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Probate Kits for Victoria Australia  The kit that could save you thousands For only $88 plus postage (June 2008 update: increase in probate application lodging fee)

The Probate Kit shows how the Executor of a Will applies for Probate and winds up a deceased estate - with no lawyer.

If there is no Will, you can usually add a supplement to the Probate Kit to show how to apply for "Letters of Administration" instead. (Further details below).

Did you think Probate was a deep legal mystery that always involves lawyers and takes forever to finalise? 

It is not.

Applying for Probate is something you can do yourself, and by doing it yourself:

• You save perhaps thousands in lawyer fees
• You get Probate in as little as 3 weeks (much faster than lawyers normally get it)
• You keep personal control over your inheritance. (This can be hugely important - some lawyers hold on to their clients' inheritance for 6 months or more "in case someone challenges the Will", and this can cost you a fortune in lost interest).

The trick in applying for probate is merely finding out what to do - and the answer to that is the "self-help" Probate Kit from LEGAL KITS OF VICTORIA.

What is Probate?

A "probate" is just a certificate issued by the Probate Office to: recognise you as the executor named in the Will, and in effect  authorise you to transfer ownership of the assets left behind.

To get probate you just apply to the Probate Office.

The application has to be done right, but that's no problem because our DIY Probate Kit shows you how. It includes explanations, forms, and a set of sample documents. Simple!

NOT EVERYONE NEEDS PROBATE
If all your assets are owned jointly with another person for example, they are still owned by that person when you die, so there is usually no need for Probate.

What Probate Costs

There are two unavoidable costs in applying for Probate:

• A newspaper advertising fee (which averages about $170), and
• A lodging fee at the Probate Office - see lodging fee.

Apart from those two unavoidable costs, what Probate costs you depends on how you do it, and you have three options:

• Do it yourself
• Pay a solicitor, or
• Pay a trustee company.

OPTION 1: Do it Yourself

Our Probate Kit shows you how to apply for probate yourself, so that:

• you pay no lawyer fees
• you get Probate in the shortest time, and
• your inheritance stays under your personal control the whole time, and you might get access to it much more quickly. 

The Kit costs $88, which saves you about 90% of what solicitors typically charge. 

"In Person" lodging (that is - DIY)

When you apply for Probate yourself you have to lodge the application "in person" at the Probate Office in Melbourne. (If you want the reasons for this you can get to them at the bottom of this page).

The alternative to "in person" lodging is to get a solicitor to lodge the application for you. This costs less than getting a solicitor to handle the whole thing for you, so applicants living interstate might find it the economical way to go.

OPTION 2: Pay a Solicitor

Lawyers (solicitors) have two fees:

• Fee 1 is just to apply for Probate. Price fixing operates, and the price rises with the value of the estate. For example, it is $680 for a $100,000 estate (even though most of the work is digging out details about assets, which the family still has to do anyway)
• Fee 2 is to arrange to get assets released and then distribute them to beneficiaries. This fee is based on each "item" of work, and varies widely, but is often thousands of dollars.

If the lawyer is also an executor, they might also be entitled to "executor's commission" of 3% to 5% of the estate. 

Hidden Costs

There might be another cost in getting a lawyer to apply for probate, although it is hidden from view - it is the cost of losing the interest on your inheritance for perhaps 6 months or more. (If you want further information about this you can click here and then return to this point).

OPTION 3: Pay a Trustee Company

Employing trustee companies is a great way to reduce how much of your inheritance ends up in your pocket, because trustee company fees are typically 5% of the value of the estate - a lot of money. Plus GST. Plus expenses.

A quick calculation says it all: 5.5% of a $500,000 estate is $27,500 - for something you can easily do yourself.

You need a really compelling reason to choose a trustee company (including State Trustees) as a method of getting probate.

Lowest Cost = Highest Quality

By applying for Probate yourself you don't only eliminate most of the cost involved in applying for probate. 

You also avoid the risks of dealing with lawyers. And let's face it - you don't need a "guarantee fund" because you know you are not going to cheat yourself. 

Guarantee funds (or fidelity funds, or professional indemnity policies) are a sure sign that you are dealing with a class of people whose members include some with a history of cheating or failing clients.

What if?

If you get an estimate from a lawyer, they might hit you with some "what if's" that are intended to frighten you into employing them:

• "What if your application is rejected?"
• "What if you make a mistake?"

Once you have handled your own probate application you will know that these "what ifs" mean nothing, because:

• Reason 1. Rejecting applications is not the Probate Office's purpose in life. Its purpose is to accept them, and if an application is not immediately acceptable it asks the applicant to provide further information to make it acceptable. It is almost unheard of for an application to be "rejected" outright, and if it is, the usual reason is that the Will has some serious fault that makes it impossible for a reasonable person to accept that it represents the last wishes of the Willmaker. An army of lawyers could not change that.
   
• Reason 2. It is our goal that all our Probate Kit users get their application accepted first time, and we put a lot of time and effort into achieving that goal. Letting you choose a "sample application" based on your own situation is a big help, and the the "first time success rate" of Probate Kit users is very high. Occasionally Kit users are asked to provide further information but that does not mean that their application has failed - it merely means they have to provide some more details on their road to success.
   

What if there is no Will?
("Letters of Administration")

You have probably heard people say that if someone dies without leaving a Will, "everything goes to the State". Right? 

WRONG!

It is true that no-one can get Probate if there is no Will, but assets still go to the next of kin - not "The State". There is an order in which the next-of-kin can inherit 

• A spouse has the first right, and if there is no spouse
• then children, and if there are no children
• then parents, and if there are none of them
• then brothers and sisters, etc.

The next-of-kin have a right to apply (in the same order) for a certificate called "Letters of Administration" (instead of probate).

The Letters of Administration certificate looks almost the same as a Probate certificate, and the application process is also the same. You use it the same way too.

Assets go to the next-of-kin according to a formula set by legislation, and the formula can cause problems because the spouse is entitled to the first $100,000 plus 1/3 of the rest. After that the balance goes to any children of the marriage. 

That $100,000 plus 1/3 limit shows how badly out of touch the Victorian Government is - it does not even ensure that your spouse can keep the marital home. The spouse gets the option of buying the home, but  they could find it impossible to raise the finance to do so, and even if they could, their lifestyle might be destroyed by the cost of servicing the loan. The Victorian situation shows what can happen when legislation fails to keep up with property values. (The obvious conclusion is "JUST DO IT - MAKE A WILL").

If you need to get Letters of Administration because there is no Will you start off by getting our Probate Kit, and then order a Letters of Administration supplement using an order form in the Kit itself. The order form includes a number of questions to help you choose the right Letters supplement. The supplement goes into some detail about Letters applications and replaces the probate forms with "letters" forms.

We do not sell Letters supplements without the Probate Kit.

A Will but no Executor?

If you have a Will but there are no surviving executors, someone has to take the place of the executor - that is usually a beneficiary under the Will, and if there are none of them then the next of kin. They apply for a special type of certificate ("grant") called Letters of Administration "with the Will annexed" (often called Letters "CTA"). Such applications are not common, so we do not have supplements for them, so do not buy the Probate Kit for this purpose.

Probate Questions & Answers

There is further information about probate in Victoria (Australia) on our Probate Questions & Answers page.

Please note however that this website is not a legal advice site, and does not respond to specific questions about the the rights and obligations of executors, beneficiaries, estranged spouses etc. We ask you not to email questions about such things.

Restrictions on who may lodge an application for Probate

You can view the restrictions by clicking here.

17 November 2008