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Utah Transfer on Death Deed
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Utah Transfer on Death Deed

Utah's transfer on death deed passes real property at death under Title 75, Chapter 6, Part 4. Record it before you die, or the deed does nothing at all.

By Settled Editorial

A Utah transfer on death deed names the person who receives your real property when you die, and it works only if you record it with the county recorder before your death. Utah Code 75-6-409 sets three requirements, and the recording one is where most deeds fail. Miss it and the property goes through probate.

Utah adopted the Uniform Real Property Transfer on Death Act in 2018. The rules sit in the Utah Uniform Probate Code at Title 75, Chapter 6, Part 4, sections 75-6-401 through 75-6-419, enacted by Chapter 26 of the 2018 General Session. Section 75-6-403 reaches back: the part governs a deed made before, on, or after May 8, 2018, so long as the transferor dies on or after May 8, 2018.

This guide walks the deed from drafting to the affidavit your beneficiary records after your death, and it names the four Utah rules that decide real cases. Most pages ranking for this topic stop at sign, notarize, record.

What A Utah Transfer On Death Deed Does

Section 75-6-405(1) lets an individual transfer property to one or more named beneficiaries, effective at the transferor's death, by a transfer on death deed. Three definitions in 75-6-402 set the boundaries:

  • Property means an interest in real property located in Utah that is transferable on the death of the owner (75-6-402(8)). A Utah deed reaches Utah land. A cabin in Idaho needs an Idaho instrument.
  • Transferor means an individual acting in an individual capacity (75-6-402(10)). A trust or an LLC cannot sign one.
  • Beneficiary means a person who receives property under the deed (75-6-402(1)), and "person" covers an entity as well as a human being (75-6-402(7)).

Three short sections settle the character of the document. It is nontestamentary (75-6-407), so it passes outside your will and outside probate. It stays revocable even if the deed or another instrument says otherwise (75-6-406). And the capacity required to make or revoke one is the same capacity required to make a will (75-6-408).

Here is the rule the deed vendors leave out. Section 75-6-405(2) says a class gift may not be made by a transfer on death deed, and 75-6-402(2) defines a class gift as a transfer to a group of persons classified by their relationship to one another or the transferor who are not individually named in the transferring document. "To my children" is a class gift. "To Sarah Bennett and Marcus Bennett" is not. Write out every name.

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The Three Requirements In Section 75-6-409

Section 75-6-409 says a transfer on death deed shall:

  1. "contain the essential elements and formalities of a properly recordable inter vivos deed"
  2. "state that the transfer to the designated beneficiary is to occur at the transferor's death"
  3. "be recorded before the transferor's death in the public records in the county recorder's office of the county where the property is located"

Requirement one points outside Title 75. Utah Code 57-3-105 governs what a county recorder may accept, and it is strict. A document that does not conform may not even be presented for recording (57-3-105(1)). A document conveying title to real property presented after July 1, 2022 is recordable only if it names the grantees, recites a mailing address to be used for assessment and taxation, and carries a legal description in one of the forms listed in 57-3-105(4): metes and bounds, a government survey referencing the Public Land Survey System, a mining claim, or a lot, block, tract, parcel, or unit within a previously recorded plat. The address on your property tax notice is not a legal description.

Requirement three is the one that voids deeds. Recording happens in the county where the property sits, and it happens while you are alive.

You do not have to tell the beneficiary. Section 75-6-410 makes the deed effective without notice, delivery, or acceptance by the designated beneficiary during the transferor's life, and without consideration.

What The Deed Does Not Do While You Are Alive

Section 75-6-412 lists six things a recorded transfer on death deed does not do during the transferor's life:

  • affect an interest or right of the transferor or any other owner, including the right to transfer or encumber the property
  • affect an interest or right of a transferee, even if that transferee has actual or constructive notice of the deed
  • affect an interest or right of the transferor's secured or unsecured creditors or future creditors, even with notice
  • affect the transferor's or the designated beneficiary's eligibility for any form of public assistance
  • create a legal or equitable interest in favor of the designated beneficiary
  • subject the property to claims or process of the designated beneficiary's creditors

Read the first and last together. You can sell the house, refinance it, or rent it out without asking the beneficiary, and a lawsuit or a divorce on the beneficiary's side cannot touch it. Read the fourth carefully: it answers a question about eligibility while you are alive. Medicaid estate recovery after death is a separate question, covered below.

