Nebraska Surviving Spouse Rights

Nebraska puts a ceiling on what a will can take away from a husband or wife. Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2313(a) gives the surviving spouse of a person who died domiciled in Nebraska a right of election to take any fraction up to one-half of the augmented estate, whatever the will says. Three separate allowances then sit on top of that share rather than inside it.

Three features of the Nebraska answer catch people who read a generic summary first. The fraction is flat at one-half and rises with nothing, because no marriage-length schedule appears anywhere in the Nebraska article. The measure is an augmented estate that reaches back and pulls in gifts made within three years of the death above $3,000 to any one recipient in any of those years. And the petition is due nine months after the death or six months after the will is admitted, whichever runs longer, so a spouse who waits takes only what the will gives.

Every rule below was read on September 10, 2026 at the Nebraska Legislature's own statute pages, the official publisher of the Nebraska Revised Statutes, and each section's amendment history was read at the same time. Section numbers sit beside each rule so you can check them yourself.

This page answers what a surviving spouse can claim under Nebraska law rather than what any one spouse should do, which is a question for a licensed Nebraska attorney. For how a Nebraska estate is opened, administered and closed, read the Nebraska probate process.

Four Rights, Four Parts Of The Code

Nebraska splits a surviving spouse's claims across four mechanisms, and each one runs on its own terms and its own statute.

• The elective share. Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2313 through 30-2319 give the right to elect a fraction up to one-half of the augmented estate. This is the part that limits what a will can do.
• The homestead allowance. Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2322 pays $20,000 in cash for a death on or after January 1, 2011 and before January 1, 2027. It is not a right to live in the house.
• Exempt property. Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2323 hands over $12,500 in household furniture, automobiles, furnishings, appliances and personal effects, measured above any security interest in them.
• The family allowance. Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2324 and 30-2325 supply a reasonable allowance in money for maintenance while the estate is being administered.

Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2318(b) settles how the first relates to the other three, in one line: a surviving spouse is entitled to homestead allowance, exempt property and family allowance whether or not the spouse elects to take an elective share. Those are separate questions, and answering one does not answer the other.

Two of the allowances have their own pages here. The Nebraska exempt property allowance covers the selection mechanics under 30-2323, and the Nebraska family allowance covers the 30-2324 entitlement and the 30-2325 figures.

The Elective Share Is One-Half And Does Not Move With The Marriage

Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2313(a) carries the whole answer in one sentence. Where a married person domiciled in this state dies, the surviving spouse has a right of election to take an elective share in any fraction not in excess of one-half of the augmented estate, under the limitations and conditions the sections that follow state.

Two words there do work most summaries skip. "Any fraction" means the spouse chooses the size of the claim and may elect less than one-half, which matters when a smaller fraction leaves a family arrangement intact. Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2317(a) supplies the default for a petition that designates nothing: the share is one-half.

No schedule keyed to the years of a marriage appears in the Nebraska sections. A spouse of eleven months and a spouse of forty years face the same ceiling. Summaries built for states that use the 1990 revision of the Uniform Probate Code print a percentage that climbs from 3 percent to 50 percent with the length of the marriage, and none of that text is Nebraska law.

Subsection (b) hands the question to another state where the person who died was domiciled elsewhere. The right of a surviving spouse to take an elective share in Nebraska property, and the amount of that share, are governed by the law of the decedent's domicile at death.

Subsection (c) closes one gap for out-of-state owners of Nebraska ground. Where a person had owned Nebraska real estate and conveyed it during life without the spouse joining in the conveyance, while domiciled outside Nebraska, that conveyance stands whatever the law of the domicile says, and the land is not subject to claims or interests derived from the grantor or the grantor's estate because the spouse did not join.

What Goes Into The Augmented Estate

Read the fraction against the right noun. One-half of the probate estate and one-half of the augmented estate are different numbers, and Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2314 builds the second one in two moves.

It subtracts first. The augmented estate begins as the estate reduced by the total of funeral and administration expenses, the homestead allowance, family allowances and exemptions, and enforceable claims.

Then it adds two pools.

