV, retirement plan administrators, and the probate court all require one. The funeral home typically files the paperwork with the state’s vital records office to generate the certificate, and you order certified copies from there.

Request at least 10 to 15 copies up front. Prices vary by state, often $10 to $25 per copy, usually with a discount for additional copies ordered at the same time. Running out and reordering later wastes weeks. Keep them somewhere secure, because you’ll be reaching for them constantly.

Your Rights When Arranging the Funeral

If the person left written instructions or had a pre-paid plan, follow those. Pre-paid plans relieve financial pressure and often lock in prices from the date of purchase.

Federal law gives you real leverage with funeral homes. The FTC Funeral Rule requires every funeral provider to give you an itemized price list at the start of any discussion about services, and you can buy only the individual goods and services you actually want rather than accepting a bundled package.¹ You can decline embalming, skip a viewing, or provide your own casket without being charged a handling fee. Providers who refuse to itemize or push bundled packages are violating federal regulations.²

Direct cremation, which skips embalming and a formal viewing, is the least expensive of the main options. Body donation for medical research is another route. Whatever you choose, the funeral home arranges transportation, preparation, and the permits needed to move and inter remains.

Who to Notify, and the Deadlines That Matter

The funeral director usually reports the death to the Social Security Administration for you. If they don’t, call SSA yourself at 1-800-772-1213 as soon as possible.³ Social Security payments received after the date of death have to be returned, so the sooner SSA knows, the fewer overpayment problems you’ll untangle later.

Beyond SSA, these notifications belong near the top of the list:

Banks and financial institutions, to freeze accounts and prevent unauthorized withdrawals. The bank will restrict the account to estate-related transactions once it has a death certificate.
The deceased’s employer, which triggers the final paycheck, any accrued vacation payout, and information about employer-sponsored life insurance or retirement plans. State law controls how final wages are paid; in many states, a surviving spouse can collect directly without probate up to a dollar limit set by statute.
Life insurance companies. Proceeds go directly to named beneficiaries and are not part of the probate estate, so there’s no reason to wait on a claim.
Pension and retirement plan administrators. The beneficiary designation on the account controls who receives the funds, regardless of what the will says.
Credit bureaus. You only need to contact one of the three (Experian, Equifax, or TransUnion) with a certified death certificate. That bureau notifies the other two and places a deceased alert on the file, which flags any new applications as potential fraud.
The Department of Veterans Affairs, if the person served. The VA handles burial benefits, survivor benefits, and any VA life insurance policies.³

The COBRA Clock Runs Fast

When someone with employer-sponsored health insurance dies, their covered spouse and dependents lose that coverage. COBRA gives those dependents the right to continue the same group health plan for up to 36 months, though they pay the full premium plus a small administrative fee.⁴

The employer has to notify the health plan within 30 days of the death, and the plan then has 14 days to send surviving dependents an election notice. Dependents get 60 days from that notice to elect coverage. Miss the window and the right is gone, so watch the mail.⁴

Benefits to Claim

Social Security

Social Security pays a one-time lump-sum death benefit of $255 to an eligible surviving spouse or qualifying child. The application deadline is two years from the date of death. Qualifying children include those under 18, those aged 18 to 19 and enrolled full-time in school, and adult children who developed a disability before age 22.⁵

Separate from the lump sum, a surviving spouse may qualify for ongoing monthly survivor benefits based on the deceased’s earnings record. Eligibility depends on the survivor’s age, disability status, and whether they’re caring for the deceased’s minor children. These benefits can be substantial, so call SSA directly.

VA Burial Allowance

If the deceased was a veteran, the VA pays burial allowances that depend on whether the death was service-connected. For a service-connected death after September 11, 2001, the maximum burial allowance is $2,000. For a non-service-connected death occurring on or after October 1, 2025, the maximum is $1,002, plus a separate plot allowance of up to $1,002.⁶

Find the Will and the Key Documents

Before estate administration can begin, locate the paperwork:

The will or trust documents, which dictate who inherits what and who serves as executor or trustee.
Life insurance policies, so claims can be filed with each insurer.
Bank and investment account statements, to identify assets and approximate values.
Property deeds and vehicle titles, needed for transfers.
Tax returns from the past two or three years, which help you identify income sources, retirement accounts, and outstanding obligations.
Social Security card and birth certificate, often required by institutions verifying authority over the estate.