Revoking A Utah Transfer On Death Deed

Section 75-6-411 allows revocation by instrument and forbids revocation by act. Three instruments work under 75-6-411(1)(a): a later transfer on death deed that revokes the earlier one expressly or by inconsistency, an instrument of revocation that expressly revokes it, or an inter vivos deed that revokes it expressly or by inconsistency.

Whichever you choose, 75-6-411(1)(b) adds two conditions. The instrument must be acknowledged by the transferor after the acknowledgment of the deed being revoked, and it must be recorded where the deed is recorded, before the transferor's death.

Then comes the trap. Section 75-6-411(3) says that after a transfer on death deed is recorded it may not be revoked by a revocatory act on the deed. Shredding your copy, burning it, or writing VOID across it accomplishes nothing, because the county's copy is the one that governs. A will cannot undo it either, since the deed is nontestamentary under 75-6-407.

Two more subsections matter to co-owners. Under 75-6-411(2), revocation by one transferor does not affect the deed as to another transferor's interest, and a deed of joint owners is revoked only if all of the living joint owners revoke it. Under 75-6-411(4), nothing in the section limits the effect of an inter vivos transfer, so selling the property still ends the arrangement.

What Happens At Your Death

Section 75-6-413 governs the transfer. Its rules apply except as otherwise provided in the deed itself and in five sections of Chapter 2: 75-2-205 (the augmented estate for a spouse's elective share), 75-2-702 (the 120-hour survival rule), 75-2-803 (homicide), 75-2-804 (revocation by divorce), and 75-2-807 (a disqualifying felony offense). A Utah transfer on death deed is not sealed off from a spouse's election, a divorce, or the slayer rule.

Survival is a condition. Section 75-6-413(1)(b) makes the beneficiary's interest contingent on surviving the transferor, and it sets aside Section 75-2-706, the substitute gift rule that normally passes a lapsed beneficiary designation to the deceased beneficiary's descendants. The interest simply lapses. Section 75-2-702 adds that a person who is not established by clear and convincing evidence to have survived by 120 hours is treated as having predeceased. Name an alternate beneficiary in the deed.

Two or more beneficiaries take without survivorship. Section 75-6-413(1)(c) transfers concurrent interests in equal and undivided shares with no right of survivorship, unless the deed says otherwise. If one of those shares lapses or fails, 75-6-413(1)(d) moves it to the others in proportion to their remaining interests.

The mortgage travels with the house. Section 75-6-413(2) gives the beneficiary the property subject to all conveyances, encumbrances, assignments, contracts, mortgages, liens, and other interests to which it is subject at the transferor's death, and the recording of the deed counts as having occurred at the transferor's death for recording-priority purposes. Section 75-6-413(4) adds that the transfer carries no covenant or warranty of title, even if the deed contains a contrary provision.

Joint ownership outranks the deed. Under 75-6-413(3), where the transferor is a joint owner survived by one or more other joint owners, the property belongs to those surviving joint owners with right of survivorship. The deed takes effect only where the transferor was the last surviving joint owner. A transfer on death deed signed by one spouse over jointly held property sits behind the survivorship rule and fires only after every co-owner is gone.

A beneficiary who does not want the property may disclaim all or part of the interest under 75-6-414.

The Affidavit Your Beneficiary Records

Recording the deed is your job. Recording the affidavit is the beneficiary's.

Section 75-6-413(5) says that following the death of the transferor, an affidavit in substantially the form found in Section 57-1-5.1 shall be recorded in the office of the recorder of the county where the property sits. Each affidavit shall contain a legal description of the affected real property, reference the entry number and the book and page of the previously recorded transfer on death deed, and attach as an exhibit a copy of the death certificate or another document issued by a governmental agency as described in Section 75-1-107 certifying the transferor's death. Section 75-1-107(1)(b) treats a certified or authenticated copy of a death certificate as prima facie evidence of the fact, place, date, and time of death.

Tell the person you named where the deed is recorded, with the entry number. Two of the three items on that list come off the recorded deed, and hunting for them later costs your beneficiary a trip to the recorder's office.

What Recording Costs

Utah Code 17-71-407(3)(a) sets the county recorder's charge at $40 for recording an instrument not otherwise provided for. Under 17-71-407(3)(b), a county of the second through sixth class charges an additional $5, unless that county holds a balance in the restricted account into which recording fees are deposited. That exception is real, so some Utah counties publish $40 and others publish $45. Ask your recorder for the county's own figure rather than working it out from county size.