1. Lifetime transfers by the person who died, under subsection (a)(1). Property transferred at any time during the marriage to or for the benefit of anyone other than a bona fide purchaser or the surviving spouse, but only so far as the decedent did not receive adequate and full consideration, and only where the transfer takes one of four shapes: the decedent kept possession or enjoyment of the property, or the right to income from it, at death; the decedent kept a power alone or with another person to revoke the transfer or to consume, invade or dispose of the principal for their own benefit; the property was held at death by the decedent and another person with right of survivorship; or the transfer was a gift made within three years of death, counted so far as the total to any one donee in any of those years went over $3,000.
2. Property on the surviving spouse's own side, under subsection (a)(2). What the spouse owned when the decedent died, and what the spouse transferred during the marriage to or for the benefit of anyone other than the decedent, counted only so far as it would have been in the spouse's own augmented estate had the spouse died first, and only so far as it came from the decedent without adequate and full consideration by means other than testate or intestate succession. The section names the forms it reaches, among them a beneficial interest in a trust the decedent created during life, property appointed to the spouse by the decedent's exercise of a general or special power of appointment that was also exercisable in favor of someone other than the spouse, insurance proceeds on the decedent's life together with the commuted value of annuity proceeds, and the commuted value of amounts payable after the death under a pension, disability, death benefit or retirement plan. Federal social security and railroad retirement are named as exclusions.

$3,000 is not a typo, and it is the figure a Nebraska estate has to work with. Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2314 was last amended by Laws 1985, LB 293, section 1, and that gift figure has not moved since. It sits far below the federal annual gift-tax exclusion, so ordinary family gifts made in the last three years of a life land inside the measure. Anyone reasoning from the federal number is reasoning from the wrong statute.

The section also defines the term that keeps a sale out of the calculation. A bona fide purchaser is a purchaser for value in good faith and without notice of any adverse claim, and the attachment of stamps to an instrument and their cancellation under the documentary stamp tax sections, Neb. Rev. Stat. 76-901 to 76-908, are prima facie evidence that the transferee was one.

Subsection (b) fixes the valuation dates. An irrevocable lifetime gift by the decedent is valued when the donee first came into possession or enjoyment, a transfer by the surviving spouse is valued when it became irrevocable, and everything else is valued at the date of death.

Subsection (c) takes three categories back out of the augmented estate:

• accident or life insurance proceeds, a joint annuity, or a pension payable to any person other than the surviving spouse
• property the decedent transferred to someone other than the spouse by an instrument the spouse joined in, or with the spouse's written consent given before, at the same time as, or after the transfer
• property transferred by or from the decedent by any means other than intestate succession or testamentary disposition, where no petition is filed or delivered under Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2317 within nine months of the death

That third item is a deadline hiding inside a definition, and the next section is where it bites.

Nine Months, Six Months, One Year

Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2317(a) sets the filing deadline. The spouse elects by filing a petition for the elective share in the court and mailing or delivering it to the personal representative, within nine months after the date of death or within six months after the probate of the decedent's will, whichever time limitation last expires.

Other clocks decide what the share is measured against, and they do not all run to the same day.

Both of the last two rows are current statutory text, and they name different cutoffs for overlapping property. Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2314(c)(3) is the wider of the two: it drops out everything the person who died transferred to anyone by any means other than intestate succession or testamentary disposition, which reaches a payable-on-death account and a joint tenancy as readily as a lifetime gift, where no petition is filed within nine months of the death. Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2317(a) drops the narrower set described in 30-2314(a)(1) out where the petition is filed later than one year after the death. How those two sentences fit together in a particular estate is a question for a Nebraska attorney, and the gap between the two cutoffs is one more reason that question reaches counsel early rather than late.

The extension carries its own trap. The court may extend the time for election as it sees fit for cause shown by the surviving spouse, and the same sentence requires that showing to be made before the time for election has expired. No relief is written into the section for a spouse who asks after the clock has run.

The rest of the procedure sits in the same statute. Under subsection (b) the spouse gives notice of the time and place set for hearing to persons interested in the estate and to the recipients of portions of the augmented estate whose interests the election would cut into. Under subsection (c) the spouse may withdraw the demand at any time before the court enters a final determination. Under subsection (d) the court determines the amount after notice and hearing and orders payment from the assets of the augmented estate or by contribution, and where property in the augmented estate never reached the personal representative or has already been distributed, the court fixes the liability of whoever holds it. Subsection (e) lets the order be enforced by suit in other courts of this state or other jurisdictions.

Where The Money Comes From

The fraction sets a target figure. Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2319 decides who pays it, and it starts with what the spouse already has.