One point catches people off guard: any power of attorney the deceased granted during their lifetime ends the moment they die. The person who held that POA has no legal authority over the estate going forward. Only the executor named in the will, or an administrator appointed by the court, can act for the estate after death. If a former POA holder was managing finances, they need to hand everything over promptly.

Figure Out Whether Probate Is Required

Probate is the court-supervised process of validating the will, cataloging assets, paying debts and taxes, and distributing what’s left. Probate is required when the deceased owned assets solely in their own name without a beneficiary designation or joint owner.

The person who manages this is the executor if named in a will, or the administrator if the court appoints one when there’s no will. Courts generally prefer a surviving spouse, then adult children, then other close relatives. The job includes inventorying and appraising assets, publishing notice to creditors and contacting known creditors directly, paying legitimate debts in the priority order state law requires (funeral expenses and administration costs typically come first), filing tax returns, and distributing what remains under the will or, if there’s no will, under the state’s intestacy laws, which usually favor the surviving spouse and children.

Creditors generally have three to six months after receiving notice to file claims. Once that period closes and legitimate debts and taxes are paid, the executor petitions the court to approve the final distribution and close the estate. Court filing fees to open probate typically run from $50 to $500 depending on jurisdiction and estate size.

When You Can Use a Small Estate Affidavit

Every state offers some form of simplified procedure for smaller estates, usually called a small estate affidavit. Instead of court proceedings, the person inheriting prepares a sworn statement claiming entitlement, presents it with a death certificate to whoever holds the asset, and the asset is released.

Dollar thresholds vary enormously, from about $10,000 to $275,000, with most states falling somewhere around $50,000 to $75,000. These limits generally apply only to assets that would otherwise go through probate, so jointly held property, life insurance, and retirement accounts with beneficiary designations don’t count against the cap. Most states also require a waiting period of 30 to 45 days after death before you can use the affidavit. Some states exclude real estate from this process entirely, while others allow a simplified court petition for transferring real property below a certain value.

Assets That Skip Probate Entirely

A lot of what the person owned may never touch the probate court:

Jointly owned property with rights of survivorship. The surviving co-owner automatically takes full ownership.
Life insurance proceeds, which go to the named beneficiary (unless the estate itself is named as beneficiary).
Retirement accounts like 401(k)s and IRAs, which pass to whoever is listed as beneficiary on the account, regardless of the will.⁷
Transfer-on-death (TOD) accounts and, in some states, vehicle titles with a TOD designation.
Property held in a living trust, which passes to the trust’s beneficiaries outside probate.

The beneficiary designation on these assets overrides the will. That’s where outdated paperwork creates ugly surprises. If someone divorced and remarried but never updated the 401(k), the ex-spouse may still be entitled to the funds. Check the designations now so you understand what’s going where.

Debts: Who Actually Owes Them

Family members are generally not personally responsible for a deceased person’s debts. When someone dies owing money, the debts are paid from the estate’s assets. If the estate can’t cover everything, creditors are paid in priority order and the remainder typically goes unpaid.⁸

A surviving spouse may be personally responsible in specific situations:

They co-signed a loan or are a joint account holder on a credit card. Being an authorized user is not the same as being a joint holder.
They live in a community property state, where spouses share responsibility for debts incurred during the marriage.
Their state has “necessaries” statutes that make a spouse liable for essential expenses like medical care.⁸

Debt collectors sometimes contact surviving family and imply they’re personally on the hook. In most cases, they aren’t. The estate owes the debt, not the family. Talk to an attorney before you agree to pay anything out of your own pocket.

Executor Personal Liability

Serving as executor carries real financial risk. An executor who distributes assets to heirs before properly paying creditors can be held personally liable for those unpaid debts. It happens more often than most people expect, usually because the executor didn’t realize there’s a required sequence.

The common mistakes that create personal liability are distributing assets before the creditor claim period expires, failing to publish the required notice to potential creditors, paying lower-priority debts before higher-priority ones (settling credit card bills before funeral expenses, say), and mishandling the estate’s tax obligations. An executor who uses estate funds for personal expenses is liable too, and may face legal action from beneficiaries.

The safe approach: pay nothing to heirs until the creditor claim window has closed, all debts are paid in the order your state requires, and final tax returns are filed. If the estate is complex, hiring a probate attorney is a reasonable cost that the estate itself pays.