Two related points. Section 17-71-407(6) bars a recorder from charging more than one recording fee for each instrument, no matter how many descriptive titles or attachments it carries. And Title 59, the state's revenue and taxation title, carries no real estate transfer tax or documentary stamp tax chapter, so the recording fee is the whole state cost of putting the deed on record.

Where The House Can Still Be Reached

A transfer on death deed skips probate for that property. It does not put the property beyond every claim.

The estate has 12 months

Section 75-6-415(1) says that to the extent the transferor's probate estate is insufficient to satisfy an allowed claim against the estate or a statutory allowance to a surviving spouse or child, only the estate may enforce that liability against property transferred by a transfer on death deed. The word "only" carries weight: an individual creditor cannot sue your beneficiary. The claim runs through the personal representative.

Section 75-6-415(2) apportions the liability among several transfer on death properties in proportion to their net values at death. Section 75-6-415(3) requires the probate proceeding to be commenced not later than 12 months after the transferor's death, which is a deadline that sits outside the ordinary probate calendar. Section 75-6-415(4) lets the estate expressly waive its claim against the property. See Utah probate deadlines for how that 12-month window lines up with the rest of the estate's dates, and Utah creditor claims for how a claim becomes an allowed claim in the first place.

Medicaid estate recovery reaches further than probate

Utah Code 26B-3-1001(12) defines the "recovery estate" the state may pursue as three things: the decedent's estate as defined in Section 75-1-201, the augmented estate as defined in Section 75-2-203, and "that part of other real or personal property in which the decedent had a legal interest at the time of death including assets conveyed to a survivor, heir, or assign of the decedent through joint tenancy, tenancy in common, survivorship, life estate, living trust, or other arrangement."

That third clause is written to reach past probate, and it ends with "or other arrangement." A transfer on death deed leaves the transferor holding full legal ownership until the moment of death, since 75-6-412(5) gives the designated beneficiary no legal or equitable interest before then. Utah's Office of Recovery Services administers the program. If long-term care Medicaid is on the horizon, ask a Utah attorney how recovery would treat the specific property before you rely on the deed.

The Optional Statutory Forms

Sections 75-6-416 and 75-6-417 print two optional forms, both repealed and re-enacted by Chapter 390 of the 2024 General Session and effective May 1, 2024. Section 75-6-416 gives a "REVOCABLE TRANSFER ON DEATH DEED" and 75-6-417 gives a "FULL REVOCATION OF TRANSFER ON DEATH DEED."

Both forms open with a notice to the owner. The deed form's notice reads, in part, "This form must be recorded before your death or it will not be effective. The beneficiary must be a named person." The revocation form's notice reads, "This revocation must be recorded before you die or it will not be effective. This revocation is effective only as to the interests in the property of owners who sign this revocation."

Both forms ask for the owner's printed name and mailing address, the legal description under Section 57-3-105, and the property's tax identification number, and both direct that an affidavit of acknowledgment under Section 46-1-6.5 be attached. The deed form adds fields the revocation form has no use for: the beneficiary's printed name and mailing address, plus an optional alternate beneficiary who takes if the first one does not survive you. Subsection (2) of each section says the other sections of the part govern the effect of the form or of any other instrument used for the same job.

Using the statutory form is optional. Section 75-6-404 says the part does not affect any method of transferring property otherwise permitted under Utah law, and a deed drafted by a Utah attorney that satisfies 75-6-409 works just as well.

When A Transfer On Death Deed Is The Wrong Tool

The deed answers one question well: who gets this one piece of Utah real estate. Several situations point elsewhere.

  • You want to name a group. Section 75-6-405(2) forbids class gifts, so "my children equally" needs individual names or a different instrument.
  • You own the property jointly. Section 75-6-413(3) puts survivorship first, so the deed fires only if you outlive your co-owners.
  • The beneficiary receives needs-based benefits. An outright transfer of real estate can disturb eligibility, and 75-6-412(4) speaks only to eligibility while you are alive.
  • The beneficiary is a minor. A minor cannot manage or sell real property, and the deed contains no trust machinery.
  • The house carries debt the beneficiary cannot service. Section 75-6-413(2) hands over the mortgage along with the keys.
  • The estate has other assets that need probate anyway. Where a case is opening regardless, the deed saves less than it looks. Start at the Utah probate guide or the Utah small estate affidavit.