Subsection (a) applies first: property that is part of the augmented estate and has passed to the surviving spouse by testate or intestate succession or other means, and that the spouse has not renounced, is applied to satisfy the elective share and to reduce the amount due from everyone else. Property on the spouse's own side counted under Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2314 goes into that first application.

Only then does subsection (b) reach the rest. Liability for the balance is equitably apportioned among the recipients of the augmented estate in proportion to the value of their interests. Under subsection (c), only original transferees from or appointees of the decedent, and their donees so far as those donees still hold the property or its proceeds, are subject to contribution. A person liable to contribute may choose between giving up the property and paying its value as of the time it was counted in computing the augmented estate.

One choice sits with the spouse and is easy to miss. Under Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2318(a), electing an elective share does not by itself affect what the spouse takes under the will or by intestate succession. The gifts in the will keep running unless the spouse also expressly renounces them in the petition for an elective share, and anything renounced is then treated, subject to contribution, as though the spouse had died before the person who made the will.

The Right Is Personal And It Dies With The Spouse

Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2315 is short and it decides cases. The right of election may be exercised only during the surviving spouse's lifetime and only by that spouse. A surviving spouse who dies before filing leaves nothing behind for a personal representative to file, because the section opens no route for anyone to elect on a dead spouse's behalf.

The section leaves one route open. Where the spouse is a protected person, the right of election may be exercised by order of the court in which protective proceedings as to that person's property are pending, after the court finds that electing the proposed fraction is in the best interests of the protected person over their probable life expectancy and of the children, family members and other successors. The statute directs the court to weigh the protected person's other assets and resources, any related estate planning the two spouses did together, the financial impact on both estates, and the estate, gift, income, inheritance and succession tax consequences of electing.

The Three Allowances Are On Top, And They Vest At The Death

The amounts are keyed to the date of death rather than the date the estate is opened, and Laws 2026, LB838 rewrote all three bands in sections 16, 17 and 18. The Legislature prints an operative date of July 18, 2026 on each of the three sections, so the table below is the law now rather than a change still waiting to start.

The homestead allowance is cash. Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2322 gives it to the surviving spouse of a decedent domiciled in Nebraska, and where no spouse survives it divides among the minor and dependent children. It is exempt from and has priority over all claims against the estate except costs and expenses of administration, and it is in addition to anything passing to the spouse by will, by intestate succession or by way of elective share.

Exempt property is measured in things, then topped up in money. Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2323(1) entitles the spouse to $12,500 of value in excess of any security interests in household furniture, automobiles, furnishings, appliances and personal effects. Subsection (2) lets the spouse reach other estate assets where the estate does not hold that much of the listed property, and gives those rights priority over all claims except costs and expenses of administration, except claims the Department of Health and Human Services files under Neb. Rev. Stat. 68-919, and except that a make-up claim abates so the homestead allowance and family allowance are paid first.

The family allowance has no figure of its own. Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2324 entitles the surviving spouse, the minor children the decedent was obligated to support and the children who were in fact being supported to a reasonable allowance in money for maintenance during administration, which may not run longer than one year where the estate cannot discharge allowed claims. The dollar amounts live in the next section, and reading either section alone produces a wrong sentence.

Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2325 is precise about whose hands the cap binds. The personal representative may determine the family allowance in a lump sum not exceeding $20,000, or in installments not exceeding $1,666.67 a month for one year. The same sentence then lets the personal representative or any interested person aggrieved by that determination petition the court, and says the court may set a family allowance larger or smaller than the one the personal representative determined or could have determined. So the figure is a ceiling on an administrative decision rather than a ceiling on the award, and it is also not an entitlement to that amount.

The closing paragraph of 30-2325 answers the question families ask most often. The homestead allowance, exempt property and family allowance, once finally determined by the personal representative or the court, vest in the surviving spouse as of the date of the decedent's death as a vested indefeasible right of property, survive as an asset of that spouse's own estate if they are still unpaid when the spouse dies, and do not terminate on the surviving spouse's death or remarriage.

Read the allowances twice, because they appear on both sides of the arithmetic. Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2314(a) subtracts the homestead allowance, family allowances and exemptions before the augmented estate is measured, and 30-2322, 30-2323(3) and 30-2324 each state that the allowance is in addition to any share passing by way of elective share. The allowances shrink the pool the fraction is taken from, and the spouse is paid them anyway.