The Tax Returns You’ll Need to File

Final Individual Income Tax Return

Someone has to file the deceased’s final Form 1040, covering income from January 1 through the date of death. The deadline is the normal one, April 15 of the year after the death, with extensions available. A surviving spouse filing jointly can include the deceased’s income on their joint return for the year of death.⁹ If a balance is due, payment goes in with the return.¹⁰

Estate Income Tax Return

If the estate itself earns income after the date of death, from interest on bank accounts, rent on property, dividends, or similar sources, the executor must file a separate estate income tax return (Form 1041) if that income reaches $600 or more in a tax year.¹¹ This covers income earned by the estate during administration, not income the deceased earned while alive. People miss this one because they assume the final 1040 is the end of it.

Federal Estate Tax Return

A federal estate tax return (Form 706) is required when the gross estate exceeds the basic exclusion amount, which for deaths in 2026 is $15,000,000.¹² The gross estate includes everything the deceased owned or had an interest in at death, valued at fair market value. Most estates fall well below the threshold, but when a return is required, it’s due nine months after the date of death, with a six-month extension available if requested before the deadline.¹³ The filing threshold tracks the basic exclusion amount defined in the tax code.¹⁴

Some states impose their own estate or inheritance taxes with much lower thresholds than the federal exemption. Check with a tax professional or your state’s revenue department.

House, Car, and Insurance While the Estate Settles

The Mortgage Doesn’t Disappear

If the deceased had a mortgage, the loan doesn’t vanish, but it doesn’t automatically become the heirs’ personal debt either. Federal law prevents lenders from calling a mortgage due solely because the property transferred to a relative through inheritance. The heir can continue payments under the original loan terms. What they can’t do is ignore it. If payments stop, the lender can still foreclose.

Vacant Home Insurance

Most homeowners policies include a vacancy clause that limits or excludes coverage once the property has been unoccupied for 30 to 60 consecutive days. For an estate holding a home no one is living in, this is an easy trap. Water damage, theft, vandalism, and liability claims may all be denied if the insurer determines the home was vacant beyond the policy’s limit. Call the insurance company as soon as possible. You may need to buy a vacancy endorsement or a standalone vacant-property policy to maintain coverage while the estate is being settled or the home is being sold.

Transferring Vehicle Titles

Vehicle titles need to be transferred to the heir or buyer. If the deceased set up a transfer-on-death designation on the title, the named beneficiary can transfer ownership at the DMV with the title, a death certificate, and the required application. Many states also allow a surviving spouse to transfer vehicles through a simplified affidavit up to a set dollar value. Without a TOD designation and with the vehicle titled solely in the deceased’s name, the executor generally needs probate authority before transferring. Check your state’s DMV for the specific forms and fees.

Protect Against Identity Theft

Deceased individuals are prime targets for identity theft because the fraud often goes undetected for months. Placing a deceased alert with one of the three credit bureaus is the single most effective step. Beyond that:

Forward the deceased’s mail to the executor or a trusted family member. Uncollected mail is an open invitation to intercept bank statements, credit offers, or government correspondence.
Cancel unnecessary accounts. Close credit cards, streaming subscriptions, gym memberships, and anything else the estate doesn’t need. Every open account is another entry point for fraud.
Request a copy of the deceased’s credit report when you notify the bureau. Review it for unfamiliar accounts or recent inquiries that could indicate fraud already underway.

Every institution you contact to close an account will ask for a certified death certificate and documentation of the executor’s authority. Closing a single credit card is simple. Closing fifteen accounts across banks, utilities, and subscriptions without enough death certificates on hand turns into weeks of delay. That’s why ordering plenty of certified copies at the start matters so much.

1
Federal Trade Commission. The FTC Funeral Rule
2
eCFR. 16 CFR Part 453 – Funeral Industry Practices
3
USAGov. Agencies to Notify When Someone Dies
4
U.S. Department of Labor. FAQs on COBRA Continuation Health Coverage for Workers
5
Social Security Administration. Lump-Sum Death Payment
6
U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. Veterans Burial Allowance and Transportation Benefits
7
American Bar Association. Nonprobate Assets
8
Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Am I Responsible for My Spouse’s Debts After They Die?
9
Internal Revenue Service. Filing a Final Federal Tax Return for Someone Who Has Died
10
Internal Revenue Service. File the Final Income Tax Returns of a Deceased Person
11
Internal Revenue Service. 2025 Instructions for Form 1041
12
Internal Revenue Service. What’s New – Estate and Gift Tax
13
Internal Revenue Service. Filing Estate and Gift Tax Returns
14
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 26 U.S. Code 6018 – Estate Tax Returns