For the rest of the plan, including payable on death accounts, joint tenancy, and living trusts, read how to avoid probate in Utah. A deed also decides nothing about your other property, so pair it with a valid will under Utah will requirements. If you are the beneficiary and the house is already yours, selling inherited property in Utah covers the next step. A surviving spouse or minor child should also read Utah family allowance, because those allowances are exactly what 75-6-415 lets the estate collect from the property.

Frequently Asked Questions

Does Utah have a transfer on death deed?

Yes. Utah adopted the Uniform Real Property Transfer on Death Act as Title 75, Chapter 6, Part 4, sections 75-6-401 through 75-6-419, enacted by Chapter 26 of the 2018 General Session. Section 75-6-405(1) lets an individual transfer real property to one or more named beneficiaries effective at the transferor's death. Section 75-6-403 applies the part to a deed made before, on, or after May 8, 2018 by a transferor who dies on or after May 8, 2018.

Does a Utah transfer on death deed have to be recorded before death?

Yes, and this is the requirement people miss. Utah Code 75-6-409(3) says the deed must be recorded before the transferor's death in the public records in the county recorder's office of the county where the property is located. A signed deed sitting in a drawer transfers nothing. The statutory form at 75-6-416 prints the same warning in its notice to the owner: this form must be recorded before your death or it will not be effective.

Can a Utah transfer on death deed name a group like my children?

No. Utah Code 75-6-405(2) says a class gift may not be made by a transfer on death deed, and 75-6-402(2) defines a class gift as a transfer to a group of persons classified by their relationship to one another or the transferor who are not individually named in the transferring document. Name each person. The notice on the statutory form at 75-6-416 puts it in four words: the beneficiary must be a named person.

How do you revoke a Utah transfer on death deed?

By recording another instrument. Utah Code 75-6-411(1)(a) accepts a later transfer on death deed, an instrument of revocation, or an inter vivos deed that revokes the earlier deed expressly or by inconsistency. Under 75-6-411(1)(b) the new instrument must be acknowledged by the transferor after the acknowledgment of the deed being revoked and recorded where that deed is recorded, before the transferor's death. Section 75-6-411(3) says that once a deed is recorded it may not be revoked by a revocatory act on the deed, so tearing up the copy in your file changes nothing. Section 75-6-417 prints an optional revocation form.

What happens if a Utah TOD deed beneficiary dies first?

The gift lapses. Utah Code 75-6-413(1)(b) makes the beneficiary's interest contingent on surviving the transferor and sets aside Section 75-2-706, the substitute gift rule that would otherwise pass a lapsed beneficiary designation to that person's descendants. The deceased beneficiary's children take nothing through the deed. Where the deed named two or more beneficiaries to take concurrent interests, 75-6-413(1)(d) moves the lapsed share to the others in proportion. Where a sole beneficiary lapses, the property returns to the estate and goes through probate.

Can Utah creditors reach a house that passed by a transfer on death deed?

Yes, within a 12-month window, and only through the estate. Utah Code 75-6-415(1) says that where the transferor's probate estate cannot satisfy an allowed claim or a statutory allowance to a surviving spouse or child, only the estate may enforce that liability against transfer on death property. Section 75-6-415(2) apportions the liability among several properties by their net values at death, 75-6-415(3) requires the probate proceeding to start no later than 12 months after the transferor's death, and 75-6-415(4) lets the estate expressly waive the claim.

What does it cost to record a transfer on death deed in Utah?

The county recorder charges $40 for recording an instrument not otherwise provided for under Utah Code 17-71-407(3)(a). Under 17-71-407(3)(b) a county of the second through sixth class charges $5 more, unless that county holds a balance in the restricted account into which recording fees are deposited, so some counties publish $40 and others publish $45. Section 17-71-407(6) bars the recorder from charging more than one recording fee per instrument no matter how many titles or attachments it carries. Ask your county recorder for the published figure rather than working it out from county size.

This guide is general information about Utah real property and estates. Confirm anything that affects a particular parcel with the county recorder where it sits, the district court handling the estate, or a licensed Utah attorney before you sign or record.

Sources:

It is not legal advice.

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Settled Estate is not a law firm and does not give legal advice.

Information current as of August 28, 2026

Settled Estate is not a law firm, and this content is for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. Probate laws and procedures in Utah can change. Consult with a qualified attorney for advice specific to your situation. Full disclaimer.

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