Where the allowances stand against every other class of claim is set out in the Nebraska order of payment.

Nebraska's Homestead Is Two Different Things

One word covers two statutes with different jobs, and treating them as one figure produces a wrong answer in either direction.

• Neb. Rev. Stat. 40-101 is a creditor exemption during life. Each natural person residing in Nebraska has exempt from judgment liens and from execution or forced sale a homestead not exceeding $120,000 in value, consisting of the dwelling house the claimant lives in, its appurtenances and the land it sits on, up to 160 acres outside an incorporated city or village or, at the claimant's option, up to two contiguous lots inside one. Laws 2024, LB1195, section 10 raised that figure from $60,000, so any source printing $60,000 is stale.
• Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2322 is a cash allowance in a probate estate. It pays the surviving spouse $20,000 and conveys neither the house nor a right to occupy it.

Nebraska once carried a probate homestead that continued to the survivor. Neb. Rev. Stat. 40-117 now reads "Repealed. Laws 1974, LB 354, section 316", and LB 354 is the act that enacted the Nebraska Probate Code. Who ends up owning the house is decided by the will, by the intestate rules or by how the deed was titled, and not by the homestead allowance.

A Spouse Who Married After The Will Was Signed

Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2320 is one of the shortest protections in the code and one of the broadest. Where a testator makes no provision by will for a surviving spouse who married the testator after the will was executed, the omitted spouse receives the same share of the estate the spouse would have received had the decedent left no will, unless that right was waived under Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2316.

Read what the Nebraska version leaves out. No exception is written in for a will made in contemplation of the marriage, none for a will stating on its face that it survives a later marriage, and none for a spouse provided for by transfers outside the will. Several states carry all three. The Nebraska sentence carries one condition, a valid waiver.

Subsection (b) says the gifts in the will abate to fund that share, in the order Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-24,100 sets. What the intestate share itself comes to depends on who else survives, and the Nebraska intestate shares work through the branches, including the $150,000 first-dollar amount Laws 2026, LB838 set and the flat one-half that applies in a blended family.

Divorce, Annulment, And Who Does Not Count As A Spouse

Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2353(a) starts with the plain case. An individual divorced from the decedent, or whose marriage was dissolved or annulled by a decree that has become final, is not a surviving spouse unless the two later remarried each other and were married at the death. A decree of separation that does not terminate the status of husband and wife is not a divorce for this purpose, so a long separation on its own takes nothing away.

Subsection (b) names three more people who are not a surviving spouse for the elective share, the allowances and the appointment priority: someone who obtained or consented to a divorce, annulment or dissolution decree that Nebraska does not treat as valid, unless the couple later went through a marriage ceremony with each other or lived together as husband and wife; someone who went through a marriage ceremony with a third person after an invalid decree the decedent obtained; and someone who was a party to a valid proceeding that ended in an order purporting to terminate all marital property rights against the decedent.

A completed divorce also rewrites the paperwork on its own. Under Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2333(d), unless a governing instrument, a court order or a marital property contract says otherwise, the divorce or annulment revokes any revocable gift, appointment or power of appointment in favor of the former spouse or a relative of the former spouse, revokes a nomination of either of them as personal representative, trustee, conservator, agent or guardian, and severs a joint tenancy with right of survivorship between the former spouses into equal tenancies in common. Under subsection (g) those revoked provisions revive on a remarriage to the former spouse or a nullification of the decree. Subsection (h) then closes the list: no change of circumstances other than the ones this section and Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2354 describe effects a revocation.

Waiving These Rights By Agreement

Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2316(a) lets the right of election and the rights to homestead allowance, exempt property and family allowance be waived, wholly or partly, before or after the marriage, by a written contract, agreement or waiver the surviving spouse signed.

Subsection (b) sets the two grounds for undoing one. A waiver is not enforceable where the surviving spouse proves that the spouse did not execute it voluntarily, or that it was unconscionable when executed and, before signing, the spouse was not provided a fair and reasonable disclosure of the decedent's property or financial obligations, did not voluntarily and expressly waive any right to further disclosure in writing, and did not have and could not reasonably have had adequate knowledge of the decedent's property or financial obligations. Under subsection (c) the court decides unconscionability as a matter of law.

