Connecticut Probate Forms Finder

Important Notes

• -Connecticut has no county probate court. The 54 probate districts of Conn. Gen. Stat. § 45a-2 each serve one or more of the 169 towns, and you file where the decedent LIVED. Use the court locator to find yours
• -There is NO flat fee to open a Connecticut decedent's estate. The $250 fee in § 45a-106a applies by its own words to matters OTHER than a decedent's estate
• -The only estate fee is the § 45a-107 sliding scale, invoiced AFTER the Connecticut estate tax return sets the values. The minimum is $25, or $150 where a full estate is settled, and the schedule for a death on or after July 1, 2016 caps at $40,000
• -Any portion of the fee basis attributable to property passing to the surviving spouse is reduced by 50 per cent
• -Interest accrues on unpaid probate fees at 0.5 per cent per month beginning 30 days after the estate tax return due date, for deaths on or after January 1, 2011
• -Connecticut has NO informal-versus-formal probate split. The court must hold a hearing before proving or disapproving a will unless everyone entitled to notice waives it or nobody requests a hearing under the court's streamline notice procedure
• -A probate bond is the DEFAULT. It is required of an executor unless excused, and the court shall take one from an administrator. Your appointment is not effective until the court accepts the bond, and that acceptance starts the two-month inventory clock
• -The creditor clock runs from the APPOINTMENT of the first fiduciary. The court publishes newspaper notice within 14 days, the routine window is 150 days, and a defect in publication does not extend it
• -The only way to shorten the window is your own written notice on PC-234, fixing a date not less than 90 days out. A creditor who misses that date is forever barred
• -Six Connecticut probate documents a fiduciary will hear about are ISSUED BY THE COURT and are absent from the public forms list: PC-160, PC-212B, PC-251, PC-260, PC-264 and PC-450. Their PDF paths return 404. Ask the court for them and never treat the 404 as proof the document does not exist
• -The judiciary's decedents' estates user guide calls PC-212A Request for Order and Distribution. The official forms list, which is the naming authority, calls it Request for Order of Distribution
• -A Connecticut estate tax return is required for EVERY decedent's estate, whether or not tax is due. Below the exclusion amount it goes to the Probate Court on CT-706 NT; above it, to the Department of Revenue Services on CT-706/709 with a copy to the court
• -Connecticut has NO transfer-on-death deed for real estate. Transfer-on-death registration here reaches securities and a motor vehicle registration only
• -Connecticut does NOT recognize tenancy by the entirety. A conveyance running to spouses as tenants by the entirety creates a joint tenancy in fee simple with survivorship instead
• -The § 45a-365 order of payment puts FUNERAL EXPENSES FIRST, ahead of the expenses of settling the estate. Do not carry another state's ordering into a Connecticut insolvent estate
• -An appeal from a Probate Court decree goes to the SUPERIOR COURT, on or before the 30th day after the date the Probate Court SENT the order, and 45 days for certain conservatorship and guardianship matters
• -Connecticut allows a fiduciary to represent themselves without an attorney under the Probate Court Rules of Procedure. If the statutory fee is a hardship, ask for a waiver on PC-184