Someone has died and you've been told the estate needs to go through probate.

Maybe you're named as executor in the will. Maybe there's no will and you're the one who stepped forward.

Either way, you're now looking at a court process nobody prepared you for, at a moment when you have the least capacity to absorb new information. This walks through what actually happens, in order.

The short version: for a routine estate, plan on nine to twelve months. Not because the work takes that long, but because a six-month statutory clock sits in the middle and can't be shortened.

Step 1: Determine whether probate is required at all

Not every estate needs it. Probate reaches property held in the decedent's name alone. A great deal passes outside it:

• Real estate or accounts held jointly with right of survivorship
• Bank accounts with a payable-on-death designation
• Life insurance and retirement accounts with a living named beneficiary
• Anything already titled in a trust

If everything the person owned falls into those categories, there may be nothing to administer. Plenty of families open an estate they didn't need, and plenty of others assume they don't need one when a single vehicle title or a savings account in the decedent's sole name means they do.

This is worth ten minutes with an attorney before you file anything.

Step 2: File the petition in the right court

New Hampshire probate is handled by the Circuit Court, Probate Division, in the county where the decedent lived. For Hopkinton and the surrounding towns, that's the 6th Circuit in Concord, at 2 Charles Doe Drive.

You'll file a Petition for Estate Administration (form NHJB-2145-P), along with:

• A certified copy of the death certificate
• The original will and any codicils, if there was a will
• The filing fee, which is scaled to the value of the estate

Note original will. A photocopy creates a separate problem requiring separate proof. If the original is in a safe deposit box you can't access yet, say so in the filing rather than substituting a copy.

Attorneys file electronically through TurboCourt. Self-represented petitioners can file on paper or electronically.

New Hampshire has not adopted the Uniform Probate Code, so guidance you find online written for other states will frequently be wrong in the details.

Step 3: Appointment, Letters, and bond

If the petition is in order and uncontested, the court appoints the personal representative — an executor if named in a will, an administrator if not. Contested or irregular petitions get a hearing, typically scheduled a month or two out.

The court then issues Letters Testamentary or Letters of Administration. This document is the point of the whole exercise so far. Until it's in hand, nobody has authority to close an account, sell a car, or sign a deed. Banks will ask for it, and they will want a certified copy with a raised seal.

The court may require a surety bond, essentially an insurance policy protecting the estate against mismanagement. It's commonly waived when the will says so, when the sole beneficiary is serving as administrator, or when all interested parties agree.

Step 4: Give notice

Two kinds, on two clocks.

1. To the people involved. Where a will has been proved, notice goes to the surviving spouse, legatees, and heirs within 60 days, and the executor certifies to the court within 90 days that it was given (RSA 552:15).
2. To everyone else. Notice of the appointment is published in a newspaper of general circulation in the county, running for three successive weeks. This is what puts unknown creditors on notice.

Neither of these is optional, and the certification is a genuinely common thing to overlook because it feels administrative.

Step 5: Inventory, within 90 days

Within 90 days of appointment, the personal representative files an Inventory of Fiduciary (form NHJB-2125-P) listing estate assets at fair market value as of the date of death.

Real estate, vehicles, bank and investment accounts, business interests, personal property of meaningful value. Real estate and unusual assets typically need an appraisal, and getting one scheduled is the step most likely to push you against the deadline. Start early.

The inventory is waived under a waiver of administration — more on that below.

Step 6: The creditor period — six months

This is the clock that sets the floor on your timeline.

Creditors have six months from the date of appointment to present claims against the estate. The personal representative reviews each one for validity, and valid ones get paid before anything is distributed.

Two things people get wrong here:

1. Don't pay early, and don't pay out of order. New Hampshire sets a strict priority under RSA 554:19 — administration expenses first, then funeral and burial, then certain preferred debts, with general unsecured creditors well down the list. A personal representative who pays a credit card before those higher classes can end up personally responsible for the shortfall.
2. Don't distribute early. Handing a beneficiary their share in month three, before you know what claims will surface, is the single most common way a well-intentioned executor creates liability for themselves.

If it becomes clear the estate owes more than it's worth, there's a separate insolvency track under RSA 554:19-b with its own procedure and its own protections.

Step 7: Taxes

Any required federal returns, and any New Hampshire returns, are generally due within nine months of the date of death unless an extension is obtained.

For most estates this means a final personal income tax return and possibly a fiduciary return. New Hampshire imposes no state estate or inheritance tax, so the great majority of estates here have no death tax exposure at all.

Step 8: Close the estate

Three routes, and which one applies was largely determined back at Step 2.

1. Waiver of administration (RSA 553:32). Available in a narrow but common situation: the decedent died with a will naming the surviving spouse — or if no spouse, an only child — as sole beneficiary, and that person serves as administrator; or died without a will and that same person is the sole heir and serves as administrator. No inventory, no bond, no accounting. The estate closes when the administrator files an affidavit of administration, which must be filed no sooner than six months and no later than one year after appointment. Miss that window and you're in default, and the clerk issues a citation.
2. Summary administration (RSA 553:33). Available on motion after six months where the estate qualifies. Lighter than a full accounting.
3. Full administration. If neither of the above applies, the personal representative files an account within one year of appointment and annually after that, until the estate is settled and the court decrees distribution.

Step 9: Distribute and finish

Once debts, taxes, and expenses are paid and the court approves, the remaining assets go to the beneficiaries under the will — or, if there's no will, to the heirs under New Hampshire's intestacy statute, which distributes on a formula regardless of what anyone believes the decedent intended.

Deeds get recorded, accounts get transferred, and the estate closes.

How long, realistically

Waiver of administration: six to nine months, driven almost entirely by the mandatory waiting period.

Straightforward full administration: nine to fifteen months.

Estates involving real estate to sell, a business, an out-of-state property, an insolvency question, or a contested claim: longer, sometimes considerably.

The delays that actually hurt are self-inflicted: waiting months to open the estate, missing the 90-day inventory, or discovering at month eight that the certification of notice was never filed.

Where an attorney earns their fee

Some estates genuinely don't need one. A waiver of administration where a surviving spouse inherits everything is often manageable alone.

Where it stops being a paperwork exercise: real estate that needs to be sold or cleared, an insolvent estate, a Medicaid recovery claim, a missing or contested will, an out-of-state asset, a beneficiary who has retained counsel, or a personal representative who lives outside New Hampshire and needs a resident agent.

And underneath all of it — the personal representative is a fiduciary, personally accountable for getting the sequence right. That's the part that justifies a phone call even if you handle the rest yourself.

We help New Hampshire families through probate, from straightforward waivers to insolvent and contested estates. See our Probate Administration page, or call (603) 499-7431 for a free 30-minute consultation.

This article describes New Hampshire law and procedure generally and is not legal advice for any particular estate. Court forms, fees, and procedures change; verify current requirements with the Circuit Court.