Subsection (d) is the one that surprises people, because it makes general language do everything. Unless the document says otherwise, a waiver of "all rights" or equivalent wording in the property or estate of a present or prospective spouse, and a complete property settlement entered after or in anticipation of separation, divorce or annulment, waives all rights to elective share, homestead allowance, exempt property and family allowance, and renounces every benefit that would otherwise pass by intestate succession or under a will executed before the waiver. Nebraska asks for no separate sentence naming the allowances. The section was last amended by Laws 2018, LB847, section 1.

The Slayer Rule Reaches These Claims

Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2354(a) removes a surviving spouse, heir or devisee who feloniously and intentionally kills the decedent, or aids and abets the killing, from any benefit under the will or under that article of the probate code, and the estate passes as though that person had died first. Subsection (b) severs a joint tenancy or tenancy by the entirety so the decedent's share passes as the decedent's own property with no survivorship, and subsection (c) does the same for a life insurance or other contractual beneficiary designation.

The proof standard is worth knowing because it does not wait on the prosecution. Under subsection (f), a final judgment of conviction is conclusive, and where there is no conviction the court may determine by a preponderance of the evidence whether the killing, or the aiding and abetting, was felonious and intentional.

Who The Court Appoints

Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2412(a) ranks the candidates for personal representative, and a surviving spouse appears twice. The order runs: the person with priority under a probated will, including a person nominated by a power the will confers; the surviving spouse where the spouse is a devisee; other devisees; the surviving spouse; other heirs; and, forty-five days after the death, any creditor.

Two mechanics ride along, and the first is narrower than it looks. Subsection (c) gives the power to nominate a qualified person to serve instead only to the people ranked second through fifth on that list, and to a person aged eighteen or over who would be entitled to letters but for their age. It does not extend to the person the will designates or to a creditor. Where two or more people share a priority, those who do not renounce have to agree on a nominee or apply together. Nobody under the age of nineteen is qualified to serve. What the appointed person then has to do is covered in the Nebraska executor's duties.

The Spouse Pays No Nebraska Inheritance Tax

Nebraska's inheritance tax is collected by the county rather than the state, and it does not touch a surviving spouse. Neb. Rev. Stat. 77-2004(3) says interests passing to the surviving spouse by will or in any other manner are not subject to tax, and the same subsection exempts the homestead allowance, exempt property and the family maintenance allowance. There is no rate and no threshold to compute on the spouse's own share. Where the rest of a family lands is set out in the Nebraska inheritance tax.

Income tax is a separate question from who takes the property, and it turns on what an asset was worth at the death rather than what was paid for it. Step-up in basis in Nebraska works through that.

Where These Rights Surface In A Nebraska Estate

Each item below states what the statutes provide. None of it is a recommendation about a particular estate.

• Nothing arrives automatically. The elective share is a petition under Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2317, and the allowances are selected and determined under Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2325. A spouse who files nothing and selects nothing receives what the will or the intestate rules give.
• The nine months run from the death, not from the appointment. Where there is no will, that is the whole of the filing window, and nothing about opening the estate late restarts it. Where a will is admitted, the six-month clock in Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2317(a) can push the deadline past the nine months, and the augmented-estate cutoffs still run from the death.
• Much of a Nebraska estate never passes under the will. Joint tenancy, payable-on-death registrations, beneficiary designations and a recorded transfer-on-death deed all move outside probate, and Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2314 is the section that counts several of them anyway.
• The allowance figures step up on January 1, 2027. They are keyed to the date of death, so two deaths a week apart across that line produce different numbers on the same facts.
• Creditors and the election run on separate schedules. The two-month claim window and the closing rules are laid out in Nebraska creditor claims and the Nebraska probate timeline.

When To Talk To A Nebraska Lawyer

A licensed Nebraska attorney earns the fee where:

• the person who died made large gifts, funded a trust or changed beneficiary designations in the three years before the death, which is what Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2314(a)(1) reaches
• the nine-month and one-year cutoffs in 30-2314(c)(3) and 30-2317(a) both bear on the same property
• the couple signed a prenuptial or postnuptial agreement, or a property settlement during a separation
• the surviving spouse is a protected person, so the election runs through a court order under Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2315
• the marriage came after the will was signed and Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2320 is in play
• a blended family sets children of an earlier marriage against the surviving spouse
• the person who died was domiciled outside Nebraska but owned Nebraska land
• the estate is large enough that electing a fraction smaller than one-half changes the outcome for the children

This page organizes the statutes and the questions worth asking. Confirm anything that decides a particular estate with the county court handling it or with a licensed Nebraska attorney.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can a Nebraska will disinherit a surviving spouse?

Not on its own. Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2313(a) gives the surviving spouse of a person who died domiciled in Nebraska a right of election to take any fraction up to one-half of the augmented estate, whatever the will says. The right has to be exercised. Under Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2317(a) the spouse files a petition for the elective share in the county court and mails or delivers it to the personal representative, and a spouse who files nothing takes only what the will gives. The homestead allowance, exempt property and family allowance are separate, and they are paid whether or not the spouse elects.

How much is the Nebraska elective share?

Any fraction the spouse designates, up to one-half of the augmented estate, under Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2313(a). Where the petition designates no fraction, Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2317(a) makes it one-half. Nebraska has no schedule that raises the percentage with the length of the marriage, so a spouse of eleven months and a spouse of forty years face the same ceiling. A table showing 3 percent after one year is describing a state that adopted the 1990 revision of the Uniform Probate Code, not Nebraska.

What is the Nebraska augmented estate?

Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2314 first reduces the estate by funeral and administration expenses, the homestead allowance, family allowances and exemptions, and enforceable claims. It then adds two pools: lifetime transfers the person who died made during the marriage to anyone other than a bona fide purchaser or the spouse, where the decedent kept possession, income, a power to revoke or survivorship rights, or made gifts over $3,000 to any one donee within three years of death; and property on the surviving spouse's own side that came from the decedent. The elective share is never a fraction of the probate estate alone.

What is the deadline to claim the Nebraska elective share?

Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2317(a) sets it at nine months after the date of death, or six months after the probate of the will, whichever time limitation last expires. The court may extend the time for cause shown, and the statute requires the spouse to ask before the time for election has expired. Two further cutoffs decide what the share is measured against. Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2314(c)(3) drops out of the augmented estate everything the decedent transferred by any means other than intestate succession or testamentary disposition, where no petition is filed within nine months of the death, and Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2317(a) drops the narrower subsection (a)(1) transfers out where the petition comes later than one year after the death.

What is the Nebraska homestead allowance?

Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2322 gives the surviving spouse of a person domiciled in Nebraska a homestead allowance of $20,000 for a death on or after January 1, 2011 and before January 1, 2027, rising to $25,000 for a death on or after January 1, 2027. It is exempt from and has priority over all claims against the estate except costs and expenses of administration, and it is in addition to anything passing to the spouse by will, by intestate succession or by way of elective share. It is a cash entitlement, not a right to occupy the house.

Does a Nebraska surviving spouse get the allowances without electing?

Yes. Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2318(b) says a surviving spouse is entitled to homestead allowance, exempt property and family allowance whether or not the spouse elects to take an elective share. The three amounts are separate requests with their own statutes: $20,000 under Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2322, $12,500 in household goods and personal effects under Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2323, and a reasonable maintenance allowance under Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2324. All three figures step up for deaths on or after January 1, 2027.

Can a prenuptial agreement waive Nebraska spousal rights?

Yes, wholly or partly, before or after the marriage. Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2316(a) lets the right of election and the rights to homestead allowance, exempt property and family allowance be waived by a written contract, agreement or waiver the surviving spouse signed. Subsection (b) makes a waiver unenforceable where the spouse proves it was not executed voluntarily, or that it was unconscionable when executed and the spouse got no fair and reasonable disclosure of the decedent's property and financial obligations, never waived that disclosure in writing, and had no adequate knowledge of it. Subsection (d) treats a waiver of all rights, or a complete property settlement made after or in anticipation of separation or divorce, as a waiver of all four rights.

Sources:

• Title: Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2313, Right to elective share; validity of certain conveyances. Publisher: Nebraska Legislature. Publication Date: Accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://nebraskalegislature.gov/laws/statutes.php?statute=30-2313
• Title: Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2314, Augmented estate. Publisher: Nebraska Legislature. Publication Date: Accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://nebraskalegislature.gov/laws/statutes.php?statute=30-2314
• Title: Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2315, Right of election personal to surviving spouse. Publisher: Nebraska Legislature. Publication Date: Accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://nebraskalegislature.gov/laws/statutes.php?statute=30-2315
• Title: Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2316, Waiver of right to elect and of other rights; enforceability. Publisher: Nebraska Legislature. Publication Date: Accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://nebraskalegislature.gov/laws/statutes.php?statute=30-2316
• Title: Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2317, Proceeding for elective share; time limit. Publisher: Nebraska Legislature. Publication Date: Accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://nebraskalegislature.gov/laws/statutes.php?statute=30-2317
• Title: Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2318, Effect of election benefits by will or statute. Publisher: Nebraska Legislature. Publication Date: Accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://nebraskalegislature.gov/laws/statutes.php?statute=30-2318
• Title: Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2319, Charging spouse with gifts received; liability of others for balance of elective share. Publisher: Nebraska Legislature. Publication Date: Accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://nebraskalegislature.gov/laws/statutes.php?statute=30-2319
• Title: Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2320, Omitted spouse. Publisher: Nebraska Legislature. Publication Date: Accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://nebraskalegislature.gov/laws/statutes.php?statute=30-2320
• Title: Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2322, Homestead allowance. Publisher: Nebraska Legislature. Publication Date: Accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://nebraskalegislature.gov/laws/statutes.php?statute=30-2322
• Title: Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2323, Exempt property. Publisher: Nebraska Legislature. Publication Date: Accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://nebraskalegislature.gov/laws/statutes.php?statute=30-2323
• Title: Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2324, Family allowance. Publisher: Nebraska Legislature. Publication Date: Accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://nebraskalegislature.gov/laws/statutes.php?statute=30-2324
• Title: Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2325, Source, determination, and documentation. Publisher: Nebraska Legislature. Publication Date: Accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://nebraskalegislature.gov/laws/statutes.php?statute=30-2325
• Title: Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2302, Share of the spouse. Publisher: Nebraska Legislature. Publication Date: Accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://nebraskalegislature.gov/laws/statutes.php?statute=30-2302
• Title: Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2333, Revocation by divorce or annulment; no revocation by other changes of circumstances. Publisher: Nebraska Legislature. Publication Date: Accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://nebraskalegislature.gov/laws/statutes.php?statute=30-2333
• Title: Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2353, Effect of divorce, annulment, and decree of separation. Publisher: Nebraska Legislature. Publication Date: Accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://nebraskalegislature.gov/laws/statutes.php?statute=30-2353
• Title: Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2354, Effect of homicide on intestate succession, wills, joint assets, life insurance, and beneficiary designations. Publisher: Nebraska Legislature. Publication Date: Accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://nebraskalegislature.gov/laws/statutes.php?statute=30-2354
• Title: Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-2412, Priority among persons seeking appointment as personal representative. Publisher: Nebraska Legislature. Publication Date: Accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://nebraskalegislature.gov/laws/statutes.php?statute=30-2412
• Title: Neb. Rev. Stat. 30-24,100, Distribution; order in which assets appropriated; abatement. Publisher: Nebraska Legislature. Publication Date: Accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://nebraskalegislature.gov/laws/statutes.php?statute=30-24,100
• Title: Neb. Rev. Stat. 40-101, Homestead; exemption from judgment liens and execution or forced sale. Publisher: Nebraska Legislature. Publication Date: Accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://nebraskalegislature.gov/laws/statutes.php?statute=40-101
• Title: Neb. Rev. Stat. 40-117, Repealed. Laws 1974, LB 354, section 316. Publisher: Nebraska Legislature. Publication Date: Accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://nebraskalegislature.gov/laws/statutes.php?statute=40-117
• Title: LB1195 (2024), Final Reading, section 10, amending section 40-101. Publisher: Nebraska Legislature. Publication Date: One Hundred Eighth Legislature; accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://nebraskalegislature.gov/FloorDocs/108/PDF/Final/LB1195.pdf
• Title: Neb. Rev. Stat. 76-901, Tax on grantor; rate. Publisher: Nebraska Legislature. Publication Date: Accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://nebraskalegislature.gov/laws/statutes.php?statute=76-901
• Title: Neb. Rev. Stat. 77-2004, Inheritance tax; rate; person subject to tax; enumerated; transfer to immediate relatives; exemption; applicability. Publisher: Nebraska Legislature. Publication Date: Accessed 2026-09-10. URL: https://nebraskalegislature.gov/laws/statutes.php?statute=77-2004

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